He nodded his head in front of the bike and I managed to look up. We were about to start up a large hill. We were both still pedaling like mad, those huge white-feathered wings flapping madly up and down.

"Wow!" I think I said. I'm not really sure if anything actually came out or not. It was probably just a dry wheeze.

"Don't worry, Wally! I'm sure this old beast'll be able to clear that mountain!" It wasn't the bike I was worried about.

Skad was truly amazing. When he leaned back to talk to me he didn't even sound like he was out of breath. And then I had a crazy idea. What if I was there, on the ground, pedaling and pedaling and pedaling and Uncle Skad really was somewhere way up in the sky, flying toward the sun? Could it be that I was just confused and making the whole thing harder on myself? I looked down at his feet just to make sure that his legs were actually moving. They were, but it didn't look like he was putting nearly the effort into it that I was. Maybe if I hadn't given up to the whumming and the wheezing a long time ago, if I had continued to think we were flying, then maybe I wouldn't be so exhausted now. But it was too late to start flying in my head again. I was down and we were about ready to start the hardest part.

As soon as we hit the base of the hill, the pace automatically slowed. It was a good thing my legs were numb. Whatever movement they generated was of their own free will. The sizable hill I saw became Skad's mountain. I couldn't do anything but look at the top of it and wait. I had faith in our legs. I had faith in the bike.

Uncle Skad rang the bell and called over his shoulder. He was able to speak in a normal voice since we were moving way too slow to create any ear friction, but he still insisted on shouting.

"We should make quite a show, Wally!"

I tried to say something and unleashed a volley of coughs instead.

"You okay back there, Wally!"

"Fine, fine," I managed. "Where are we going?"

"I told you! Anywhere! But first I thought we'd stop and get a bite to eat! I'll buy!"

"Sounds great. Are we almost there?"

"Top of the mountain, Wally! It's called the Hilltop Cafe! A wonderful place! We'll be there in no time! Just enjoy the ride!"

We were going slow enough for me to look around again. It must have been late afternoon sometime. The hill was covered in trees. The air felt cooler since we were in constant shade and everything smelled woody. I always found the woods to be slightly creepy. They seemed completely disorienting, like you'd never be able to remember where you were. And the further you looked into them, the darker it became. I imagined people living in secret houses and doing secret things like making moonshine and f.u.c.king relatives. Both of us were up off our seats, putting some weight into the thrusts and taking some of the strain off our legs. The road wound and twisted to the top of the hill. I knew this made it less steep but it seemed to draw the excursion out to a nearly epic proportion.

A huge car headed straight for us before swerving and honking its horn. I realized that cars had been pa.s.sing us all day. If I'd been more aware, this would have made me kind of nervous but I was too busy with everything, I guess. Uncle Skad had that effect on me. I didn't think it would be possible for me to feel unsafe around him. It had been under twenty-four hours since we met and I already felt comfortable. I hadn't really said much to Skad since telling him my story yesterday, which was another thing. I didn't feel compelled to talk, like I should just say stuff for the h.e.l.l of it, but I did feel like I could blurt things out. If I had a thought I could go ahead and say it.

My stomach started growling and I wondered where the h.e.l.l this restaurant Skad was talking about was. The trees gradually thinned and the ground gradually leveled.

"Any minute now!" Uncle Skad shouted. I really hoped he'd stop doing that soon. "We won't take this bird through town!"

We rode it for a few more yards. Once we reached the leveled top of the hill it felt like we were gliding along on ball bearings. We were at the edge of a very small town. Actually, calling it a town was, more or less, hyperbole. It was more like the fractured remains of a town. The top of the hill really wasn't large enough to contain an entire society. To my right I saw the Hilltop Cafe, a small, rundown-looking restaurant. A large red neon sign on its roof flashed "EAT" into the coming dusk. Across the street, to my left, there was a football field, the gruff shouts and plastic clatter of helmets and pads echoing through the quiet. On the far side of the hill were a few houses, built there for the view, no doubt. A gas station sat beside the Hilltop. On the left side of the road, where the football field was, there were a couple of other two-story brick structures. I couldn't tell what they were. I didn't really give a f.u.c.k, either. I was ravenous.

We rode the bike over to the side of the road and got off. My legs nearly rubberbanded me to the ground. We pushed the bike over into the edge of the woods.

"How'd you like the trip, Wally?"

"It was all right, I guess."

"It was fantastic!"

"Fantastic!"

"We'll leave this baby right here. Let's go get some food."

"Thanks for being so nice, Uncle Skad."

"h.e.l.l. Thank Otto, it's his money. May he rest in peace. Otto was an expert panhandler and he didn't drink so he had a good amount socked away."

Both of us walked very slowly toward the restaurant. It was pretty windy there at the top of the hill and the air was starting to moisten a little. It would probably rain all day tomorrow, I figured. The air smelled much better up here than down in Milltown. I could smell the dirt and the gra.s.s-all the smells were good clean smells. And as we got closer to the restaurant, I could smell even better smells, the toasting of bread, the frying of flesh and boiling vats of fat.

Skad took a deep breath. "Ah, the best food this side of the carnival, Wally. You get whatever you want."

The gla.s.s door jingled as Skad swung it open. The only people in there were a family sitting over in a corner booth. None of the waitresses were visible. I suddenly had an overwhelming urge to urinate. Apparently Skad also had the urge to urinate. We matched each other step for step, our shoes sticking to the yellow tiled floor, as we retreated for the obscure back location that harbored most bathrooms. In this one, you had to open a door to a small vestibule before the actual bathroom door. I got my hand on the handle first and then Uncle Skad's covered mine. We paused as though both of us were locked in some form of h.o.m.ophobic dilemma. Skad looked me in the eye and issued a challenge: "This is okay. We can have a pee race if you feel up for it."

I didn't grow up with any brothers or any f.u.c.kness like that and when Racecar p.i.s.sed he had to sit down, so I didn't really know what the h.e.l.l a pee race was.

"What's that?" I asked.

"Oh, it's easy. There's nothing to it. Just do what you normally do."

We crowded into the small bathroom and quickly shut the door. Skad kicked up the toilet seat and had his pants unzipped before I even knew what was going on. He dangled his p.e.n.i.s over the bowl and gave it a shake. I unzipped my pants and fished around for my p.e.n.i.s. I chuckled with the absurdity of it all. Normally my p.e.n.i.s was sucked back into the body cavity. That probably came from being so high- strung. I looked down and saw Skad had already started, his p.i.s.s pretty much the color of the bathroom. I had trouble starting. I've always been a little bit pee shy. I almost never went at school but if I did I had to use a stall. Skad had a really respectable-looking d.i.c.k. I was sure he had it named something really masculine like Brock or Rocky or some f.u.c.kness like that. Mine looked weak. Long and skinny. A real Mr. Lawrence.

Finally, I started up, the p.i.s.s screaming out of me. There was nothing like a good p.i.s.s after a long wait. I was sort of surprised anything came out. Skad's stream was slow and steady, heavy-sounding. Mine was the urinary equivalent of a greyhound. The two streams crossed each other, bubbling in the once clear water. Skad's stream slowly ground to a halt. It looked like he had won. A few seconds later, I finished. Skad's d.i.c.k suddenly let go with a couple more spurts and he shook it vigorously. He held the entire thing in his hand while he urinated whereas I'd normally only had to use a couple of fingers or perhaps a thumb delicately pressing down on the head. Anyway, now it looked like I had won.

"d.a.m.n that prostate," Uncle Skad said. He zippered up and looked at me. "Congratulations, Wally, you're the first person to beat me in a pee race. Maybe I should retire. Wallace Black. The new pee race champion!"

"Hooray!" I said.

"Okay, let me walk out first. When I get to the booth and sit down, you go ahead and come out. Don't want people to think we're weird."

Skad left the dim bathroom vestibule, picked a booth in front of the window and sat down. Once he got a cigarette lit, I went ahead and walked out too. I walked quickly and with my head down. The only time I was really conscious of the horns' weight was when I lowered my head like that. This really felt like the first time I'd been out in public daylight since tooling around Milltown in the wheelchair yesterday morning. Christ, that was only the day before! It felt like a f.u.c.king century ago. After I got to the booth and sat down, I felt a little less self-conscious. I mean, I was used to being a freak anyway so you'd think I'd just be able to shut out those voices around me. But it was just the opposite. As soon as I went anywhere in public my body established some form of hyperawareness to the mocking voices around me.

For instance, when I got to that booth and sat down, I heard a little girl from the family table over in the corner say, "What's wrong with that man?"

The mother whispered something in her ear, I couldn't quite make out everything she said, but I'm pretty sure I heard the word "dangerous" in there. That made me want to laugh. I found the notion absurd. Maybe someone who knew about the murders would think I was dangerous but I didn't think the horns made me look dangerous. I figured it probably had more of the effect of watching a prep.u.b.escent boy struggle with his first set of weights. Nevertheless, after hearing that, after knowing I'd been noticed, I sat there in dread. I sat there in dread because I kept waiting for some sort of macho instinct to kick in with the father of the family, like he'd have to come over to our table and kick the s.h.i.t out of me and Uncle Skad to show his family how protective he was. But he made no attempt to stand up. He just kept glancing back over his shoulder to make sure we weren't moving in to rape, rob, and loot his family.

"Hungry, Wally?" Skad asked.

"Starved."

"Make up your mind quick. Here comes the waitress."

"Oh, I know what I want."

The young waitress sauntered up to the table wearing a one piece skirt the same color as the toilet bowl once it was filled with mine and Skad's p.i.s.s. She couldn't have been much older than me and she already looked totally beaten down by the world. Snapping her gum between her teeth, she lackadaisically ran her eyes up my horns. She wiped her greasy brown bangs off her greasier forehead and slapped her order pad down on the table, leaning over it. She wore her hair pulled back into a sloppy ponytail, dandruff flaking rampantly around the canyon of her part.

"What can I getcha?" She refused to make eye contact.

Skad ordered a cheeseburger, fries, and coffee. I ordered country fried steak. This place seemed like the type of place that would have especially good country fried steak. Country fried steak was the wonderful invention seemingly designed with the express purpose of creating a heart attack. You start with a cut of the poorest quality beef. The beef is then covered in breading and deep fried. Once fried, it is coated in a thick white gravy. I also ordered a c.o.ke.

The waitress schlepped back to the unseemly looking kitchen. I hadn't eaten in a lot of restaurants so it must have been something instinctual telling me we probably wouldn't be seeing the food for quite a while. She did, however, return immediately with our beverages. She lingered at the table for a few uncomfortable moments before going back to the kitchen.

I looked out the window, across the street to where the high schoolers were playing football. I realized Skad was staring at me.

"You don't say a whole lot, do you, Wally?"

"I guess, no, not much."

"I think talking is something you have to practice, anyway. Sometimes, if there's no one around to talk to, you just kind of get out of practice."

I nodded my head. I just a.s.sumed I didn't talk because I didn't really have anything to say.

"Myself, I don't normally talk too much, either. But when I saw you, I had the overwhelming urge to talk. I don't know why." He took a sip of his coffee and flicked his ashes onto the floor, neglecting the ashtray sitting right there on the table. "You know all that stuff I told you about at the house last night?"

I nodded my head.

"Lies. There wasn't any truth to that at all. It was a story. Actually a series of stories. You're the first person to hear them though. Well, that's not true, either. The stories aren't entirely my own. Dr. Blast and I cooked them up. That's what we do when we get together. We drink, we smoke, we tell stories... We build stories. My life has not been that eventful at all. If only it was, Wallace, if only it was. I'm surprised Sadie never told you the truth of it.

"They wanted me to go to war. Only they didn't call it a war. They called it a conflict. I almost went to Vietnam, Wally boy. Fortunately, I was completely f.u.c.king nuts. At first, I was only a little bit crazy. But then, all of that stuff started happening and I started imagining myself thousands of miles from home. I'd heard about what it was like. Something snapped, Wally. Something just snapped. You've felt the snap, haven't you, Wally?"

I nodded again.

"Do you know what happened when I snapped, Wally? Do you know that what I did was of catastrophic proportions and it directly involves you? Do you know what I did when I snapped?"

I shook my head, whispering, "No," because there was something about Uncle Skad that had made me completely captivated. He no longer moved his hands in the dramatic fashion. He stared straight into me, his eyes reaching in and wringing the soulhurt I suddenly felt.

"I imagine it. There's a metallic kind of feel in your body. This feeling, it has a way of completely and totally overwhelming you, driving you to your knees. It feels like a lifesize railroad car is roaring through your head. Sometimes, when this feeling comes over you, you are not you anymore. You have no control over yourself and you'll do anything, anything to make that bending, warping feeling go away. It's so consuming that it blocks your vision, blinds you. The logic it imposes is its own fever logic. The ends to the means are completely ridiculous because the means themselves are ridiculous. One time I woke up while pulling out one of my teeth because, according to this dream logic, I had to excise the tooth so the car would start when I woke up in the morning. I didn't even have a car. Do you know how numbing it is to wake up to something like that? To 'come to' and realize that, for however brief a period of time, you were not able to exercise any self-control whatsoever? Of course you do.

"So one morning I wake up, I come to, because I was never really asleep, you see. I come to and, in my hands I'm holding a sledgehammer. And I'm standing in a bed soaked red with blood. My parents are below me. Smashed. Pulp. I threw the hammer down and rolled out of bed and lay on the floor and cried and cried and cried. Do you know why I cried, Wally?"

"I think... maybe."

"Not so much because I had killed my parents. Anybody could have killed them. Part of the crying, of course, was the sadness of their death. But what made me really break down was that brief period where the dream logic overlapped reality and what I was doing made perfect sense. The fact that I remembered, quite clearly, bringing the hammer down onto their heads, that was what made me break down. The fact that I was capable of doing something like that. That I could have, at any time, found that behavior rational. But the act was done. And I had to go away for awhile. It was a departure that I welcomed, that I deserved. It was there, in the hospital, that I discovered myself.

"I spent most of my time there wondering this: is a man who he is, should he be judged by his actions of the past and maybe even the present, or should he be judged by who he wants to become, what he is trying to be? Should a man be judged at all? And who is he judged by? Look out there." Skad motioned out the window, at the high school kids practicing football. I turned my head to watch them.

"You see those people out there? I'm afraid they may be the judges of people like us. Oh, that's not to say all of them are like that or, for that matter, that you and I are exactly alike. But their mentality, think about it. They want glory, they want recognition. So once a week, they have a heap of lights pouring down onto them and, for a couple of hours anyway, they have everyone's attention. Most of them even have their names across their back so they can be identified. The strongest, the most cunning, the one who can smash the most people down-that's the one that gets the most recognition. And look where they play, a field covered in lines. Cross some of the lines and you're out of bounds-the game stops. The entire game is about getting to the end zone-the final prize. Sometimes I think that's what's missing, the final prize. But it's not their fault, of course. That's just a metaphor. Sometimes I feel like I'm only living to die."

The waitress came over and sat the plates of food down on the table.

"Can I get you anything else?" she asked.

"We're fine. Thanks," Skad said. Then, to me, "Dig in."

We devoured our food, our mouths making sounds like rabid animals. Skad alternated between taking bites of his food, sips of his coffee, and drags off his cigarette. The rapidity with which he performed each of these actions looked like an amazing task. Comical and demonic looking smoke rolled out of his mouth as he chewed the food. While I ate, I couldn't stop thinking about Uncle Skad. I found myself periodically glancing at him, trying to find the murderer somewhere within. I couldn't do it. His eyes were too gentle. There was an overall deliberate delicacy in his movements that rendered him incapable of taking anyone's life. Something about the way he held his head suggested he was the type of man who was perfectly content with food, drink, and smoke. He'd probably forgotten about women a long time ago.

There was that other stuff he said, too. The f.u.c.kness about only living to die. Sometimes I felt exactly like that. Sometimes I waited to die. I thought that him telling me all about that stuff would make the wave of soulhurt come back over me. But it made me feel better. Knowing he felt like that too somehow made me feel like I didn't have to feel bad. He stated it as though it was a fact of life.

We pushed our plates aside once we finished and the waitress came over to refill my c.o.ke and Skad's coffee. She laid the check down on the table, a waitress' subtle hint to settle up and get the h.e.l.l out.

"You can pay that at the register," she said. She turned to walk away and then, pausing, turned back around and looked at me. "Why the h.e.l.l are you wearin them stupid horns?"

I was expecting someone here to point that out. I don't exactly know why. Nevertheless, I think I fielded it a little bit better. I reached up and felt them, stroking their grandeur, feeling the confidence from Skad across the table.

"My mother, uh, f.u.c.ked a bull," I said.

The waitress's mouth dropped open, but she was clearly angered by the comment.

"Well, them's the most r.e.t.a.r.ded things I ever seen. n.o.body from my school would date a boy with horns."

"Thank you," I said.

"I think you better pay that and get out. Boss told me to tell you we don't need no freaks and b.u.ms in here. This ain't that kind of place."

Then Skad asked, "Just what kind of place is this, ma'am?"

The waitress, looking about ready to cry, clenched her teeth and said, "This here's a decent place."

Then she turned to walk back to the kitchen. I felt and heard my bowels shift. I had religiously had a bowel movement a day ever since I turned twelve. I managed to hold it in yesterday but this was the big one.

I stood up and leaned over the table. "Excuse me," I winced to Uncle Skad and hurriedly walked toward the bathroom. I undid my pants as I opened the door. I turned, facing the inside of the door, angling my a.s.s toward the toilet and pulling down my pants in one swift motion. My bowels released with an explosion of sound and stink. It was a succinct s.h.i.t, however. One heave and it was over.

Finished, I wiped and stood up to wash my hands in the sink. I don't really know why I bothered. It's not like it really mattered, the rest of my body was so filthy. I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror. I'd felt the horns, but this was the first time I really saw them. And it was the first time I'd really seen myself. I looked truly hideous. My face was lumpy and swollen. My nose was crooked. One of my eyes wouldn't quite open all the way. The horns rose up from my scalp, monstrously large. It made me sad to look at myself. The wave of soulhurt quickly washed over me. Was it panic? Maybe it was panic. Every time the soulhurt would infest me, I had the overwhelming urge to sabotage everything I had. To escape from wherever I was. And it was with that feeling I had another terrible idea. Another terrible idea I knew I would follow through on. Not as terrible as my ideas of the day before, but terrible nonetheless.

I was going to leave Uncle Skad's side. It had nothing to do with Uncle Skad, there was just something inside of me screaming that I deserved to be alone. I knew the voice was right. No, I knew it was true. It may not have been right. I would undoubtedly be happier if Uncle Skad were to accompany me wherever I went but I started alone and I felt like I had to end up some place alone and I didn't want to drag Uncle Skad into anything else I might do. Knowing that I was going to follow through on it gave me the most soulhurt of all.

I shook my hands out over the sink and finished drying them on my pants. How was I going to tell him? I briefly thought about just running out but I didn't really think my legs would work very well and that just didn't feel like the right thing to do.

I walked out into the restaurant and was surprised to see that Skad wasn't sitting in the booth. Maybe he'd left without me. That would have certainly been a relief. I didn't think that seemed like Uncle Skad but, then again, how much did I really know about him? I didn't think he seemed like a murderer either. It seemed more likely he led a country called Pung and spent time in h.e.l.l than murder someone. Was it the brutal reality of murder that should have made it seem more likely to believe? Did I seem like a murderer to him? Because, most definitely, that's what I was.

Lowering my head, I quickly walked out of the restaurant. When the door shut behind me, I was sure I heard the waitress shout something at me, but I couldn't make out what it was. Outside, the sun was well on its way out of sight and the air felt chillier, the wind having a slicing quality on the top of the hill. Skad was out there, smoking a cigarette and turning in circles. He saw me coming and stopped his rotations.

"You don't look so good," he said. "I hope I didn't scare you with that stuff back there."

"No," I said.

"Because, you know, when it's all said and done, we are really living to live. Happiness can be easily obtained. All I need to do is wake up to a cigarette and a cup of coffee. Maybe have some whiskey before I go to bed at night. A roof over my head. A warm fire. Those are the essentials. Where we off to next?"

I gritted my teeth and mumbled, "Gonna go."

"Eh, Wally?"

"I think I'm just gonna go."

"By yourself?" I could tell by the gleam in his eye that he was disappointed. Not angry, just sad.

"I think it's just something I need to do alone." I moved closer to him and hugged him. "I've enjoyed being around you."

"You're a good kid, Wally." Then he grabbed me by the upper arms and thrust me away to arm's length. That electric feeling shot through me and I could see that bluish glow glittering around in his eyes. "You can do anything you want to do! Just find something! Go wandering and it will come to you. Anything you do, do it with pa.s.sion! That's the problem with the world today, there's no pa.s.sion. Walk like G.o.d, Wally! Walk like f.u.c.king G.o.d! What do you think of when you think of... G.o.d?"

Truthfully, I didn't really think about G.o.d too much, unless I was feeling especially pitiful. "I don't know... creation?" It was the first thing that popped into my head.

"Then create. No one creates anything anymore. Now we want machines to do everything for us. Create a fantastic life, Wallace. Start now and spend the rest of your days creating the perfect life so you'll die a happy man."

Then he let go, but I still felt that electricity sizzling through my marrow, through my head.