Lustmord 1 Page 2

  And so on Dec. 31, 2016 I sat at my desk, flipped open my laptop, opened the notebook crammed with all types of jottings and scribbles containing snatches of dialogue, fresh character insights and background detail, and went to work.

  Eventually it became evident that there was more to that single stretch of kindness, brief as it was, that he’d experienced in his life as a child and the older couple with the pet hog who had befriended him and that Cecil had grown quite fond of and wished he could have been adopted by. Fact was, they were his only source of light in that otherwise perpetual combo of fear and despair that his childhood was. And who knows, he may have even gone a different route entirely later on as an adult, had his friends Flora and Truly Turnbull and their pet pig not only been extracted from his needy grasp, but so abruptly and with such viciousness that the resulting gap had been too much of a shock for his young mind to comprehend, let alone bear.

  And so the details were all there, now all that remained was to read from the beginning, as I had countless times in the past over the years, the nearly half million word horror novel and weave this new information in. Daunting? More so than was usual for me and what I was used to. You better believe it. And there didn’t seem to be any recourse but to tackle it head-on. My attitude always has been: No point in taking on a project unless you’re willing to give it your all, (no matter that it damned near put me in the loony ward initially.) And if you think this is a stretch and/or far-fetched, look up a U.K. crime writer named Derek Raymond (who wrote the mind-twisting crime noire novel entitled I Was Dora Suarez) and see the emotional state it left him in, and there’s others; they’re easy to look up on the Net. Point being: Fuck with evil—and guess what? Evil has a tendency to fuck you back. That’s what the Nietzschean quote at the top of this forward is about. There is no such thing as a free lunch.

  Logging in 14 to 16 hour days or more and getting by on next-to-no-sleep, I got through it, survived it. Eighteen days later, the revised and updated Lustmord: Anatomy of a Serial Butcher contained thousands of additional words.

  This is that new version, dear reader. From my end, I felt it was worth the time and effort. You tell me if it works for you at yours.

  If I could have just one thing taken away from this novel, and I don’t write message thrillers, folks; I don’t believe in getting up on a soap box and preaching to the reader or even dispensing advice, this is what it would be: be kind to your offspring. To anyone who thinks this isn’t much, or who thinks it’s overstated, I’ve got news for you: it’s the most important thing there is.

  This entire enterprise begs the question then, doesn’t it? If it was such a task to write and clearly it was, and had taken not only a heavy toll on its author, but three long decades of hard work to pull off, why go anywhere near the subject matter, then? Because had I an inkling it was going to be anywhere near this tough or that it would take thirty years to complete, there is no way in hell I would have so much as attempted it. I was in my mid 30s when I started it, sixty-six is mere months away. No-way-in-fucking-hell.

  Still does not answer why the topic was chosen. Why fool with something this cynical and psychologically draining? Because as a writer I have to bounce around, move from genre to genre, or else I lose interest—and because if I’m going to do a book about a sociopath, you better believe one thing: I am going to treat the material with absolute honesty. There is no other way. I did not want to whitewash (or sugarcoat) any of it, the way certain writers like to do, or the way some, rather, most Hollywood flicks treat the material: by having the unpleasant stuff happen off screen, or else it’s done with gimmicks and cheesy effects. I wanted it raw, and I wanted it to be disturbing—not only physically, but more importantly, on a psychological level—because when it happens, the way it happens in real life, that’s what it is: appalling, venal, sickening and twisted and scars/marks anyone within its vicinity for life afterwards, including the guilty cretin who leaves this kind of unspeakable trauma and dread in his or her wake.

  So I repeat, read at your own risk. The author/publisher is not responsible for any nervous breakdowns, facial tics, insomnia, depression, loss of appetite, loss of hair, sexual dysfunction, bouts of insanity, marriages and/or relationships disintegrating, time spent in therapy, stays in the bughouse, shakes, quakes, headaches, heart problems, prostate issues, vomiting, nausea, episodes of anxiety, suicidal tendencies or a sudden, inexplicable urge to do bodily harm to your fellow humans, and any other ailments, be they large or small, that you may experience as a result of having read LUSTMORD: Anatomy of a Serial Butcher. You have been thoroughly advised. Proceed at your own peril.

  K.A.

  January 17, 2017

  “I’ve been called everything but a human being.”

  —Cecil O. Biggs

  CHAPTER 1

  They were into it. Heard more than he wanted to.

  “J.J., don’t!”

  “Shut your mouth, whore!”

  “I’ll be good! I promise, J.J.!”

  “I told you to shut your hole!”

  “Don’t hit me, J.J. You better not hit me no more!”

  “I’ll beat you to death! Filthy heifer cunt!” Slaps and screams followed. “Why, you ain’t even a good whore! Where’s my whiskey money, bitch? Spent on shoes and ice cream for that worthless little shit? Why come? Since when are the little bastard’s wants more important than mine?”

  More slaps followed, screaming. The next sound was the male’s, a deep grunt, as though on the receiving end himself. Furniture was thrown, dishes. The woman shrieked.

  “We’re out of ass-wipe, over-the-hill heifer, and you got nerve to waste money on ice cream and shoes for the little pissy!” Dogs barked; a real ruckus was in progress up there. The boy pretty much ignored it all. Went about in a calm way burning his spiders, tearing wings off flies.

  The view from where he stood at the grimy rear window on this tenement landing between the third and fourth floors gave one about as much hope and peace of mind as the hell going on up on the fourth floor: a back parking lot with cracks in the pavement, pot holes and loose cement chunks and gravel that had, over time, become the unofficial dumping site for neighborhood wrecks. Autos of all makes and sizes, pickup trucks, vans, gutted. Some without doors and windshields or wheels, had been abandoned to rust on wood or cinder blocks, bricks, piled rocks.

  Knee-high weeds grew from fissures in the pavement. There were scattered stacks and piles of threadbare tires and strips of black rubber throughout; rusted out mufflers, gas tanks, radiators and grills; engines that had long ago been stripped of anything useful.

  Down, toward the right-hand part of the parking lot-cum-junkyard, where the dumpster was located and over-flowing to capacity with refuse, dead foliage, and an assortment of fractured and discarded bargain-basement, low-rent coffee tables and nightstands, sofas and chairs, toasters, crock pots, washers and dryers, refrigerators and other appliances, large and small, with additional mounds of plastic trash bags bloated and splitting at the seams, that surrounded it at the base, were a couple of stray dogs engaged in the act, something the boy had been exposed to enough times in the past, so that in and of itself held no real interest; only these two were caught up/entangled in such a way that he had never witnessed until now. Stuck, they were, ass-to-ass, literally; on all fours, heads at opposite ends. Evidently attempting to separate, to untangle, and not able to do so.

  One would pull one way for a while, dragging the other with him, then the other mutt would pull, or try to, in his direction, forcing the other dog to back up, neither getting anywhere.

  Mexican standoff? He couldn’t say. All he knew was it was the Latino part of town. East LA. What was going on?

  It was only moments earlier that they had been in front of the building. Fucking, to be sure, but doing it the way they were supposed to: the male, forepaws atop the other’s hind end, while he pumped away from behind. The boy’s mother, with whom the boy had walked up, having been thoroughly disgu
sted by the sight, had flung one of her pumps at them. The dogs hadn’t bothered to separate—maybe even then had not been able to—instead had hopped the short distance to the left of the tenement to where the driveway and entrance to the lot in back was. And here they were, still at it, only coupled in this baffling manner.

  What was it J.J., his dogcatcher step-daddy had said to him about it that time? Couldn’t recall the exact words. “Ever see ’em stuck, boy, it’s ’cause the bitch has got her snapper locked on the male’s prick and he ain’t gettin’ out until he shoots his load in her. Then the head of his prick, fat like a light bulb, goes down; only then can the male take his dick back. Now, them young males don’t get it; and it’s fun to watch ’em panic, an’ struggle to pull out. Ain’t happening, no way. What a man who knows dogs does then is to calm the asshole down. Only thing that works. Calm the motherfucker down.”

  Cecil wondered if that’s what was going on, if only in a casual way. Because the mongrels, the junkyard, and the heaps hardly mattered beyond what went on in them at night, as well as during the day: local prostitutes, some who lived in the building, sneaking about with their johns, junkies in a crazy frenzy to slam a needle somewhere, bums seeking out vehicles with missing seats to take a dump in.

  He’d taken more than one girl to one of the forgotten sedans himself, gotten them to pull their panties down and show him what they had.

  None of that rated this mid-morning. No. What mattered and preoccupied his thoughts were the spiders and fat flies he enjoyed burning to a crisp on his side of the window, the flies who threw themselves mindlessly against the pane, and the spiders lying in wait in various corners of the window frame and the traps they had spun for the purpose of snagging a meal.

  The boy stood at the window, book of matches in hand, doing the thing that sent the familiar sensation through him: setting things on fire, living or not; fire did it for him. Even though it was beyond his comprehension how or why the mere sight of fire and destroying things in this fashion had the effect that it did on him, it did not stop him from yearning for more of the same.

  Drawing his attention above his head, in a web in the upper right corner of the frame, a newly trapped fly struggled to untangle itself, to no avail. Spiders knew what they were doing. The web was sinewy, tough, and this spider’s latest victim was not going anywhere.

  As expected, the spider emerged soon enough from within its lair. Moved toward the prey. With bated breath, the kid waited until the predator was practically upon the doomed insect before striking the match, reaching up, and roasting them both.

  There were other flies he pounced on, clutched in his fist, and dealt with. Large, glistening green flies, who made the loud buzzing, grating noise that added to the thrill, he caught and relieved them of their wings. They were incredibly easy to grab: dumb flies who kept throwing themselves against the grime-streaked glass as if they expected to be able to drill through somehow and escape out there to join up with thousands of their ilk at the dumpster below and anywhere else throughout the lot.

  The boy snatched them up, yanked the wings off, and watched with something like inner satisfaction as they kicked out with their spindly legs on their backs, on the sill, kicking out frantically, that enhanced the experience for him. There was no denying it, no explaining it: the combo, fire and subsequent death, not only heightened the senses all around, but clearly left him in a state of arousal, just as there was no denying he felt responsible for what was taking place up there on the fourth floor.

  Coco Garcia, the gap-toothed, obese Mexican woman who lived across the way from them in the other apartment and everyone knew to be a prostitute, who had, in fact, turned his mother on to some of her johns, poked her head out through her partially opened door.

  “They’re at it again, huh, kid? I wouldn’t take that off no man. I hope she beats the shit out of his fag ass this time.”

  The boy said nothing. Looked up at her, then turned away to mind his spiders and flies. He was down to his remaining match and that bothered him. The big woman shook her head at the ongoing racket. She withdrew back into her place and closed her door.

  “Lemme get this straight, bitch: You stayed out all night and a good part of the morning, and all you got to show for it is a handful of change? Why, you ain’t even good at whorin’! To call you a whore would be an insult to all the hard-working whores out there! Hear what I’m saying, bitch? You ain’t even good at whorin’! You don’t rate!”

  “It’s the boy’s birthday, Joe. I wanted to do something for the boy this once.”

  “You ain’t even got enough coins left here for a bottle of rotgut—”

  “He needed shoes, Joe. It’s his birthday.”

  “How many times I gotta hear about the bastard’s birthday, goddamn you! I ain’t got enough here for a taste, and you got nerve to spend on shoes and birthday cakes and ice cream!”

  “Can’t you do without this one time? We’ll get some money later—”

  “Why should I have to do without, bitch? Why should I have to suffer? Didn’t I tell you to abort the bastard? Didn’t I?”

  “There was no money for it, asshole! You drank everything I brought in—like you’re doing now!”

  “You’re blaming me? It’s my fault?”

  There was a loud slap. The woman screamed. There was tumbling. Someone being thrown against a wall. More screaming and yelling. Mad dogs barked inside the apartment.

  Eight-year-old Cecil Omar Biggs stood at the landing between the floors, struck the last match and burned a plump spider with it. Through with that, he was back on the green flies: easy to catch, while they kept at the filthy windowpane, buzzing away. He’d sever their wings and lower them on the window sill on their backs. Liked to watch them kick wildly this way.

  He had an unusually large one now. Was desperate to burn it. Went through his pockets in search of matches. Dug up a book. No matches left in it. Kept searching, found another. A single match left. Struck it. Lowered the flame toward the frantic fly: the fat fucker. He wanted to kill them all. Nothing gave him more pleasure than killing these fuckers. And then he got him but good. The last match. That was it. Gone. All of them. What would he do? Keep catching them and tear their wings off. He’d have to find some more matches somewhere soon. While happening to look up toward the top of the windowpane at a couple of flies banging their heads against the glass, his eyes wandered up toward the ceiling, up there in both corners, large cobwebs, too, but he couldn’t reach those. He wished that he could. There were also plenty of dead moths along the window sill that he felt like frying . . . but he needed matches for that.

  The landing was littered: beer cans and soda bottles, cigarette butts and empty cartons, bologna packaging and candy bar wrappers, used condoms and Tampons. He shoved his worn sneaker around in there, in search of a possible match, a lighter . . . and found nothing. He cursed. Needed fire. The yelling and fighting in their apartment kept on: more things being broken; his father’s dogs barked. Then he heard John Joseph release a deep howl. The apartment door opened like a cannon shot, and his mother, heavily made-up as usual, both eyes swollen, mouth bleeding, with all that wild dark hair flying and not a stitch of clothing on her, scrambled down the flight of stairs toward him.

  There was panic and terror in her peepers; even, incredibly enough, to some degree, a kind of glee. He noticed, too, a couple of her front teeth were missing this time.

  She descended the stairs in her clumsy, harried way, with John Joseph, drunk and slobbering, nose and jaw bloody, in his soiled OD green army boxers and worn, mis-matched white socks, staggering in the doorway, the birthday cake haphazardly balanced on the palm of his left hand, while he held onto the doorjamb with the other to steady his aim. He cursed and hurled the cake at her, the birthday cake that she’d only bought moments earlier. J.J. sent the cake flying through the air as she neared the landing where the boy stood. The youngster turned his back in time. The cake grazed the top of her head, and a good deal
of it deflected and spattered the back of the boy’s neck.

  “Half a whore!”

  “Up yours, faggot!”

  The boy’s mother continued on down the next flight to make her way toward the lobby below.

  “I’ll kill you, bitch! Kill the both of you!”

  John Joseph ducked back inside, to reappear seconds later with the box the boy’s new footwear was in and pitched the shoes, one at a time, at the eight-year-old.

  One shoe bounced off the top of the boy’s head and went sailing through the windowpane, causing him to pivot enough for the second shoe to nail him between the eyes. The blow sent the kid spinning into the corner, his face buried in his hands. He wasn’t crying, merely doing his best to deal with the throbbing pain.

  CHAPTER 2

  John Joseph Biggs staggered back into the apartment, slammed the door shut, and could still be heard cursing and carrying on at the top of his lungs.

  “That’s right: kill you both, so help me! Cake and ice cream, when I ain’t even got enough to wet my beak! Good-for-nothing, two-bit half-a-whore! Cake and ice cream! No ass-wipe in the crapper, but there she is throwing good money away on nothin’! Out of dog food, out of ass-wipe, nothin’ left to drink—and the bitch throws money away with both hands! What I get for marryin’ a madwoman! My own goddamned fault, right there. Could’ve married up—no, not me; I had to marry down! Insane over-the-hill heifer! Probably got Mad Cow. Wouldn’t be surprised.”