The Tears Devourer

XVIII

     The bags were still on the ground when Michael, Rachel, and Julie returned to the scene of the awkward impact. It wasn't a complete disaster, as the plastic had held up quite well, but still, the bad looks were felt yards away. Patton parked his car near the mailbox. He let out a big weary sigh when he realized what he owed, and had promised to fix.

     “Is your mother at home?” Michael asked, although he already knew the answer perfectly. Hallie Sweet left for work Monday through Friday, from nine in the morning, and returned until eleven at night, with an extra schedule on Saturdays, holidays, and several Sundays, so the girls took care of themselves and the chores around the house, both for their protection and for their care.

     "I don't think she's here yet, but it's not taking too long either," Rachel lied, as a precaution.

     "But Mom won't be here until..."

     "Four or four-thirty," Rachel interrupted her sister, uncomfortably subtle, and with a nervous smile on her face, "like I said, it shouldn't be long."

     Julie entered the house, going back and forth for her sister's backpack, as Rachel politely offered to pick up the waste that Patton had caused hours ago.

     It took them less than half an hour to fix the mess, everything between plastic bags, disposable gloves, and awkward smiles. Patton took the opportunity to ask more about Rachel's mother's trade so that he could cover, and verify everything he had learned about her so far.

     He was just as clumsy but talkative, just as at the beginning. He kept the character he was supposed to show her, the character he created with the time he had to watch over her and chose so carefully.

     He had finally succeeded, he had chosen the next perfect girl, and at all times, while still studying the gestures on the girl's face, he planned on how to get rid of the other. Suddenly, Rachel brought up a somewhat sensitive subject on Patton's mind. Rachel wanted to know a little more about the boy's family.

     Since Patton came to Dells, hundreds of versions of his provenance have been created, and even hundreds more about the trade of Mathew Patton, the newest drunk old Holmwood's tavern had ever won.

Children had mistaken him more than once for a neighborhood beggar, and parents were already using him in stories to force them to sleep or eat vegetables. He was never seen with a woman, and his son rarely spoke about his mother, so the idea that he had something to do with her death didn't seem so crazy to villagers in Dells.

     Michael is completely unaware of where the idea came from that his father was a spy, a hitman, a drug dealer. More than once addicts have passed by his door asking for weed, to which Michael only managed to dismiss them amiably, while on the other hand, his father always threatened to pull their teeth, just as he did with the fat Peak when the latter hinted at Mathew a queer proposition.

     "And how long have you lived here in Dells?" Rachel tried to avoid eye contact, but something about the boy seemed irresistible.

     “Almost two years...” Michael's glove was torn by a piece of glass in the debris he was collecting. He gestured with his lips, placed the torn glove into an orange bag Rachel offered him, and replaced it in her hand with a new one.

     "And why did your family choose Dells?" Rachel sat on the sidewalk and took the torn glove box over her legs.

     "My mother was from here," he sighed.

     "She... how did she pass...?" The girl stopped. He was playing with a pair of gloves he had just taken off, trying to keep his mind clear. She didn’t want to intrude too much in the life of someone she had just met, and less because of rumors coming from Melissa.

     “You can ask… It’s not a big deal,” Patton encouraged. “I know kids at school talk nonsense about him.” Michael set the half-filled bag on the floor, sighed, and sat down next to Rachel. "I know my father can be scary sometimes... But my mother passed away in an accident, he had nothing to do with her death. Since then he's not been able to stop drinking. It's a bad habit that haunts everyone who suffers misfortunes and has no other support from which to support themselves."

     "You miss her?"

     Michael's eyes turned watery. His breathing; choppy. He swallowed hard and licked his lips from the inside out. He wiped away a small, thin tear that wanted to escape that beautiful prison in her eyes, called eyelashes. He looked directly at the girl's and tried to appear as convincingly as possible at the moment.

     "You have no idea how much..." the boy smiled sadly.

     "Well, you're right about that. I have no idea what it's like to lose one of my parents. They're always talking about my future and constantly comparing me to my sister... they always tell me that I shouldn't follow in her footsteps." The girl looked up at Patton, feeling sorry for her selfish comment. "Sorry, I didn't realize. You must think I'm an i***t who only cares about herself."

     "Not at all... You're one of the few people who's been brave enough to ask me about her." He raised the same arm again and wiped another slippery drop that overflowed the moisture in his right eye.

     "Come here." The girl threw her arms around his neck, and squeezed him as hard as she could, the intensity was so great that she seemed to want to choke him instead of giving him comfort.

     "Tell me you Love Me," Patton ordered her, once he let go of the tender key given by the female. "You could do it? At least once... Say you love me."

     "Michael..." The girl blushed at the innocent request. "We just met yesterday... I don't know. I mean, I think I do feel something for you, but I don't know if I should say that, you get me?"

     "Say you love me now that you have me in front of you, not when there's a visitor, not when there are strangers around." Patton's voice was beginning to grow thick as if he had a deep hatred inside him. "Say you love me and I'll stop. I promise."

     "Michael, I don't get what you're saying. What are you talking about?" The girl's eyes no longer revealed affection or pity, now they were as confused as the first time she spoke to the boy. "You're scaring me."

     "I knew it. You've never loved me." Patton kept his gaze to the ground, hiding his face from the girl's restless view, "and you will never do."

     "Michael, please stop. You're scaring me... you know I think I'd better go, it's late enough, and I don't know..."

     "I'm sorry." The boy apologized raising his eyes, now dry and with an expression void of feelings. "Let me take you home, okay?"

     "I don't know... You gave me a good scare. Why did you say all those things?"

     "It's after eleven. You won't find any cars at this time. And taxis are grouped in nightclubs, where they find more customers. It'll take forever to get here. If you won't stay, at least let me take you home,” the boy insisted, starting to get up from the grass and holding out a hand to the grieving girl at his feet.

     "Okay, fine... But, for God's sake, Michael... don't scare me like that again." She begged. The girl kept her mouth half open and her eyes lively. A small nook on the back of her neck gave him the signal — from his adrenaline rush — that her body was ready to run if something strange happened.

     "Get in the car." They walked together to Patton's Civic. The chivalrous young man opened the passenger door for her and stepped around the chassis of the vehicle to reach his. "s**t,” he muttered, glancing in the direction of the ground. He tapped the window of the nearest door twice with the knuckle of his right index finger, asking the girl to rool down the window. "It's the tire. The tire's been lowered. Let me get the cat out of the trunk so I can inflate it."

     "No, don't bother Michael, I'm better off taking a taxi..." The boy turned his head from left to right, slowly shaking it.

     "I can't let you to take a taxi at this time. Something could happen, and it would be on me. I don't want to lose anyone else who's important in my life." That was enough. The girl returned a sheepish smile, and settled into the back of the Civic, immediately buckling up.

     Michael hurried toward the trunk. He took a small key from his pants, and turned the lock with it. He opened the lid. He made noise with the cat inside of the trunk, just to give himself enough time to open the small backpack that he always carried in that compartment of the car. He took out of it a light blue handkerchief, with floral decorations in each corner, and soaked it with a foamy substance that filled a transparent glass jar. He glanced at the rearview mirror and waited for Ariana to glance at her phone screen.

     It was then that he moved fast. He opened the door of the back seat where the girl was sitting, and with a graceful movement of his left arm, he pressed the handkerchief to his face, right on the nose, holding for a few seconds the epileptic hustle that the girl gave in the fight for not become unconscious.

     It was already done. He had already ordered it, and now he had it on a tray. That was the test that she had to pass, that was the question that everyone had to ask him before being accepted to satisfy his darkest and macabre desires. A simple question. So simple, that not just anyone was worth doing.

     "Do you miss her?" Rachel asked, and Michael's eyes turned watery. He breathed hard, and wiped her crocodile tears more than once, just to fit in the final act.

     "You have no idea how much..." he remembered that last friendly dialogue he had with his last quarry, and he couldn't resist a mental smile at that moment. But he had to keep his composure. He had to save the character. Sensing the warm feel of Rachel Sweet's palm on her shoulder, he covered his eyes with both hands and sighed more times than he could count. "You're one of the few people who have asked me. That tells a lot of you."

     "I know... more or less, what it feels like to lose a parent." The poor girl tries to console him. "I'm sorry you lost her so soon."

     "Thank you." Michael places his hand on top of Rachel's, on top of the one still on his shoulder. "I have to go. There's something... There's something I need to fix right now."

     "Sorry if I said anything that made you uncomfortable..." Rachel had suddenly lost the thread of the conversation. She felt awkward for not realizing her lack of empathy for the boy.

     "It's not something you said. Quite the contrary, Rachel. I think you're great as a person... And even better as a friend. But I must go, my father must be waiting for me."

     They said goodbye, not before throwing their used gloves into the half-full bag that Michael had thrown to one side. Everything was as good as new, or well, as new as garbage cans can be seen outside a house.

Patton waited for Sweet to enter her home, only to say goodbye once more, just to make sure his prey was in the field, and instead of fleeing in terror from her predator, she would smile at him and show her back, ready to receive the first bump.

     But first Michael had to fix his old business. Because a lion doesn't go for the next prey, without first being completely satisfied with the previous one.