Tears Soak A Calloused Heart
Chapter One: Life Is Cheap, Death Is Free
The sound of his footfalls of the carpeted floor of the forest was all Joe heard. His breath came in ragged and painful shards. He ran to escape the world behind him. The world that had tormented and tortured him for the last seventeen years. He had done this for too long. He was not going to allow the world and those close to him to tear him apart piece by piece like so many demonic harpies. This was it. He was done.
Each running footstep brought him closer. A yawning chasm of self destruction lay just beyond his view. He felt like his sanity was seeping away from him. His death was the only thing he could focus on.
The trees were sparse but tall evergreens blocking out the sky with their thick canopy high above his head. The land had once been farmland and was crisscrossed occasionally by stone walls. The ground was clear of brush and blanketed with a thick layer of brown pine needles.
Joe stumbled and dropped to his knees, skidding to a stop. His mind barely registered the pain in his legs from the impact with the dry earth. The whole of his tall, thin body felt wracked with spasms. His muscles all tensed and ached. He ran his fingers into his thick blonde hair and gritted his teeth as though through sheer force of will he could end all of the pain and all of the suffering.
It didn't work.
Defeated he dropped his hands to his sides. He leaned back and unleashed a primal death cry at the sky. He ran his voice hoarse screaming.
Panting he leaned his shoulders forward. His hair hung in tendrils in front of his face. Slowly and surely his hand reached into the pocket of his green BDU jacket. From the pocket he pulled what looked like a simple wooden block, long and thin. The block had words scrawled across it that Joe had written himself when his depression seemed only to be beginning.
The words, in plain blocky script, read 'Life Is Cheap, Death Is Free'.
Joe held the block before him with one hand on either end. He pulled his hands apart and the block separated along a seam in the center revealing a glistening chrome blade about four inches in length. The knife had been made for fishermen, if dropped into the water the wood would float and the knife would not be lost. The back of the blade was even serrated in a wicked looking scaling tool. The blade itself Joe had sharpened to a razor edge, as he did with all of his knives.
The glint of the blade consumed him. The world seemed to just fade away and all that was left was Joe and that bright steel blade.
Slowly and purposefully Joe pushed the sleeve of his jacket up to his elbow, bearing his pale, scarred flesh to the air. Almost with a will of its own the blade came down and painlessly parted the flesh. He felt the blade enter him and slide smoothly through him until it struck the bone.
He yanked the knife away revealing the wound. The pink flesh was parted by a large canyon of an injury. Strangely, there was still no pain. The walls of muscle dropped down to the gray white bone. Beneath the paper skin the purple and blue vein slid soundlessly toward the center of the wound.
Then the blood came.
It began as two channels near the bone and a trickle from the side of the vein. Quickly it filled the cut and engulfed Joe�s wrist. The viscous, crimson liquid flooded around his forearm in a thick band and ran down the underside of his arm to drip off his elbow and stain the ground below.
Joe felt the world slipping away with the flow of blood from his arm. Everything faded leaving only a blissful peace. He closed his eyes and embraced it. This time he had done it. He had finally succeeded.
***
The first thing Joe noticed as his sensed faded back to him was the musty smell of raw earth. The pain began to creep in, filling him with a dull, aching agony. Carefully he opened his eyes and the world swam before him. He closed his eyes and waited. His head was throbbing and his breathing was shallow. He tried to breathe deeply and orient himself.
He was sore all over and his stomach was clenched in hunger.
He opened his eyes carefully and waited for the world to come into focus around him. Before him he saw the forest floor very close. Slowly and carefully he sat up. His head swam and he felt like he would pass out. He waited and the vertigo passed. Opening his eyes again he saw the forest around him. He sighed.
He was still alive.
"Fuck." He said softly.
He hurt so badly. He brushed dirt and pine needles from his face and hair where he had collapsed. Slowly he climbed to his feet and waited for the vertigo that washed over him to ebb away. He staggered a few feet and leaned against a tree, panting heavily. He wasn't sure he could walk home, now. He groaned and looked around again. He was definitely still in the forest. Where he had been laying the blanket of needles was disturbed and there was a patch of stained brown.
He looked down at his arm and saw the mess he had made. His arm was dirty and brown blood was caked along the back of his arm. His hand tingled so painfully he lifted it and saw that his normally pale skin was splotched with red and blossoms of purple bruises were forming around the wound.
He sighed again. He carefully removed his green jacket and inspected it. It was dirty and tattered but seemed to have no bloodstains on it. He must have collapsed with his arm away from him. He dropped the jacket to the ground and pulled his gray, hooded sweatshirt over his heard, carefully maneuvering it around his injured wrist. Once his sweatshirt was off he shivered. The air was chilly already and it was rapidly growing colder as Joe stood in only a t-shirt and jeans.
Carefully he wrapped the gray sweatshirt around his wrist creating a makeshift bandage. With his good hand he picked up his jacket, shook it to remove excess dirt and needles and draped it over his shoulders. The jacket provided a little warmth that way but not much.
He looked at his watch. He sighed. He had been on the ground for more than an hour.
"Fuck." He said again.
He turned and slowly walked away. The walk back to his house was slow and laborious because he had to keep stopping when he got light headed or nauseous. After another half an hour he emerged from the forest to the back yard of the small home he shared with his mother and her boyfriend. The day was still and quiet. The leafless trees rustled in the breeze and the sky was a dull gray.
Joe approached the house and climbed the steps of the front porch, holding his injured arm close to his stomach. He stopped and listened at the door. Inside all was quiet. Slowly and carefully he opened the door and stepped in. The interior looked gloomy as his eyes adjusted. He breathed a sigh of relief when he saw that the living room was empty and the house was silent. His mother was away at work at Curt commonly laid down for a nap in the afternoon. He had hoped that Curt would still be sleeping and was glad that he was.
The living room was quaint with a couch against the wall opposite the door and a rocking chair to one side. An archway led to the small kitchen next to a large bookshelf. Next to the couch was a short hall that led past two doors, Joe's mother's and Curt�s bedroom and the bathroom. At the end of the hall was a stairway that turned on itself as it rose to the second floor. Joe walked quietly to the stairs and up them.
At the top of the stairs was another short hallway running left along the length of the house. The door to the right at the top of the stairs went into Joe's room. The other two doors stood open and went to a sewing/craft room that Joe's mother had set up and the other went to a room that Curt called his 'shop' or 'den' but was really nothing more than storage.
Joe slipped through the door to his room and closed it behind him with his elbow. He took a deep breath, he had made it without being discovered. The last thing he wanted was to try and explain what had happened to his arm, especially to Curt.
Joe's room was not particularly small but he had put as much in it as he could fit. It was about fifteen feet square with a window opposite the door that looked out across a sloping roof and then the road about a hundred feet beyond that. That is, if Joe ever opened the heavy curtain he had hung over the window he would see that. Under the window and against the right wall was a twin bed, unmade where Joe usually slept. To Joe's right was a small desk placed kitty corner so anyone sitting at it would have their back to the corner. The left wall was dominated by a dresser and bookshelves. The shelves were overflowing with various things Joe had picked up and decided to keep. Dominating several shelves was Joe�s collection of cassette tapes. Music, he felt, was one of the only things that kept him sane.
His eyes lingered over the cluttered room. He nearly hadn't returned here. He hefted himself from the door and walked to the dresser. He pressed play on the tape deck of a small, battered radio and it exploded to life with sound. The heavy riffs of Pantera's thundering music calmed him.
"Live in a hole,
But stay close to my kind,
'Cause they understand,
What burns in my mind."
He shrugged off his jacket and let it fall to the floor. He reached out with his good hand and brushed aside several objects. Pez dispensers, a dog skull, some stones, a dirty t-shirt. He wrapped his fingers around the cold metal of a blue first aid kit and picked it up. He walked back over to the desk and sat down heavily in the chair. He set the first aid kit down and then used his good hand to shove a stack of books and papers off the desk, sending them crashing to the floor.
He opened the first aid kit and dumped its contents onto the desk. Out fell some gauze pads, a bunch of band-aids, a roll of cloth dressing tape, an ace bandage and about five rolls of gauze. He had stolen all of it from his school's medical supply though he wasn't sure what he might need it for at the time. He had used it for this sort of thing a few times in the past.
He placed his wounded arm, palm up on the desk. Slowly and carefully he unwrapped the sweatshirt wound around his arm. The last layer peeled away revealing the grisly mess. He hung his head. This was as bad as he had gotten. He had never made such a mess of himself, though he had come close more than once. What a fucking failure. He couldn't even manage to kill himself properly. He botched up and made a mess of everything. It was like a cursed Midas touch that turned everything he touched into shit.
He stood up and grabbed a black zip up sweatshirt from the top of his dresser and partially put it on. His wounded arm he kept close to him under the jacket. He grabbed the roll of medical tape, a bandage and a roll of gauze from the desk and tucked them into his pocket.
He stopped his radio and the quiet was oppressive. He slipped out the door and crept down the stairs. On the small landing where they turned he stopped. Below he heard the television on. That meant Curt was up. He looked down into the living room but couldn't see him. He looked toward the bathroom door and saw that the room was empty. On the other side of the hall the bedroom door was closed. Joe was unsure where Curt might be lurking. If Curt was on the other side of the bedroom door, waiting to open it as Joe neared then he was found out. There would be no way to hide his injury then. He needed to clean it and to do that he had to get to the bathroom.
He made up his mind and moved. He rushed down the step with his back turned in the direction of the bedroom door. If Curt was there then he would only see Joe's back. If he was in the living room and chanced a look down the hall then hopefully he would only see the fact that Joe was entering the bathroom and not the state of his arm. Joe reached the bottom of the stares and was through the door to the bathroom swiftly. He latched it shut and flipped the lock with a sigh of relief.
The bathroom contained all the things one would expect to find in such a room. A sink, a toilet and a bathtub. The room was made small by the inclusion of a washing machine and dryer against one wall as well as a set of curtained shelves.
Joe took off his sweatshirt and piled it on the washing machine. From one of the shelves he pulled a white face cloth out and ran the water in the sink. When the water got warm he wet the washcloth and began to wipe the blood from his arm. The warmth was soothing to the ache in his muscles. The cloth dirtied quickly and Joe was forced to run it under the water several times as he cleaned his arm. The dirty rust colored blood contrasted harshly against the clean, white porcelain of the sink. Joe cleaned all around the wound before dabbing at it with the soiled rag. The warmth filled the wound and soon began to bleed freely into the basin.
Joe breathed sharply through his teeth and tried his best to keep it from bleeding more. Fresh droplets of blood splattered into the sink and ran down the sides to join the dirty water swirling around the drain. Joe held his arm, wrist down over the sink so the blood would not make a further mess and grabbed his sweatshirt from behind him.
The world was swimming again. He tossed the contents of his pocket onto the small counter next to the sink and ripped open the gauze pads with his teeth. As deftly as he could manage with the vertigo washing over him and the world going out of focus he placed the pads over the cut and snatched up the roll of gauze. He began to wrap his wrist as the blood soaked through. He wrapped tightly several times until the blood stopped seeping through the topmost layer. In the process he used the entire small roll of gauze. Using his teeth again he tore of two long strips of tape from the roll and secured the gauze in place.
He staggered back and leaned against the washing machine for several seconds as the waves of disorientation began to move away and the spots before his eyes cleared. He felt parched. His stomach churned and knotted in on itself. As much as he despised food he knew he needed something.
He cleaned up the sink and put his sweatshirt on. The long sleeves hung down over his hands and very neatly covered the bright white beacon of a bandage. He took the washcloth and went upstairs with it. In his room he wrapped it up inside the blood soaked sweatshirt and placed the clothing aside. Later he would go into the basement and throw it into the woodstove, thus eliminating the evidence of what he had done.
He still felt shaky and dry. He didn't want to face off against Curt today but he knew he needed something. He didn�t quite care if he passed out and died but he didn�t want to suffer through the pain of starvation to get there so he ate just enough to keep himself alive but not enough to make himself vomit it all back up because he had never liked puking.
He drew himself back up out of his chair and walked back down the stairs. As he emerged into the living room he saw Curt lying sprawled out on the couch watching television. Curt was tall and lanky, much like Joe, and had long brown hair and a close, sand colored beard. Joe tucked his chin down and walked past the arm of the couch toward the kitchen.
"Keep your fucking music down." Curt spat as Joe walked by. "I was trying to fucking sleep."
Joe slipped into the kitchen and ignored him. He stopped and leaned against the counter with his good hand. Fury rose up within him and he had to fight the desire to grab a knife from the nearby cutlery set and go stab Curt right in his fucking face. Joe looked around. Before him was a wide sink with two basins flanked on both sides by linoleum countertop. To his right was a white refrigerator and to his left as a gas range. Behind him was a pine table under a large picture window. The window looked out over the front yard and the driveway. Beyond the driveway was the garden that Joe's mother tended. It was about the time of year for her to begin pulling up rocks that had been trust toward the surface by the winter frost and plant her rows of vegetables.
Joe tried to calm down. He breathed and closed his eyes but his heart still hammered and his body still twitched with adrenaline fueled rage. One day he would not be able to control himself and he would turn Curt into a bloody pulp only barely recognizable as the human it once had been.
Thoughts of eating anything really just made Joe feel like he would puke it up as soon as he ate it. Instead he just poured himself a glass of Mountain Dew and sat down at the table. He rested his arm before him and sipped at the soda. He watched as the condensation on the glass formed a small ring on the polished surface of the wood. His mother�s small, brown station wagon pulled into the driveway and she walked into the living room. Curt never moved from his place on the couch.
Joe stayed silent in the kitchen, he really didn't want to argue and fight today. His arm hurt and he just didn�t have the will for it. So there he sat, ignoring them in the other room. Even when Peggy Conrad entered and busied herself putting away groceries Joe ignored her. Joe�s mother was a short woman of middle years with long brown hair and a hard face. Perched on her nose was a pair of wire frame glasses that were as much a part of her features as anything else about her face.
She removed a can of beer from the refrigerator and turned around. She leaned against the counter as Joe studiously ignored her. She gulped down the beer before finally breaking the silence.
"So how was school today, Joe?" She asked.
Joe fought against rolling his eyes. He didn't know why she bothered to even feign interest.
"It was okay." He responded without looking at her.
"Did you do anything interesting?" She continued.
Joe scoffed.
"It was school." He said plainly.
From the corner of his eye he saw her roll her eyes and shake her head.
"Did you even go today?" She asked in an accusing tone.
Joe dropped his hand back to the table nearly spilling soda from the glass. He turned to her.
"Mom!" He said annoyed. "Yes I went today. Christ."
He turned back away from her shaking his head. He had in fact gone today though he would have reacted the same way even if he hadn�t. He knew admitting skipping was a sure fire way to induce an argument. He�d probably get one even without admitting.
"Well, it's not like you haven't done it before." She said harshly.
He knew it.
"Yup." He said apathetically.
He didn't want to argue so it was easier just to placate her until she went away.
"Great attitude, Joe. Wonderful, really." She said. "You're never going to graduate if you keep this shit up."
Instead of answering or even responding to her and perhaps escalating the argument, Joe ignored her. He sat sipping his soda and acting like he was alone in the room. For his effort he got a loud sigh from his mother.
"Are you going to work tonight?" She asked obviously annoyed.
She just didn't want to stop harping on him about shit tonight apparently.
"Yes." He said allowing his annoyance to show.
"Well Curt and I are going over to Arthur's." She explained. "Don't forget to lock the door when you leave."
"What am I, twelve?" Joe asked.
"No but you sure as hell act like it sometimes." His mother retorted quickly.
Joe went back to ignoring her. He didn't bother to fight the urge to roll his eyes this time.
"You'll probably be home before us." She said.
"I won't wait up." Joe said still without looking at her.
With a sigh she turned and stormed out of the room. From the living room Joe could hear her speaking to Curt in hushed tones. Joe didn't particularly care what they were saying though he was sure that the topic of their discussion was him.
After a few minutes he heard them walk out the door. Moments later his mother�s car started and pulled out of the driveway.
For several long minutes Joe just sat and listened to the wonderful silence.
Joe decided against going to work that night and instead enjoyed the time he had to himself. He seldom had free run of the house without having to coexist next to people he despised and who felt similar about him. The tension was better left downstairs and outside his bedroom door.
Walking all the way to work for a meager three hours and putting up with the drama just wasn't worth the effort. He listened to the stereo, skipped supper, wrote some poems and watched Star Trek: The Next Generation. He sat back with his feet up in the plush recliner. The episode was not one that he had seen before so he was enjoying it immensely.
Outside he heard a vehicle pull into the driveway and his heart sunk. He weighed his options. He could retreat to his room where he wouldn't have to deal with Curt and his mother or he could put up with their presence until the episode was over. Guessing that the episode was only going to run for another twenty minutes or so he decided to just ignore them until he was done watching TV.
Moments later the door slammed open and in walked Curt and Joe's mother. In their hands were matching beer cans. Joe ignored them and they seemed to not notice him sitting there in plain sight. They walked between him and the television and disappeared into the kitchen. The sounds of their drunken talking rolled out to Joe. Even though they weren't in the room he continued ignoring them.
A few minutes later Curt walked out and, without even a glance at Joe, went directly to the television and changed the channel. The images of Captain Picard and Counselor Troi vanished to be replaced by a football field and several padded players milling around.
"What are you doing?" Joe demanded.
He lifted the remote control and changed the channel back to Star Trek.
Curt, who had started to sit on the couch jumped back to his feet.
"Change it back, I want to watch the game." He said with a harsh tone.
"I'm in the middle of watching something." Joe said.
Curt turned and changed the channel again. The football game reappeared on the screen. Immediately Joe changed the channel back. Curt flipped the channel and spun on Joe. His hard eyes glared down at him.
"Do it again." He threatened.
Staring right at Curt Joe defiantly lifted the remote and changed the channel. Curt stormed out of the room to the kitchen. Joe knew it wasn't over but he was stubbornly determined to watch the remainder of the show. From the kitchen Joe heard heated talking between Curt and his mother. He studiously ignored them and focused on the television.
After only a few minutes Curt and Joe's mother emerged from the kitchen. His mother moved down the hall that went to their bedroom and the bathroom. Curt walked purposefully across the living room and stopped next to the television. He reached down and yanked the cord from the wall turning the screen blank. He dropped the cord and wheeled around to glare at Joe.
"What the hell did you do that for?" Joe said sitting forward.
Curt just glared at him.
"Give me the remote." He said after a moment.
"What?" Joe said.
"Now!" Curt nearly screamed.
Joe wanted to just drive the remote into Curt's fucking head.
"No." Joe answered.
With a quick step Curt came forward and snatched at the remote. Joe latched a hold of it with both hands and for a moment they struggled to pull it away from each other. With a powerful arm Curt slammed his palm into Joe's chest knocking him back into the chair. With the remote in hand he stepped back.
"Fine!" Joe yelled as he jumped from the chair and stormed into the kitchen.
Joe fumed and raged silently in the dimly lit kitchen. In the living room he heard the TV come back on. He really wanted to just step out into that living room and start pounding on that rotten motherfucker�s head. Really just pulverize him with that stupid remote control.
Joe breathed deeply and clenched his arms at his sides. Eventually he stopped shaking. Fuck it. He was just going to go to his room and the hell with them and the rest of the world.
He opened the refrigerator and stopped. It was mostly empty except ample amounts of beer but that wasn�t what stopped him. He poked around a bit but he couldn't seem to find the two-liter of soda he had bought. It had been there earlier. He began to get angry again, suspecting what had happened to it. For good measure he checked the freezer and then the cupboards. It was not unheard of for him to leave things in strange places without thinking. As he suspected he did not find it.
Furious all over again he wheeled around and went back into the living room. He was in no mood to play any of Curt's stupid games.
"Where's my soda?" Joe asked with an edge to his voice.
Curt, who has now laying on the couch, turned his head to Joe.
"I dumped it out." He said simply.
"What?!" Joe nearly yelled. "What in the hell did you do that for�"
"If you're gonna hog something that not yours then there's gonna be consequences." Curt explained.
Joe couldn't believe what he was hearing. That didn't even make any sense. Curt had been known to do some mind numbingly stupid things in the name of fairness in the past and each time Joe couldn't seem to figure out how it made any sense at all. Joe could never figure out Curt's logic and this time was no different.
"That soda was mine." Joe said, trying his best to remain calm.
"And the TV's mine." Curt said with a tone of finality and unerring logic.
Joe's resolve failed.
He snatched the remote control off the arm of the couch and hurled it as hard as he could against the wall. As if in slow motion he saw its black form strike the paneling and shatter into dozens of pieces. Let�s see him enjoy his precious TV now.
"Fuck you!" Joe screamed.
Curt tried to lunge at Joe but he was rising from an awkward position and managed only to snag Joe's sleeve as he was turning away. With a powerful tug he was free and moving up the stairs.
The burning pain in Joe's arm caused the soreness in his chest to fade. When he had pulled free from Curt's grasp he had managed to pull the bandage on his wound and re-open it.
He walked into his room and closed the door behind him. Downstairs he heard Curt speaking harshly to Joe's mother. Fuck it. Let him get pissed. Let him talk his bullshit. Joe didn't care right now. The fight in him was gone. He sunk to the floor leaning against his door and put his head in his hands. There he sat for quite some time.
***
The night was late and the room was quiet. Joe sat alone on the edge of his bed. His chest showed the scars of a hard life. His ribs poked through his skin revealing exactly how malnourished he really was. A large bruise spread yellow and purple across his right side from a fall a week earlier. In his left hand burned a cigarette, nearly forgotten and in his right was a knife, not forgotten.
He sat there listening to the soft sounds of an old Simon And Garfunkel record float gently from the radio.
"A rock feels no pain."
He tried to muster the will to move but it seemed lost.
His arm throbbed in pain, keeping rhythm with each beat of his heart. His left hand came up and planted the cherry of the cigarette into the soft flesh of his right forearm. He sucked in a breath as the flesh singed and his synapses flooded with the sensation. The world was lost to that one white hot point.
He moved the cigarette away and panted. He thought it strange that he couldn�t smell the burnt flesh.
Then, slowly at first, the pain in his arm came back and the pain of the burn ebbed away. He lifted the cigarette again and jammed it back into his arm. He sucked in a deep breath as the cherry transformed the skin on his arm. The pain nearly sizzled into his brain. All was lost to that one point. All of his worries. All of his suffering. All of the destruction he had wrought. That one point made it all go away. When he couldn�t stand it anymore he pulled the cigarette away, panting.
All was at peace for a moment in time.
Then as the searing faded and ebbed away the anguish and suffering came back as with a tide. He breathed deeply and heavily. He felt like screaming. He rocked back and forth on the edge of his bed.
Swiftly he planted the cigarette back into his arm. The pain consumed him. On the fringes of that masochistic solace seams began to tear and the chorus of anguish moved in. A flood of overwhelming despair and pain washed over him. He removed the cigarette and jammed it back into his arm again and again and again. Over and over he tried to wipe out the world with the pinpoint of focused intensity that had taken it all away before but it was no use. It only added and enhanced the steady thrumming of reality.
Joe reached out and jammed the cigarette into the ashtray on his bedside stand. He stabbed the knife down into the mattress beside him and stood up. His entire being was focused on a single thing. Hanging from the exposed crossbeams of his ceiling was a length of white nylon rope tied in a simple slipknot to create a noose. He pulled the chair from behind his desk under it and stepped up onto the chair. He slipped the nooses over his head and tightened it on his neck.
"And an island never cries."
He kicked the chair back and it fell over on its side. His weight dropped about four inches and the rope cut into his neck as it tightened and pulled up toward his head. As his body snapped against the length of the rope the knot around the rafter slipped and he crashed to the floor in a heap.
His head throbbed and the sound began to fade from his ears. His sinuses began to ache. His vision blurred. His fingers tingled. He floundered on the floor as his equilibrium began to leave him. Spots swam before him as he dragged himself over to his bed and up onto it. He pawed at the rope cutting into his neck.
The room was gone. All he could hear was the blood rushing inside his head. A steady thrumming whine like the wind through a field of tall grass. His body felt cool. He managed to get two tingling fingers under the rope and yanked on it pulling the knot and loosening the rope around his neck. He pulled it over his head and with a weak hand hurled it across the room
The world flooded back with a rush of throbbing pain. He gasped and wheezed uncontrollably. His head felt twice its normal size. He hurt and his vision was still badly blurred. He panted and groaned on the brink of unconsciousness. Finally he stopped trying to hold on and lost himself to the blackness.
Novels Home
Chapter One: Life Is Cheap, Death is Free
Chapter Two: On The Way Down
Chapter Three: From The Bottom Looking Up
Chapter Four: As These Tears Soak A Calloused Heart
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