“Ah, you need a needle? Like you’re gonna stitch yourself up?”
Nodding, he stopped performing the charade.
“No problem. I’ll get that for you. But, first you have to do something.”
He walked over to the shower, leaned over and cut it on. The water rained from the nozzle.
“You’re all bloody and stink. If you’re going to be hiding out here for awhile then you need to clean yourself up.”
Tilting his head to the side, he couldn’t believe what he’d just heard. Had the boy just told him he smelled bad? He didn’t doubt that his body odor was pretty repulsive to a sensitive nose like Joel’s. He’d grown used to the smell, himself.
Explaining, Joel said,
“Look, it’s my sister. She’ll smell you a mile away. Then that’ll be bad.”
Joel pointed at the basket hanging from the spout. Inside was a bottle of shampoo, conditioner, liquid soap, and a loofah hung from the side. He grabbed the loofah and soap.
“Now, you take the soap and squirt it on here like this.”
He mimed the procedure.
“Rub it on your body until it builds a good lather. Be sure to get all over.”
He knew how to do it, but thought it was kind of funny how Joel spoke to him like he’d never heard of something as common as a shower. He must smell worse than he’d originally thought.
Joel barely stopped to breathe.
“Then rinse.”
He sat them back on the rack and took the shampoo.
“This is the shampoo. I don’t know how much hair you’ve got, so just put a decent amount in your hand. Lather it up real good in your hair and then rinse. It’s got the conditioner mixed in, so it’s a two for one deal. Then it’ll be shining like mine. Understand?”
He shot him thumbs up.
“Well, I’m going to let you get in there and clean up. My dad has some old hunting clothes somewhere, camo-stuff, I’ll find them. He was tall too…they should fit you, I hope so anyway. We haven’t touched his stuff since the…well…”
Joel lowered his head. His bottom lip quivered a few strokes. He saw that the boy’s eyes had gone watery.
“Will you be all right alone?”
He nodded.
“Great. Hop on in; I’ll get out of your way.”
His voice sounded different now, not full of the excitement that had been there beforehand.
The door closed.
He was alone in the bathroom, and the air was growing heavier with steam. He could feel himself perspiring under the mask. He grabbed the back of his shirt and pulled. It had become plastered to his chest from the blood. With one good yank, he ripped it up the middle so he could peel it off like banana skin. As he tore away the pieces of his shirt, he tried his best to ignore the pain from the drying wounds he’d reopened while doing so.
Gashes went up the front of him like cracks. It was a wonder he was still living, let alone walking around on his own two legs. How’d he survive that attack? He must be becoming stronger. She had come at him with everything she had, using his own weapons. He’d have to get them back. They were still in the woods. She was too. Her body had to be disposed of. He’d get to it, eventually.
He unhooked his belt, pulled it through the loops, then tossed it on the floor. His boots came off next. The odor around him turned sour. He could smell an odd combination of rotten eggs and sweat. When he realized it was his own feet, he quickly removed the browned socks, his pants, and under garments and got in the shower.
The water slapped at his chest, stinging as it rained down. As much as it hurt, it felt so good at the same time. He turned around, letting it pound his shoulders and neck. His hood was getting drenched, cementing around his head and neck like when he’d get caught in a rainstorm. Made everything much more difficult with the flimsy cover obstructing his range of sight, but he had never dared to remove it. He knew what he looked like underneath. Plus, it had become part of his errand-boy uniform. How had he become the one who finished off what was left of the victims. He’d like to see Buddy or Carp do what he did while wearing this shit.
On that, he reached behind his head. Fingering through the doused fabric, he found the thin string of twine. The knot was small and had grown tighter through time. He doubted his chunky fingers could unhook it. Instead of trying to untie it, he tugged, pulling until the twine dug into the creases of his fingers, and slit them open. Then he pulled harder until the thread snapped. He tossed it over the shower curtain. The hood hung over his head like a wet towel. Some of it was engrossed in the scar tissue on his face. Pulling it loose would hurt, but he didn’t care. He wanted to feel the water on his face.
It had been too long…
He tore the pillowcase from his head, like ripping a bandage off hair. It burned, but only briefly. His face felt free, as if it could breathe, welcoming the warm steam on his damaged skin. It’d been so long since he’d removed the mask that it had become a part of him. Literally. His wounds had healed into the fabric. Tearing it free like that had opened some of them up again. Some dead-skin chunks dropped off his face and into the tub. The blood turned the clear water pooling around his feet a pinkish shade, and with the added lumps of skin it looked like a grotesque mixed-drink.
He was tempted to touch his face, to feel the damage that had been done to him all those years ago, but he didn’t have the courage to do so. He’d only dared once to see and that had been enough for him to never want to acknowledge it again.
He resisted the urge.
Then, sticking his face into the water, he embraced the downpour. Though it burned like hell, he didn’t turn away. It wasn’t long before the stinging stopped.
Soon, it felt wonderful
.
(I)
Face never kept them waiting longer than an hour, and it had been damn near half a day since he’d left. Buddy was far beyond concerned as he stood outside the makeshift barracks, assembled from old wood and tarps shortly after they’d settled on this mountain. The location had been fine at first, but recent land developments had been moving in closer and closer. They’ll be discovered if they don’t move on. Buddy figured they probably had three months left, tops, before they had to find somewhere else to station.
Where the hell is he?
He could hear the crunching of leaves from approaching footsteps, their light density revealing the hiker to be Carp. Face sounded like a bear when he went tramping through the forests.
Though Carp wore full camouflage fatigues, he could always pinpoint him in the rough. His eyes were used to it.
“Did you find him?” he asked Carp.
Shaking his head, Carp stepped up the side, using the protruding rocks like stairs. “No, the girl’s gone too.”
“What?”
“Went back to where we left her. Found the barbwire hanging there, pieces of that bitches skin stuck in the loops.”
“But, no girl?”
“No. No girl.”
Placing his hands on his hips, Buddy stared at the ground. Carp could tell he was getting angry. Buddy wasn’t a muscular man, barely six foot tall, and he stood with a slouch. If it came down to it, Carp could dice Buddy up without much effort. Yet, something about Buddy was more scary and intense than Carp or Face put together. It was how he could talk to people and come across as perfectly normal, when in fact he was nowhere near it.
He ran a hand through his short, spiky hair. “Face doesn’t just disappear like that without good reason.”
“Well, he’s done it before. I know you haven’t forgotten.”
Nodding, Buddy did remember.
Face had unloaded from the bus looking like the invisible man. Head bandaged up, all you could see was his eyes. It just so happened, a little girl no older than six or so, was also at the station and found it hysterical that he was dressed like that. She couldn’t stop her high-pitched laughter. Buddy had said, “Just ignore her, Face.” Then she pointed at him, and called him
Pillowface
; Buddy guessed because his face was white and fluffy from the gauze, like a pillow. No matter how much her parents tried to make her, she wouldn’t shut up. Finally, the mother popped her on the mouth, and told her to stop being rude.
Buddy figured that was why Face had let the parents live, but the little brat hadn’t stood a chance. When he found Face with her it looked as if she had exploded. There was blood, skin, and innards scattered all over the forest. And, none of it was his. Face had been missing for three days before Buddy found him with the little girl. Kimmy was her name. He’d taken her from her bedroom in the middle of night, even bringing her goddamn favorite pillow along. After he’d destroyed her, he’d begun to wear the pillow case over his head to hide his scars, and to also use it as a symbol. That was when he’d demanded to be called Pillowface. Buddy never had, because he felt his name should remain what it was on his dog tags.
Face.
But, he wasn’t the same man he used to be.
Hell
, thought Buddy,
none of us are.
That was why they’d come here. To start over, going after them one at time, showing them just how horrible their homeland could be. They’d been betrayed by their own country. Now, it was time for them to betray it right back.
“What do you want to do?” asked Carp. He removed his hat, scratched his sweaty head, flipping his hair all over.
“I guess we’ll wait. If he’s not back by sunrise, we’ll go looking for him.”
And find him one way or another.
Joel found the key to his parent’s room hidden in Haley’s jewelry box. He’d have to be sure he put it back when he was done. Didn’t need her knowing he’d been snooping around in her room.
He unlocked the door and went inside. The closed curtains blocked most of the sunlight from outside. The dark red veneer hanging in front of the window illuminated the room like an inferno. Not wanting to be in there any longer than he had to, he rushed to the closet.
He sifted through clothes, eventually finding some camouflage pants. Then he found a paper bag packed full of what Dad called his grease monkey shirts. Those he’d wear while changing the oil in the cars or doing any other repair work that he could handle himself.
He took two; one was dark blue and the other gray.
He put the key back in Haley’s jewelry box on his way back to his room. He marched straight to the work table to find the mask he’d made out of burlap for a scarecrow prop he’d planned to build. Having started it several times, he had never actually finished it. Joel took it from the Styrofoam head and quickly left the room.
(III)
He rinsed the shampoo out of his hair. The pleasure from his tingling scalp was nearly orgasmic. It’d been too long since he’d gotten the chance to do this. After finishing, he took the loofah from under the basket.
He used his thumb to flick open the bottle of liquid soap, then squirted a large mound onto the sponge-like ball. He put the soap back and began scrubbing. This didn’t feel as good as it had washing his hair. The wounds and open slashes screamed at him. He kept on though, knowing that he had to clean them before dressing them. Hopefully, he’d get rid of any type of infection before it was too late.
He heard the door creak, followed by a light knocking.
“It’s me.”
He heard Joel say, through the water in his ears.
The gash on his chest throbbed when the soapy water filled it. He screwed his eyes shut, and punched the wall it hurt so badly.
“I don’t want to peek, just give me a thumbs up if you’re okay.”
Slowly, he raised a trembling fist above the shower curtain, lifting his thumb upward to tell him all was well. But, all was not well. He was in some grisly pain.
“Okay, good. You scared me.”
The kid was silent a moment.
“Hey, uh--I have something for you if you want it. It’s the mask you were looking at earlier. The one you were wearing looked pretty bad off and I thought maybe you’d like this one. I made it myself.”
He stood under the water, listening as Joel continued.
“Here’s the stuff you needed.” He heard footsteps toward the door. “I’ll leave you alone to take care of all that; I’m going to toss these dirty clothes. Don’t want my sister finding them.”
There was some rustling, assumedly from a plastic trash bag.
“When you’re done, just push that switch to turn off the shower, then twist the dial to cut off the water.”
The door bumped as Joel exited.
After waiting another moment to make sure Joel wasn’t coming back, he left the water running as he stepped out of the shower. He stood on the floor mat, dripping onto the carpeted square, and reached over the toilet, filling both hands with supplies Joel had left him on the sink.
Then he returned to the shower, keeping his back to the jetting streams.
He twisted the cap off the peroxide and raised the bottle above his head. He took a deep breath, then upturned the bottle. A peroxide shower ignited the openings in his body like liquid fire. He gritted his teeth against the pain. When it had subsided enough that he could move on, he chucked the empty bottle over the shower curtain.
Next he took the spool of thread, pulled out a lengthy line, and used his teeth to snip it off. Then he carefully removed one of the small needles from the pack, and fed the string through the tiny hole. After tying it into a knot, he was ready to begin.
Using his free hand, he pulled up a slab of skin. He pressed the needle’s point to the skin and inserted it. Surprisingly, it barely hurt. Felt like nothing more than a briar prick until he tugged it through the other side. By doing that he felt more pain, but still not as much as he should. He assumed numbness was settling in, his body’s natural sedative, and as he continued to sew himself up, the pain became less acute until it wasn’t there at all.