From Night of the Furies

Opening Statement

Killing my mother was easy. It wasn’t the first time I’ve killed, and it probably won’t be the last.

It’s not like she was a saint. She didn’t even know me. Who’d have sympathy for a mother that didn’t know her own kid? But like I said, it wasn’t my first time taking a life.

When she stepped into the bedroom at the top of the stairs, I was already waiting for her. She didn’t recognize me at first. How’s that for a greeting after thirty years? But when I showed her the birthmark, my one lock of white hair that still stood out against the grays coming in, she knew, and she knew why I was there. It was her own people who said there’s always a price for betrayal, that fate will step in and punish you for killing your husband. I was Fate’s hit man.

So, when I shot her and that pansy ass lover of hers, she got exactly what she deserved, and she couldn’t do a damn thing but accept it.

“What are you going to do?” she said. “Shoot your own mother? The one who gave you life?”

“The day you killed my father, you took my life.”

She denied it, of course. That song and dance about having nothing to do with it. But when the weak old man walked in, the one who’d taken my father’s place, he knew right away. I could see it in his eyes. “No,” he said. “You can’t be here.”

“You never see someone for the last time,” I told him. “Not until they’re dead.” I didn’t give him a chance to say anythingelse. I squeezed the trigger, twice, and he went down. I watched him gasping on the floor of the short hallway at the top of thestairs. He tried to stand, clutching at the end of the banister, but his bloody hand slipped, and he fell backwards, halfway down the stairs. The sound of the shots echoed off the walls.

She watched him go down. When his body got hung up, one leg stuck in the railing, she sniffed, raised her chin, then faced me as if nothing had happened. The heartless bitch. She stood there, bold as brass, but then I shot her, too. She took two staggering steps back. For a second I thought I was going to have to waste another bullet on her, but then her whole body seemed to raise up, then floated in mid-air before she fell down on top of him. The impact loosened his leg, and the two of them skidded the rest of the way down to the landing. I had to kick at his arm to get by them.

When I walked out into the night, the cool summer air washed over me, and for the first time in over thirty years, I felt the weight off my soul. I had avenged my father, as any good son would. I tucked the gun, a four-inch Colt Python, into my pants and made my way down the street, covering the three blocks calmly, but briskly. I heard the sirens just as I was getting into the stolen Olds I’d stashed in the public lot. It seemed like a long walk, but I cut across the tracks and stayed mostly out of sight. I put on an old man’s slouch hat, pulled it down low, and drove slowly to the highway. I passed a pair of cop cars and an ambulance speeding to the scene as I crossed the intersection onto Route 1 heading south. They’d be too late.