|
Louis finally found the man he was looking for sitting in the shade on a park bench. It was Saturday afternoon; most of the benches were filled with parents gently pushing strollers back and forth. They watched their older children on the playground sliding down fireman poles and tromping across wooden bridges. But this man sat alone, watching the children, unnoticed.
“Mind if I have a seat?”
The man looked up. He studied Louis’s face for only a moment before he turned his gaze back to the children. At the centre of the playground, three boys were storming the jungle gym like it was the Alamo, while the girls occupying it were screaming in feigned terror.
“So you found me,” the man said. “I guess I should have expected as much.”
Louis sat down next to him. “It’s been a long time, Roger.”
Roger continued to watch the children. “You’re too late, you know. It’s going to happen any minute.”
“I can see that.”
A jacket was draped over Roger’s stomach even though it was ninety-five in the middle of summer. He’d gone pudgy in his middle years but even the jacket and the extra girth could not completely hide the pulsating of his stomach. It expanded, then retracted in a fluid motion like the swell of an ocean wave, then expanded, retracted …
“Why did you do this, Roger? You were always so … peaceful. You wouldn’t hurt a fly.”
“I wouldn’t expect you to understand. You were always so naïve … thinking the best of people, trusting in the kindness of strangers,” Roger pursed his lips and drew in a big sigh, “and for some reason they never disappointed you. But if you give them half a chance, people will show you their worst.”
“I … I tried to call you after I heard about your wife. I wanted to …”
Roger raised his hand. “It’s all right.” His rueful grin was much like the one Louis remembered from childhood. “I’ve taken matters into my own hands.”
“Let’s go somewhere else, Roger. This place is full of children.”
“I’m afraid I’m in no condition to move even if I wanted to.” Roger put his hands on the roiling of his belly, much like a proud pregnant mother. Then he turned to look Louis in the eye. “Besides,” his grin returned, “he’ll like children. They’ll make him nice and strong.”
Louis looked down at Roger’s belly. The rolling was increasing in intensity, and now, just above his navel, a bulbous protrusion pressed upwards, forming a tent in the fabric of his white dress shirt.
Roger placed a hand on his friend’s shoulder, just as he had so many years ago when they were in school together. “I’m glad you’re here, old pal. You’ll get to see him be born.”
Louis forced himself to look at Roger’s face, not at the burbling mass in his stomach. “You know I can’t let this happen.”
“Always the hero still, eh, Lou? Even as a kid you always did the right thing.”
Louis reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out his revolver. His hands shook, and his palms were sweaty. He aimed the barrel right between Roger’s eyes. This would have to be quick, before anybody noticed.
Roger didn’t flinch. Instead, he looked back at the children on the playground. They had switched roles; the girls were now storming the jungle gym controlled by the boys. The boys abandoned ship like lemmings before the girls’ onslaught.
Roger sneered. “You can’t do it, Lou. You were always the peaceful one. You couldn’t hurt a fly.”
“I do what I have to,” Louis tightened his finger on the trigger.
Roger chuckled softly. “What … in front of all these children? What kind of monster are you?”
Louis straightened his arm, touched the barrel of the revolver to the side of Roger’s head, above the ear. He tightened his finger on the trigger again … one squeeze was all it would take. So far no one had taken any notice of them.
“Ahh.” Roger closed his eyes and heaved a contented sigh. “He’s coming. I can feel him.”
“Damn you, Roger. Damn you for making me the monster.” He closed his eyes and squeezed the trigger.
When he opened his eyes, Roger’s body lay at an odd angle on the bench, now spattered with red. Children were screaming, all thoughts of tag and cooties forgotten.
The rolling of Roger’s stomach was slowing. Louis fired three shots into it for good measure. He stood, then walked slowly from the body and the bench and the widening pool of red in the grass. Children’s cries of terror echoed after him.
Now, whenever they slept, they would see his face, the face of a cold-blooded murderer. But at least they could look forward to a lifetime of nightmares.
* * *
Vote for this story in the Readers' Forum Poll
* * * |
