The Tears Devourer

XXVIII

     "You like to go to school? Yes? Are you a good student?" A young officer had Derick sitting on the living room couch while she, kneeling on the rug in front of him, asked him questions to distract his attention while his mother was being questioned.

     "Where is Mom?"

     "Your mommy's answering some questions with a policeman, outside the house. It won't take long, I promise."

     "Why is she outside?"

     "Don't worry, everything will be fine, darling. Your mom should tell us what happened here, and thus put that bad man who wanted to hurt you in jail."

     "The man who entered the house?"

     "Yes, darling. That bad man must go to prison because he has behaved badly..."

     "Was that the man who went bang bang next door?" Derick interrupted, already getting tired of being spoken to as if he were somehow retarded.

     "What did he go bang bang?"

     "Yes, he fired bullets," he clarified, realizing that speaking in the language of Stupiland, she was not getting the message well.

     "Yes..." The officer's face wrinkled as she didn't understand where a child of seven knows the real sound of a bullet. "How are you so sure it was bullets, sweetheart? It could have been fireworks or some..."

     "Because my dad taught me how to shoot. He did it often when he was here."

     "Where's your daddy honey?"

     "In Iraq, protecting our country from the bad guys. Something similar to what you do, but with worse people."

     "Is your dad a soldier?" A sigh escaped the officer, feeling sadness for the little boy's life without a constant father figure in it. "Do you miss him?"

     "Yes, he's a soldier, I thought it was clear. And... I think not so much. It doesn't make much difference whether or not he is here."

     "What do you mean? What is not different?"

     "Well, Mom and her friends. If dad is here, her friends come a little, but if dad is not here, her friends come every day. And it's better that he's not here, because at least that way I know that he's killing bad people. Sometimes I would like to be like him, and kill people who behave badly, like that man outside in handcuffs."

     "Well..." The officer was completely stunned. She didn't quite understand where she was with this infant, or how to react properly to what she was hearing. "Honey, killing... Take the life of a person... It's wrong. No matter how bad he was, you can't just... You can't take his life."

     "But Daddy does. And those people deserve it."

     "Yes, but that's different... It's completely..."

     "Didn't the man outside kill the neighbors?" Derick interrupted again, noticing that he was correct and that the officer was beginning to talk stupid things and give him silly excuses, like the other adults he had talked to before on the subject. "Doesn't he deserve to die because he killed other people?"

     "Yes, but... No, I mean, that's not the way the law works. He must first be judged so that they give him a punishment... And then he must comply with it."

     Derick stared at the officer in disbelief. As much as he listened to what they said, he didn't understand the difference between being punished and being judged. Derick saw his own differences. For him, to be punished is to receive what you deserve, depending on the damage you cause, and to be judged, was to receive what others impose on you, depending on how much pity you cause them. That way, if the guy they had arrested was poor, or had a tough childhood, or simply suffered from mental illness, they would put him in a building with bars and more police, and they would never let him out again, or at least until that he behaves better. Because it didn't matter if you killed one, two, or a hundred people. If you behave better, eventually they let you out. And not to mention if you have money and kill someone, because they don't even think about putting you inside those places.

     "The way they punished Mom today?" The boy asked, thinking deeply about what had been done to his mother a few minutes ago.

     "Did he punish your mother? You mean, the man outside us hurt her?"

     "I think so... I couldn't see well, since my eyes were crying from so much dust that was under the piano. I wanted to sneeze, but couldn't, and the urge to do so made my eyes even wetter. That's why I couldn't see well, but the man had my mother, and she was crying, that's why I think he was punishing her."

     The officer walked away for a moment, stopping and taking a few steps towards the door of the house. She took a quick look at the mother's position, and noticing that she was still talking to one of his colleagues, she approached Derick Peck again. She had noticed something very strange in that child, and she wanted to find out everything she could before the mother arrived and could forcibly change the version of the child.

     "Honey, why should your mother be punished?" The officer put her hand on top of the boy's, trying to comfort him with her internal warmth.

     "Because she's misbehaving... with me."

     "What does she do to you, love? Does she harm you?"

     "Yes, sometimes."

     "How does she harm you?"

     "She yells at me. Sometimes she beats me."

     "How does she beat you, sweetheart? What does she do to you?" Despite the boy's confessions, the officer didn't find much credibility in them, since when she spoke, the boy said it with extremely chilling coldness. It was as if the infant was comfortable with his situation, or at least very used to it.

     "I shouldn't be talking about this with you. You didn't say we would talk about this. Why hasn't my mom come yet?"

     "Honey, are you comfortable living with your mother?"

     "I don't know... I..." Derick waved at the officer, asking her to bring her ear to the boy's mouth. The officer did, the infant, hollowing out the palm of his hand using his fingers, whispered to her: "I sometimes want to see her dead. Sometimes... Sometimes I would like to do it myself, but I'm afraid..."

     "Who are you afraid of, honey? Your mom?" The officer replied, also between murmurs, without being able to understand very well what the boy was telling her, or rather, without wanting to understand what she was hearing.

     "Not to whom. To what." This time it was Derick who glanced out. He saw his mother rush to the door, so he did the same with her confession. "I am afraid of not knowing where to put her lifeless body."