He closed his eyes so he couldn't see Jacob's face anymore. He hugged the rage to him, hard, and brought his hand down.
23
'I SLAPPED THAT POOR BOY, AND I . . . DID WHAT MARK TOLD me to do, and I watched as Mark threatened him after,' the man on the video continues to read. 'He told Jacob he'd kill him if he finked, and that afterward, he'd fuck Jacob's mom in the ass.
'That was the end of my childhood Saturdays. I tried waking up again in those quiet hours, but the cartoons seemed washed out, and the cinnamon toast never tasted as good.
'I never felt the same about myself after that. You have ideas about yourself, particularly as a child. Ideals. You assume that you'd be courageous when needed, that you'd make the right decision in a tough situation. Mark shattered that illusion for me. I realized that I was capable of harming, even raping, another person--a helpless person--to save my own skin. I wasn't heroic when the chips were down, and whatever else happens, I'll always know that about myself.
'I told Nana about what happened. I told her and I cried and she held me for a long time. She was quiet for a while, thinking through it in that way that she had. In the end she told me this: 'Everyone has a little bit of ugly in them. Remember yours the next time you think about judging theirs.'
'Nana was the only one who knew, until this year. I found a priest, a good man, who was willing to hear my confession. I talked, he listened, and then, miracle of miracles, he absolved me. He told me that God would forgive, and I believe him. God, I am finding, is not really the problem. I'm just not sure if I'm ready to forgive myself.
'But I'm trying. I really, really am.'
The man puts the page down on the table in front of him and refolds his hands, thumb and forefinger still rubbing away at the rosary.
'So Dexter Reid revealed one secret to the world, his desire to be a woman. But he held one back, something even more shameful, perhaps. Certainly more shameful to him. As they say, the whole truth, nothing but the truth. Easy to say, difficult to do, necessary for salvation. Another example follows in the death of Rosemary Sonnenfeld.'
The clip fades to black.
'Is the bad feeling I'm getting justified?' I ask Alan.
'Yeah.'
'Go ahead.'
He clicks the next clip. The lettering this time reads:
'Rosemary was a sinner's sinner,' the man intones. He doesn't sound especially judgmental about it. Just telling it like it is. 'She spent her youth having sex indiscriminately and for money, embroiled in drugs and perversion. At her lowest point she accepted God into her life and confessed her past to Him. She revealed her secrets and tried to walk a righteous path. But, as with Dexter, she had a second secret, a deeper sin. Observe.'
The clip cuts to a woman, her face hovering above a pile of cocaine, straw in hand. She's naked and shaking. The sound of her snorting coincides with the pile getting noticeably smaller. I recognize the woman as Rosemary.
'Again,' a voice commands. It's the man who's been narrating the clips so far.
Rosemary looks up. Her eyes are a little unfocused, but I can see the fear in them.
'If I keep snorting, I'll die,' she says.
'Indeed,' the man replies. 'But if you don't, I'll shoot off your kneecaps and cut off your breasts. You'll still die, but it will be far more painful.' A pause. 'So, again.'
A look of resignation crosses her face. She bends over the pile and takes a huge snort. It seems to go on forever. The straw falls from her fingers, and her head snaps back, eyes fluttering, hair trailing down her back. It's a kind of hideous art, the aesthetics of death and death to come.
'Lay back now,' the man says, his voice soothing. 'Lay back, my child.'
A gloved hand comes into view and he pushes her shivering, shaking body back onto the bed. She's smiling, biting her lower lip. Fine drops of sweat bead her brow. She's the picture of a woman in the throes of something ecstatic and wonderful. She clenches her upper thighs together again and again, as though she's fighting an orgasm.
'Tell us about Dylan, Rosemary.'
The clenching stops and she seems to find some focus. She frowns and then shudders. She's started to sweat.
'H-how d-do you know . . . ? H-how? Only told people at my . . .'
'I know, Rosemary,' he interrupts. 'You're dying. Go to meet God with the truth on your lips. Tell us about Dylan. He was your brother, wasn't he?'
'Y-yes. Brother. Beautiful brother.'
'How old was Dylan?'
She spasms once and she closes her eyes.
'Thirteen,' she hisses.
'And how old were you?'
'Fifteen fifteen fif-fif-fifteen,' she says in a singsong.
'Tell us, Rosemary. Tell us, tell them, tell God, what it was you did to beautiful Dylan.'
A long pause, and now she's really trembling. Her breathing is getting shallower and faster. Not much time now, I think.
'I came into his bed one night and I sucked his cock!' she crows.
'Sucked him and he couldn't help but let me. And then I got him hard again and fucked him.'
'And what happened the next day, Rosemary?'
Silence. Spasms. Sweat.
'What happened the next day?'
She shakes her head back and forth, back and forth.
'No no no no no no no.'
'God is love, Rosemary.'
These words bring a change upon her that I don't quite understand. She begins to weep.
'He killed himself. He went into the bathroom and cut his wrists and he didn't leave a note because he knew I'd know why. No one else ever knew, not Mom, not Dad, but I knew I knew I knew. The evil hungry in me had killed sweet Dylan, had made him do bad against his will, had eaten him alive. The evil hungry had killed him dead.'
I grimace at the pain in her voice, and at the idea of someone having a name for something about themselves that they despised.
'Very good, Rosemary,' the man says, and I'm surprised at the depth of compassion apparent in his voice. He actually seems to care.
'I'm going to give you peace now, I'm going to send you home to God. Would you like that?'
She begins to recite the Lord's Prayer.
'Our Father, Who art in heaven.'
A long, metal rod with a sharp and pointed end appears in the camera view.
'Hallowed be Thy name,' he answers.
The film cuts back to the man seated at the table. Just as well. I know what happened next. He stuck her in the side, angled the point up and into her heart, delivering the quick death he'd promised.
'Again, you see? One secret, revealed, hides the other, unrevealed. Truth is not a striving, it is an immediate arrival.'
For the first time, his body language changes. He places the rosary to one side of the table and lays his palms flat on the surface.
'I have spent my life building up to this moment, preparing for this reveal. I haven't done this for myself. I haven't done this because I enjoy killing.'
