The Tears Devourer

Chapter 2: The Misery

"Why can't I kill him?

If we're going to die anyway. "

-Mary Bell

"It wasn't as dark and obscene as it sounds.

I had a lot of fun. Killing someone is an entertaining experience. "

-Albert DeSalvo

XXVI

     One shot alerted the entire neighborhood. Dogs hurt their throats when they barked at the top of their lungs into the air, into the dark. In the shadows, the light from the corridors moved, completely dulling the darkness provided by the lack of lighting.

     Derick jumped out of bed, every little hair on top erect and nervous. Then he began to cry, to moan loudly and shout "Mama! Mama!" over and over again, much louder than the noise of the dogs.

     The door to his room shook and slapped the parallel wall, the one that served as a support. It was his mother, Maddy Peck — or Maddy Hayden if it's considered her maiden name — wrapped in a sweaty, faded yellow robe, desperately coming to her little boy's call.

     "Derick! Come're! Fast! Come here!" The young mother gestured with her left arm, swinging it aggressively back and forth, pointing to herself with her entire palm. Derick understood instinctively and ran into his mother's welcoming arms.

     "Mom," the little boy blurted out through tears. "What was that?"

     "Don't worry dear, everything is fine." She took the boy on her lap, lifting him with difficulty, and carried him down the short hallway of the house to the door that leads to the basement. "Everything will be fine." Derick tilted his face, so he could see his mother's, and saw that she was furious, but not scared by the horrible thunderous impact.

     "Why are we going to the basement, Mommy?" The boy bounced in Maddy's arms on every step the brunette stepped on. "Mommy?"

     "Be quiet, Derick." She took the boy downstairs and put him on the floor, turned, approaching the ladder, and reaching the first steps. She rested her right hand on the gnawed wooden railing and listened to any noise coming from the half-open door to the grim, dusty room. "Let's play a game, okay, dear?" She said to the infant, without encouragement in her voice. "We're going to hide here for a moment, until..."

     The front door of the house slammed violently. Frantic stabbing strokes made the aged wood vibrate, and Maddy's soul despaired. Not because of what could happen to Derick, after all, he was just a boy, and she was still young and could have more at any other time, but it was her life that mattered to her, it was her life that was in and it was playing at the time, and the little bastard was making nothing but noises on the first floor, noises that would attract the mentally ill who is firing bullets at the neighbors.

     For weeks now she had heard about an i***t who killed without a certain beat, and how not to hear about him if he spent most of the day on the news, they only stopped to update the lives of local models, and entertain the public with some than another viral video of animals on the Internet, moments that she did enjoy, since seeing so much death on television disgusted her.

     Totally disgusted with so many shitty people in the world, selfish people who take pleasure in killing others, she hoped with all her soul to be caught quickly, so that that i***t would not ruin any night of pleasure. What's more, at that very moment she was waiting for Steve, the one at the gas station two blocks from her house, to give her what every woman in her class needs before going to sleep: a good push where the sun doesn't get in. Killian, her husband, and Derick's father was serving in the military in Iraq, so she needed a male presence in the house, as she puts it: so the business won't go bad by not using it.

     She had doubts about the identity of the person behind the front door, the one who was agonizingly asking to enter the house, since it could well be her Romeo, or on the other hand, the i***t with the bullets.

     Maddy placed her free hand on the boy's lips, just as he leaned in to ask her a question, and with a prominent 'Shhhh!', she silenced him. The four pairs of eyes were conspicuous by their width in the dark as the door gave way, and the bolt broke into small pieces of scrap metal.

     Instinctively, the boy tied himself to his mother's leg, holding her with both arms around her calf. Tension took hold of the atmosphere. Footsteps could be heard on the first floor, careful footsteps approaching the corridor.

     "Go over there, hide there," Maddy whispered, pointing her child to a hole in the skirts of the old piano belonging to her mother-in-law.

     The boy, without thinking twice, ran to the hole and slipped through the cobwebs and the sea of dust that was breathed in there. Suddenly, the cellar door screeched, and a new presence appeared in the room.

     "What do you want here? Who are you?" Maddy rebuked the stranger, but he was just looking at her, without saying a word.

     The steps groaned as the guy walked upon them. Maddy only managed to back away, panic reflected throughout her body. Derick was observing everything in complete silence, but he was already beginning to feel a slight stinging in his throat, due to the dust and dirt that he was embracing.

     The brunette walked away from the ladder and ran to a pile of dirty clothes in the basket on top of the washing machine. She threw all the clothes on the floor and held the plastic basket tightly to defend herself. Never in her life she had to defend herself from someone, she always had boys at her feet to do it for her, but not this time, this time the only one she had under her feet was little Derick, and a seven-year-old couldn't do a lot for her.

     The man kept getting closer, gradually closing the small distance to the basement washing area. Derick could see the malice on the stranger's face. He smiled without moving his eyebrows up, but they elongated to the sides, like two wings of a gigantic bird bend to take flight.

     He was wearing a white zero sleeve and very threadbare jeans, with a bulge in one of the back pockets. Maddy tried to defend herself with the basket when the guy attacked her by throwing his body forward, but it was useless. A few seconds of struggling was enough for the basket to give way from Maddy Peck's slender fingers, and fly through the air until it hit the piano.

     Derick jumped in fright, slamming himself against the frayed wood, but no one paid any attention to him thanks to the horrible ringing of keys the basket caused. Maddy was determined to slap until her palms ached, but her effort was of no help since the attacker was so much bigger and so much stronger than she was. He took both hands of the woman, and with an accurate punch on her forehead side, put her to sleep. Maddy's body passed out and she fell crashing to her side, hitting the automatic dryer next to the washing machine in her wake.

     Once on the ground, the stranger started his business. He untied the strap and opened his pants. He dropped them to the ground and kicked them off the ladder. He took Maddy's body, and lifted her torso, leaning his strength on the brunette's delicate hands, turned her around, and placed the upper half on top of the washing machine. Maddy wriggled limply, beginning to regain consciousness, but she was still half-dead. She felt her nightgown being lifted and her panties lowered, but she didn't have the strength to defend herself, so she let it pass.

     Tears welled up, not only on Maddy Peck's face, because of the pain, but also on the tender face of her son Derick, who thought at all times that this guy was hurting his mother, introducing that thing that was hanging on him in the crotch where her mom pooped.

     Derick tried to keep quiet, because he didn't want his mother to be hurt anymore because of him, or worse still, to be hurt himself. He waited and waited until the lord seemed to tire. The boy observed how the guy cleaned his glans with his mother's clothes, how he held it again and threw it belligerently against the floor in the opposite direction of the laundry, and near the piano. He was even more frightened when he pulled up his pants and managed to make out what he was pulling out of the bundle behind him. It was identical to what his dad kept in the closet, but he couldn't remember the specific name of the gun.

     He coughed slightly then, trying to ease the burning in his throat a bit, but now his little nose was starting to itch.

     "What the f**k?!" Screaming came from the cellar door, drowning out the sound of the boy's cough. It was the voice of another man, a voice somewhat familiar to Derick, and even more common to his mother.

     The assailant finished pointing the revolver at Maddy, but with the surprise arrival of that intruder, he had to abstain for the moment from taking the innocent woman's life, and desperately go for the one who had just shouted and flee the place. He knew that he couldn't leave any loose ends, no man, no woman, much less no child, like the one he had just heard sneezing under the piano.