It rained like hell on that autumn night in 1974 when the cops stumbled upon Blac Balor in the act of strangling a waitress on her way home from the night shift. By then, Blac Balor had painted the faces of thirteen women, dressed them like Raggedy Ann dolls, and strangled them to death. He was 19.
While searching Balor’s apartment, cops discovered tiny dioramas Blac had carved, each depicting one of his murder scenes. When questioned, Blac confessed to being an artist, claimed to have loved his victims, which he considered his creations whom he desired to preserve in a more perfect, permanent state.
On his twentieth birthday, a jury of non-serial killers convicted Blac. A judge sentenced him to hard time for life. In the joint, Blac pursued his artistic passions. He read classic literature—particularly Proust—endeavored to emulate the Romantic poets and studied painting and sculpture. Assigned to the prison woodshop, he became an accomplished carpenter and expert marionette maker. Doing time, loving art, and craving the love prison had denied him, he became enthralled by Proust’s quote: “The greatest work of art is love.” Blac Balor became determined that through his art he would be beloved.
In 2019, a newspaper ran a Sunday feature about the reformed Blac Balor. Then TV news filmed him, featuring his hand-crafted marionettes performing a snippet of Romeo and Juliette. A confident, well-groomed, articulate Balor put on a show of being civilized. An expert string-puller, he assumed the role of host to the TV people who called him Mr. Balor or sir.
My mother and I were watching the evening news while eating meatloaf, mashed potatoes and peas when the Blac Balor segment came on.
“Remarkable man,” my mother, transfixed by the flickering TV image, swooned. “So handsome. Probably lonely. I’ll write to him.”
Every day she wrote a letter to “Dearest Blac,” then strolled to the corner mailbox humming, “When I Fall in Love.”
Figuring that either her letters wouldn’t get delivered or that a lunatic serial killer had better things to do than answer sickly sweet love letters from an aging widow hundreds of miles away, I didn’t discourage Mom. But….
Blac Balor wrote back, thanking Mom for her kindness, saying he hoped she’d write again to brighten the days of this now repentant blackguard.
Mom had her hair done, bought new clothes, had professional photos taken and sent those to Balor.
Balor sent Polaroids of himself wearing a wifebeater shirt and showing off his muscular and tattooed arms.
Awestruck, Mom wrote back asking to visit him.
“Ma,” I said, “Are you fuckin’ crazy?”
She waved her hand at me like I was a bothersome fly.
Every weekend for three months, Mom rode the train 200 miles each way to the penitentiary and back, spending a night in a cheap motel. Then, one Saturday afternoon, she texted me a picture of her and Blac Balor, side by side, holding a sheet of looseleaf paper inscribed in red marker, “Just Married.”
Our state pen was a progressive place with educational and sports programs—and conjugal visits. To “conjugate,” inmates had to build an impeccable record and be deemed trustworthy. Blac Balor—artist, marionettist, TV personality—had convinced the universe that he’d transformed himself from serial strangler into a decent human being. The personification of truth, justice and the American way.
Mom put our house up for sale and bought another near the penitentiary. I found a cheap, basement studio apartment to live in.
Mom phoned me often, saying, “I’m happier than I ever dreamed.”
“He’s a murderer. He’s the devil.”
“I love him.”
One night I couldn’t hold back, and shouted into the phone, “Ma, remember that story about the woman who brought a half-dead frozen snake into her house, thawed him, fed him and nursed him? Remember how that turned out? Snakes don’t change.”
“Silly boy. Snakes always change their skin—make themselves new all the time. Blac is proof of such change.”
I quit arguing. I tried to be happy that Mom was happy. Since my dad left decades before, she’d been lonely and raising me wasn’t easy—even if I never strangled thirteen women that the cops knew about and probably a bunch more. I guess I envied her—and Blac Balor. I mean, I wasn’t a serial killer, but I couldn’t find anybody to marry me. I had an okay job, good teeth, and I lived with the sweetest Tabby cat in my dark basement studio apartment. Still, nobody ever wrote news articles about me, or did a TV story. Or wrote me love letters, any letters. What did a murderer serving life in prison have that I didn’t? Some people can get away with murder, even if they’re caught.
Life went on just that way. I lived with my cat, while Mom and Blac Balor enjoyed connubial bliss one weekend each month on what I envisioned as a raggedy-ass double bed inside a windowless concrete box.
Near Christmas, Mom pestered me to spend the holiday with her and my “stepfather.” I declined.
Christmas morning the phone rang. I figured Mom was calling to say Merry-Merry and that she was happy.
“This is Warden Roy Bean. I have bad news. Your mother’s dead. Balor strangled her during their conjugal. We found her—ropes tied to her neck, wrists and ankles; her face made up like Raggedy Ann—hanging from a water pipe. Balor said their sex game went wrong.”
“What happens to that murdering snake now?”
“Charges filed. Prosecution. Probably gets another life sentence.”
“So, he got away with murder?”
“He’ll have other consequences, of course.”
“Consequences? What are my chances of getting that son-of-a-bitch-bastard alone for ten minutes?”
“Non-existent. To even get inside you’d have to be arrested, convicted, but even then…”
“Arrested, you say?” Of course, I’d miss my cat, but I started planning. If teenage Blac Balor could strangle thirteen women, how hard can it be?
