the whipping boy

we were supposed to write a scene of violence. i just wrote this one, although i'm not sure it's the one i'm going to read if we have to read these out loud in class tomorrow. on the other hand, it's best heard out loud in a southern accent, so maybe i should.

*

The game comes to an abrupt halt when it’s Gwen’s turn to stab Eric with the screwdriver. Eric’s already got three holes in his chest where the other three of us took our turns, and there’s blood sliding out of the holes in little dark gushes, dripping down his skin and soaking into the waistband of his jeans. Gwen’s standing there with the screwdriver in her hand, looking at it.

“Go on,” I tell her. “What are you waiting for?”

She’s just standing there staring at that screwdriver, the whole metal part streaked red, the yellow plastic handle smudged where Jerry got blood on his hand before he passed it to Gwen. Without looking away from it, she says, “I don’t think I want to.”

“Why not?” I ask. “It’s not like he can feel it.”

She just shrugs, then holds the screwdriver out to me because it’s my turn again. But I don’t take it from her.

“You did it last time,” I say.

“Yeah, but…” Gwen exhales heavily and looks upward like she does when she wants to avoid a conversation but knows she can't. “My mom says—“

“Your mom’s a sympathizer,” Jerry interrupts.

“No she’s not! She just said we shouldn’t because they,” Gwen lowers her voice, “they look like people.” She glances over at Eric and then away again. “Even though they’re not.”

Me and Jerry and Doug all turn to look at Eric. He's standing there with blood running out of those holes in his chest, breathing funny, in shallow little hiccups that probably mean one of his lungs got punctured again. Maybe from Doug's turn. The tip of the screwdriver actually came out the other side on that one. It's a Phillips head.

"They are people," Doug says. "That don't mean they're human, though."

"Just cause they can't feel anything--" Gwen starts, but I stop her because I know what she's going to say.

"They can feel stuff, usually," I tell her, "but my dad had Eric's pain sensors disconnected. Right, Eric?"

Eric nods. He's still got that stupid pleasant expression on his face that never goes away, even if you hit him in the head with a two by four. And I know, because I've seen Daddy hit him with a two by four out in the garage, just to see if he could knock the smile off his face. "I'm alright," Eric wheezes, and the words seem to rattle around in his chest before they come out. "Go ahead, Gwen."

"See, it's okay," I tell her. "He don't care."

She's staring at his chest now, at the wounds already there, the blood. It's real human blood, I know, but I never did think of Eric as my brother. He's just the boy Daddy bought to beat on instead of me, and anybody that lets himself get treated that way ain't a real person. "I don't know where," Gwen says, gesturing with the screwdriver at Eric's body. "I mean, I don't want to, you know. Kill him."

"You can just go in a hole that's already there," says Doug. He points at the lung puncture. "Just go right on through that one again."

While the three of us watch, Gwen lines up the tip of the screwdriver with the hole Doug pointed out. But before she shoves it in, she looks up at Eric's face, that dumb smile. "Is this okay?" she asks him.

"It doesn't hurt," he says. And they stand there that way, just looking at each other for what seems like a really long time. Jerry glances over at me and raises an eyebrow like maybe we should leave the two of them alone, but after a moment Gwen goes on and shoves the screwdriver in, straight through the fleshy tunnel of Eric's body, through his lung and out the other side with a slick, squishy sound. Then she lets the handle go and takes a step back, and we look at Eric standing there coughing, the yellow plastic sticking out of his front and the tip of the metal peeking out of his back, trickles of blood swelling out of the hole around the screwdriver and running down.

By the time Eric catches his breath enough to talk, there are tears in his eyes from coughing so hard. "Told you," he says, looking up at Gwen. "Didn't feel a thing."

*