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thickets, the sawgrass, the dunes.   He maims and kills and leaves his prey unburied.   He takes their eyes and throws them into the fire. He takes their eyes and uses them in his dreams. He makes me bear witness.

9.
     
    O n Linda's porch I stand fast while her father works my midsection.   Like her, he's got a lot of muscle to him.   He hooks me twice more to the ribs while screaming what a filthy animal I am.   I swallow my laughter.    He should only know what his daughter is capable of.   He should only see her in action.
    Linda's eyes meet mine.   She's having a hard time hiding her smile too.   And her fear.   The amusement plays there in her face.   The terror rises and fades from one moment to the next.   She loves me genuinely now.   She loves me now because she knows Ricky is no longer the only boy who knows how to talk to demons.
    Her old man says he's calling the cops.   He says he's going to kill me.   Her mother lets out a wail from the other side of the screen door, like a trapped animal seconds away from gnawing off its own trapped paw.  
    Despite his brawn he's not doing much damage.   I resist striking him back.   My father's done a lot worse to me.   I know how to deflect and dodge and buckle just right.   It keeps everyone happy.   He's not hurting me and I have no need to kill him.   Unlike the cop, whose rage can never be spent, Linda's father is already wearing himself out.   I can take this in my sleep.   I do take this in my sleep.
    I understand his fury.   Linda's covered in bruises, welts, bandages, butterfly Band-Aids and gauze.   Some of it's my fault.   Most of it is Gwen's.   All of it was at Linda's own request and passionate need.   No matter how bad she looks, Gwen is bound to look much worse.
    He backhands me and I taste blood.   The heady stink of it ruins what's left of my patience.   What would daddy say if he knew his little girl got off fifteen times thanks to our minor agonies?   I spit and my laughter comes out with the blood.   He rushes in to try to pummel my belly again but I've had it.   In one fluid motion I'm on him and he's down next to the barbeque grill, and I'm making sounds that I haven't made in a very long time.  
    So's he.   It takes thirty seconds of using my hands in strange ways to make him sob and whine and mewl.   My laughter gets louder inside of my head.   Outside of my head, I am whispering in a harsh voice, describing just one small act that Linda and I performed last night.   He squawks like a chicken about to meet the axe.
    I kneel on his chest and enjoy his panic.   My mouth waters.   My mother's secret name is in my throat.   My own secret name is bound in a box made of lead and leather and hidden under my heart.  
    I thrust him from me.   He hits the side of the house and wood shingles splinter.   I stand and the clouds move together and move apart, thunder murmuring distantly, and the night birds are signing in the morning.  
    Linda places her hands on either side of my face and draws me closer.   She kisses me deeply and I follow her to the Mustang.   We get in.   We drive on to the next act of our Grand Guignol Theater that plays out beneath a very bad star, moving us along as it must.
    "I wanted you to snap his neck," she tells me.   "I know you could've done it.   Why didn't you do it?"
    All of our fathers want us dead, and we want all of them dead.   Her mother's wail is the only bit of grace I've experienced in longer than I can remember.
    "Next time, kill him," she says.   "And her.   Especially her.   She deserves it even more than him.   She deserves it the most, my fucking God, living the way she does, if you can call it life.   So vague, so transparent.   They disgust me.   I'll help you plan how to do it.   He's got a shotgun collection.   He keeps them locked in cases in the den but I know where he keeps the key."
    There's no need to point out that she sounds like a moron.  
    We