'Why'd you have to do it, pup?' Jimmy asked. He was sobbing. It was disgusting. 'Why couldn't you have stuck to rats and rabbits?'
The dog whined. It limped onto the shop-rag bed Jimmy had made for it and lay down on its right side. Every breath was a short whimper. Black BBs were embedded in its side. Quail shot.
Jimmy knelt and stroked the dog's head. It licked his wrist. That was the first time it had done that.
There was nothing he could do. He couldn't drive. There was no way to get it to a vet. All a vet would do was put it to sleep anyway. All Dad would do was shoot it with birdshot again. Fucking redneck idiot.
He stroked the dog's head a little longer. It wasn't right to let it keep hurting. He stood and wiped his face on a shop rag, then looked around the garage. Dad's toolbox was on the workbench. He went over to it. The dog stayed on the bed of rags, panting.
Jimmy opened the box. The tools were jumbled. He reached in and grabbed a hammer. Wrenches and screwdrivers came out with it. He took the hammer over to the dog. He heard gravel crunch outside.
He knelt again and put down the hammer. He pulled a few rags out from under the little dog's head, then turned the head so that the jaw lay flat against the floor. He stroked the top of the head. The eyes looked up at him. He stroked from the nose up over the eyes so that they closed.
He kept stroking with his left hand. The eyes stayed closed. He picked up the hammer in his right.
Jimmy had stopped crying. Now that he knew what to do, he could control himself. There was no point in prolonging pain. It would have to be one blow. It would have to be perfect. Perfection allowed no tears, no trembles.
'That's a sweet pup,' Jimmy said. He raised the hammer.
A shadow fell over him. He took his left hand from the dog's head. He brought the hammer down.
It was one blow. It was perfect. Jimmy pulled the hammer free, then looked away.
His sister Jasmine was in the doorway. He stood and faced her. She turned and ran.
Mom was in the kitchen when Jimmy went inside. She hugged him and told him she'd missed him. She was going to make a special supper of smoked pork chops, and there would be ice cream for dessert.
Jimmy pulled away from the hug and looked at her. She looked the same.
Jasmine was standing with Dad beside the kitchen table. She was hanging on to Dad's leg and staring at Jimmy. Dad had his hand on her head. He still wasn't wearing a shirt.
Jimmy's prayer had worked. It had worked in just the way he had prayed it. He had told God that he would pay any price to have his mother back. Now the little brown dog was dead, and Mom was home. It made sense.
He went back to the garage and bundled the dog's body in shop rags. He carried the bundle out behind the chicken coop. There was a dead rat lying there. He set the bundle down beside it, then fetched the shovel and started to dig. The ground was packed hard. It was stiff with chickenshit. He kept at it.
A shadow passed over the hole. He looked up and saw Jasmine. She was the only one who was innocent. She was the only one he could love. He wouldn't let anyone hurt her, ever, as long as he lived.
'I saw you kill that dog,' Jasmine said. 'I hate your guts.' She went back to the house.
Jimmy kept digging. He dug until his hands blistered, and then until the blisters opened. The hole still wasn't deep enough.
VICTIM NUMBER SEVEN
For the first seven weeks, Blackburn's job in the Automotive Department of Oklahoma Discount City went well enough. He unpacked cardboard cases of parts, stocked shelves, and helped customers find things. His boss wouldn't let him run the cash register, but that was fine with him. It was too much responsibility. He preferred work that allowed him to think about other things, and to go home and watch TV when he was finished. There wasn't much else to do in Oklahoma City, but he'd had enough partying for a while anyway. Austin had worn him out.
Blackburn's TV was a twelve-inch black-and-white that he'd bought with his first paycheck. The folks over in the Electronics Department had given him a few dollars off because he was an employee. He thought that was a pretty fair deal. In fact, he thought Oklahoma Discount City in general was a pretty fair deal. Then his boss retired, and the store hired a man named Leo to manage the Automotive Department.
Leo didn't like Blackburn. For one thing, he thought Blackburn's hair was too long, and called him a hippie. Blackburn replied that he couldn't be a hippie, because it was 1978 and all the hippies had been declared dead in 1967. Leo grimaced and spat on the floor of the stockroom. Leo was about fifty, and he wore a black toupee. He had lines around his eyes, and liver-colored lips. He looked pissed off all the time, and he sneered at any customer who paid using a lot of pennies.
It was because of Leo that Blackburn lost his job. Leo had only been the department manager for a week and a half when he accused Blackburn of stealing a case of Quaker State 10W-30 Multi-Viscosity Motor Oil.
'I'm sorry, sir,' Blackburn told him in the stockroom. It was early on Thursday morning. Leo had just accused him. They were the only ones there. 'I didn't steal any Quaker State. I didn't steal anything.'
Leo's face twitched. 'I saw you take it out of the store last night,' he said. 'Then I stayed late to count the sales slips, and I came in early this morning and did it again. It's short. You're a goddamn liar and a thief.'
Blackburn became irritated. He was a lot of things, but a liar was not one of them. He took a breath and closed his eyes. There was no point in getting upset. All he had to do was tell the truth. Then he could get to work and think about other things.
He opened his eyes. 'May I explain, please?'
Leo's eyebrows rose. They were thin and gray. They were how Blackburn knew that Leo wore a toupee. The toupee was thick and black.
'May you?' Leo said, mocking.
'That hardly seems fair.'
'I could care less,' Leo said.
'Couldn't.'
'Huh?'
'Couldn't. Saying that you could care less means that you actually do care. Saying that you couldn't care less means that you don't really give a shit.'
Leo sneered. 'Listen to the college boy. You sound like my wife. Thinks she's Albert fuckin' Einstein 'cause she had a year of juco. Maybe I should straighten you out like I do her.' Leo raised his right hand in a fist.
'Your wife's name is Lorraine, isn't it?' Blackburn asked.
'How'd you know that?' Leo's voice was low.
