Just after dawn Bruce stopped snoring and crawled out of the tent. He looked over at me where I sat against a cypress tree with my hands tied behind my back and fumbled with his prosthetic leg, strapping it onto the ruined pink thigh that protruded from his shorts.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou comfortable?\u201d he asked. \u201cYou want them ropes loosened up a little bit?\u201d<\/p>\n
He was serious. I told him I was fine even though my arms were stinging numb and I hadn\u2019t been able to feel my fingers since before the sun came up.<\/p>\n
Bruce shrugged and started a fire. He put some coffee in the percolator and stretched in the sun, wind-milling his arms, bouncing to keep his balance on the leg. The scar shifted with each movement, crawling like a snake across his torso, emerging from his shorts just to the right of his belly button, cutting across his chest and ending where his nipple would have been had it not been gouged away by the shrapnel.<\/p>\n
When the coffee was done, Bruce poured two cups and stood looking down at me, trying to figure out what to do. \u201cTell you what,\u201d he said finally. \u201cI\u2019m going to undo your arms.\u201d He went around behind the tree and fiddled with the ropes, and I felt my arms fall to the ground. I tried to lean forward but he\u2019d left the ropes lashed around my chest and gut. \u201cDon\u2019t get excited,\u201d he said. \u201cYou ain\u2019t going anywhere yet.\u201d He gave me a cup, but my hands were still dead and I couldn\u2019t hold it. He chuckled and grabbed my right hand, kneading the palm between his fingers and looking up at the sky. I thought about punching him with my other hand, but I didn\u2019t think I could muster the strength to do anything more than flop my arm harmlessly toward his head. When he was done, he\u2019d rubbed enough life back into my hand for it to feel like it was on fire, but it worked reasonably well, and we sat, drinking coffee and not looking at one another.<\/p>\n
When I\u2019d finished the coffee, I told Bruce that I was about to piss my pants. \u201cSo piss your pants, then,\u201d he said. I told him that he would have to shoot me before I wet myself, and I was pretty sure I meant it. He tilted his head from side to side to look at me like a bird sizing up a worm. Then he stood up slowly and pressed the barrel of the pistol against my forehead. It was warm from sitting in his lap. \u201cIf I tell you to piss your pants, you piss your fucking pants,\u201d he said. He cocked the pistol and my chest went empty. So did my bladder.<\/p>\n
When he saw what I\u2019d done, he laughed and dropped the gun in my lap. \u201cGo ahead,\u201d he said. \u201cPick it up. The fucker\u2019s not even loaded. It wasn\u2019t even loaded last night, because I was scared I\u2019d shoot you if it was.\u201d He went to the fire and stoked it absently for a few seconds before he looked at me again. \u201cI would\u2019ve let you up to take a leak, though,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m not an asshole. You ought to know that.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Though Bruce didn\u2019t believe it, there was nothing going on between me and Francine while he was in Iraq. I cut her grass and changed the oil in her car, removed spiders from the bathtub and poisoned her mice, things like that. That was all.<\/p>\n
I scrupulously recounted these things in my emails to Bruce, especially after he\u2019d called me one night when it was his turn to use the phone. He\u2019d begun that conversation by telling me that hadn\u2019t done any fighting this time, was just a glorified clerk around the base, but he\u2019d been in a convoy that was ambushed. \u201cThing is,\u201d he said, and paused so long I thought the line was dead \u201cI saw one of them, laying in the road when it was over. It was a kid, probably fifteen. The back of his head was blown off, brains leaking all over the cement. And I turned him over and the motherfucker looked exactly like Malcolm Shumpert.\u201d<\/p>\n
Malcolm Shumpert was a kid who\u2019d been ostracized in middle school so badly that his parents were forced to move him out of town. He was rumored to have gone on to Stanford or MIT, where he\u2019d developed some sort of medical robotics technology. Someone told me he\u2019d retired in his twenties to study Buddhism in Singapore, that he was married to a Bollywood actress, that his daughters were up and coming tennis pros. If he ever came back to Hammer Springs, though, he\u2019d still be the kid who fucked a school lunch apple in the janitor\u2019s broom closet.<\/p>\n
I didn\u2019t know what to say, so I said nothing. \u201cFrancine said you been coming over a lot, that you\u2019ve been a big help,\u201d he said. \u201cI just hope you know where the goddamn helping <\/em>stops.\u201d Of course I knew where the helping stopped, I told him. I didn\u2019t tell him about what had happened two nights before, when Francine, sloppy drunk on wine and Xanax, called me in the middle of the night saying she\u2019d heard someone breaking into her house. She asked me to stay the night, and I did, on the couch.<\/p>\n At some point in the night, she\u2019d crept into the living room, and I woke with her head on my chest, her fingers fumbling with my belt. I asked her what she was doing even though I had a pretty good idea, and she pretended to pass out. I left as soon as she was asleep for real, and we never spoke of it. Two weeks later, she got the news that Bruce had lost his leg to a roadside bomb and might not make it out of the hospital in Kuwait alive.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Bruce decided that we couldn\u2019t very well have me sitting there in piss-pants, so he reloaded the pistol and undid my ropes, reminding me that he still wasn\u2019t sure if he was going to shoot me or not, but that if I tried be a badass, he\u2019d make up his mind quick. I stripped down and waded into the creek. It was early June, and the water was still cold.<\/p>\n I thought about diving underwater and seeing how far downstream I could swim before coming up for air. I might be able to get away from him that way, even if he managed to get in the canoe to follow me, but I wasn\u2019t sure, and then I\u2019d be buck naked and literally up the creek, and I had no delusions about my survival skills, even with a one-legged man as my adversary not counting the gators and the moccasins.<\/p>\n We were somewhere on his uncle\u2019s vast property, where we\u2019d taken a canoe five or six miles up the creek. He\u2019d brought me out here under the guise of a weekend camping trip, saying he needed to get away from Francine. I\u2019d thought at the time he had no way of knowing how much I needed to get away from her myself, how much she needed to get away from both of us. \u00a0I decided to come back ashore, thinking that I would be better at talking my way out of this rather than attempting some daring, athletic escape. Probably he didn\u2019t really want to shoot me anyway, but you never knew with Bruce.<\/p>\n When I\u2019d put a new pair of shorts on, Bruce tied me to the tree with my arms behind my back again. He sat down in front of me and put his face in his hands. \u201cAlright,\u201d he said finally. \u201cI realize this is a pretty fucked up situation to be asking for advice, but what am I going to do?\u201d<\/p>\n I watched a tick crawl up my sock and wade through my leg hair. \u201cAre you asking me if I think you should shoot me?\u201d\u00a0 I asked.<\/p>\n \u201cI guess I am,\u201d he said, leaning over to pick the tick off of me just as it sank its mouthparts into my leg. He crushed it with his thumbnail.<\/p>\n I\u2019d like to say that I faced him down with steely eyes, that I didn\u2019t crack under the threat of imminent death, but the truth is I started to blubber. I told him that I was sorry. I told him that I loved him. I begged for my life, sniveling so much that I tasted the snot running out of my nose into my mouth.<\/p>\n \u201cJesus Christ, what a show,\u201d he said when my fit subsided. He brought a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped the snot from my face and said, \u201cI tell you what. I\u2019m going to hobble off in the woods here and take a shit while you pull yourself together.\u201d I suppose shitting in the woods is a bit of a production with only one leg, because he was gone for a long while. I tried to compose myself while he was away, wondering if I\u2019d helped or hurt my cause with my pathetic outburst.<\/p>\n When he returned, I had a little speech prepared. \u201cLook, Bruce,\u201d I said. \u201cI don\u2019t blame you for wanting to kill me and all. But it\u2019s not worth it. There\u2019s no way you\u2019d get away with it. People know I came out here with you.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWell,\u201d he said, \u201cthe thing is, none of that\u2019s going to matter, cause I\u2019m fucked already. I might as well tell you now. I killed Francine yesterday morning before we came out here. I put a pillow over her face\u2026\u201d\u00a0 He paused for a second to mime his actions for me. \u201cAnd I shot her with this very pistol, killed her right in her sleep. Never felt a goddamn thing.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n I\u2019d known Bruce since we were six years old. We\u2019d been inseparable until we drifted apart in high school, when he became a bit of a baseball star and I spent most of my time trying to figure out how to smoke dope in the bathroom without getting caught. He married Francine after graduation and went into the army, just like his father, who\u2019d come back from Vietnam and promptly shot himself after knocking up Bruce\u2019s mother. I flunked out of Clemson while Bruce was fighting the first Gulf War, and by the time I was thirty I\u2019d found myself living back in Hammer Springs, selling radio advertisements.<\/p>\n I bought a house in a neighborhood quaintly named Live Oak Terrace despite there being no oak trees lining our cul-de-sacs. It turned out that Bruce and Francine lived about four doors down from me, and we became friends again in the way that men approaching middle age are friends: we drank beer and grilled steaks together, planned fishing trips that we never took, borrowed each other\u2019s lawn implements, and generally stayed out of one another\u2019s lives. Then his reserve unit got called up again. He cussed the army and said he wished he\u2019d gotten out when he had the chance, but I think he was secretly glad to be going back.<\/p>\n Bruce was in and out of the hospital for a year after he came back to the states, having surgery after surgery. Even after he was out of the hospital, there were endless appointments: doctor visits, post-traumatic stress counseling, physical therapy, measurements and fittings for the prosthetic. On my days off I\u2019d drive him around to these appointments or just keep him company while Francine was at work. He always made a big show of hobbling around to do things for himself, though he did consent to letting me do his yard work. He\u2019d sit in the sun and watch me cut the grass and prune the bushes.<\/p>\n He loved to speak frankly about the state of his recovery and all of his bodily functions, and I listened, laughing when I was supposed to laugh and shaking my head gravely when I wasn\u2019t. The medicines made his shit the color and consistency of used motor oil, he told me, and though the doctors said he might not ever get a hard-on again (they\u2019d picked four individual pieces of shrapnel out of his dick) he proudly announced one day that he\u2019d managed to jerk off that morning and held up his hand for a high-five. He always seemed buoyant with me, the very picture of mental stability and perseverance. But from the things that Francine whispered to me, I knew that he saved his darker moods for her.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n When I first moved back to Hammer Springs, I didn\u2019t know what to do with myself. Knocking around town on my own was unbearably lonely, but soon I\u2019d settled into a little routine that made my early thirties pass by quite comfortably. There was no one to answer to, except my mortgage company, and I was in possession of myself in a way I\u2019d never been before. I took to reading a book a week and saw just about every movie that came out. I started playing golf at Bruce\u2019s insistence, and driving around a freshly manicured lawn in the brutal summer heat trying to knock a tiny ball into a tiny hole as an excuse to get drunk seemed like a good enough metaphor for life as any. I went out for a drink a few nights a week, and just when the routine started to get dull, something random would happen: a stranger at the bar with an interesting story, a reasonably attractive woman who took enough of a shine to me to press herself against me in the dark for a few nights before drifting away.<\/p>\n That was about all I wanted from women in those days, but Francine used to cluck over me as if being unmarried at my age was an unnatural and tragic state of affairs. Once, at a New Year\u2019s Eve party, just after Bruce had gotten the news that he would be shipped off to Iraq in a few months, the woman Francine tried to set me up with had gotten drunk and left with some guy I didn\u2019t know long before midnight. As the New Year rang in, I sat on the patio listening to the firecrackers and watching all the happy couples smooch.<\/p>\n I was actually relieved that Francine\u2019s friend, whom I found interminably boring, had abandoned me for greener pastures, but Francine took pity on me anyway. \u201cStevie here doesn\u2019t have anybody to kiss,\u201d she announced at the stroke of midnight. Then she licked some salt from the rim of her margarita glass, and as fireworks bloomed in the sky she gave me a kiss that was a little too involved to be innocent but just short of scandalous. Bruce just laughed it off and planted an exaggerated open-mouthed smooch on her after she was finished with me. \u201cLong as you don\u2019t kiss her like that<\/em>,\u201d he said, patting her on the ass, \u201cI don\u2019t see no harm. No harm at all.\u201d<\/p>\n It was like that with Francine. She flirted with me openly in front of him, putting her legs up on my lap when we were watching football or licking her fingers to smooth the cowlick in my hair. Bruce never let on that it bothered him. I suppose it was just that he trusted me, but it made me feel neutered, as if he didn\u2019t perceive me as a threat at all.<\/p>\n All that changed after Bruce came home from the hospital for good. Francine called me every other day or so and told me all about their problems. She told me that he got angry with her when he couldn\u2019t perform, and once he\u2019d gotten it in his head that she\u2019d bribed the doctors to spike his medicine with something to keep him from getting erections so she\u2019d have an excuse to leave him. Some days he drank until he was sure that she secretly wished he\u2019d died in Iraq, or that she was carrying on an affair with her boss, a dentist she\u2019d worked under for ten years. Once he\u2019d even accused her of being an Al Qaeda operative.<\/p>\n All of this put me in quite a strange position. On the one hand, I was loyal to Bruce, and it made me uncomfortable to hear things he wouldn\u2019t tell me. On the other, Francine\u2019s news brought out the protective streak in me, and I wanted to shield her in some way from Bruce\u2019s madness.Maybe she told me those things because she had to talk to someone and she trusted me. Or maybe she was playing me like a fiddle, getting me all riled up and leaving me with no options to do anything about it. I don\u2019t know. But I do know that when she knocked on my door one evening and collapsed onto my couch, I would have done nearly anything to stop her from crying.<\/p>\n Bruce was away for the weekend, playing golf on his new leg with some army buddies in Myrtle Beach, when Francine knocked on my door. \u201cI don\u2019t know why I came over here,\u201d she said, resting her head on my chest. I could feel her tears soaking through my shirt. I smoothed her hair and tried to calm her down, and somehow my face came close to hers. Before I knew what was happening, we were kissing urgently and her hand was in my shorts and my breathing quickened when she found what she was fumbling for, and I thought that it couldn\u2019t be all wrong because at least she wasn\u2019t crying anymore.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201cYou know I was just joking about killing Francine,\u201d Bruce said, looking back at me over his shoulder from where he sat fishing on the bank of the creek. \u201cDon\u2019t worry. Your girlfriend\u2019s okay. She\u2019s probably cleaning somebody\u2019s teeth right now. I just\u2026\u201d he stopped talking when the rod tip jerked and he reeled in the line. When he got the fish to the bank he walked back to where I sat, still tied to the tree. \u201cWell,\u201d he said, holding a catfish by the bottom lip, \u201cit ain\u2019t much to brag about, but it\u2019s good frying pan size.\u201d He dropped it at my feet and I watched it flop around in the dirt. \u201cSoon as it dies I\u2019ll cook it up,\u201d he said. \u201cYou hungry?\u201d<\/p>\n I nodded, though I didn\u2019t think I could eat anything, especially this creature writhing at my feet. I\u2019d pretty much stopped responding to him after he\u2019d told me about killing Francine. As soon as he saw that I wasn\u2019t interested in talking any more, he\u2019d gotten himself a half-pint bottle of Old Crow from his backpack and sat on the bank of the creek fishing, turning up the bottle every now and then. I thought about Francine lying on their bed, the blood soaking through the pillow over her face, feeling like it was my fault, but knowing it was just as much hers. I tried to be relieved by the news that he\u2019d only been joking about killing her, but for all I knew, he was lying now and had been telling the truth earlier.<\/p>\n \u201cSo anyway,\u201d Bruce said, \u201cI didn\u2019t mean that. I\u2019m not going to lie. I mean, I thought about it all right.\u201d He turned up the bottle and then nudged the catfish with the toe of his fake leg. \u201cWhen I first started putting two and two together, and I figured out what was going on, I thought about it, and the longer I thought about it, the more I figured I\u2019d do some crazy shit like one of these motherfuckers you see on the news that shoots their wife and then cleans up the house and finally blows his own brains out later that afternoon.\u201d<\/p>\n He put the barrel of the pistol against his temple and looked at me. \u201cWhat you think\u2019s the best way to do it?\u201d he asked. \u201cLike this, or through the mouth? The mouth thing is more dramatic, you think? But you remember Buddy Craven\u2019s daddy? He tried to shoot himself like that, and ended up just blowing his goddamn jaw off. Had to eat through a straw the rest of his life. What he should\u2019ve done is did it like this-here.\u201d He stuck the gun between his teeth and turned the pistol so the barrel pointed at the roof of his mouth. \u201cYou can\u2019t really miss like that.<\/p>\n \u201cAnyway, then I started thinking that I better get you in on the plan, too. I mean, a double-murder suicide thing. And then I had these moments where I was like fuck it<\/em>, I\u2019ll just move out and get a divorce and play fucking golf all day every day and they can both just go to hell. <\/em>But then that would always go away and then I\u2019d come back around and I\u2019d want both of you to fucking die.\u201d He took another drink and bounced on his toes. His prosthetic made wet farting noises and he dragged his camping chair over in front of me and sat down to take the leg off and swab at his stump with a rag. \u201cWhat I\u2019m trying to say here is I don\u2019t know what to do.\u201d<\/p>\n I didn\u2019t say anything.<\/p>\n \u201cYou know what?\u201d Bruce said. \u201cI didn\u2019t even know about it until you told me last night. I just figured is all. I sniffed it out about two weeks ago. I started to ask Francine about it, but that wouldn\u2019t have done any good. Number one, she\u2019s a good liar. Number two, I reckon you know I got it in my head that she was messing around with the dentist a while back, and she woulda just told me I was paranoid. She\u2019s good at that, you know, setting you up to feel like a jealous asshole like she ain\u2019t doing anything wrong to make you feel like that in the first place.\u201d<\/p>\n He looked at me like I was supposed to say something. I didn\u2019t have anything to say. I was wishing I\u2019d have denied it too. Maybe I could have swindled him into feeling like a jealous asshole the way he was sure Francine would have done. But he\u2019d proven trickier than I was when he\u2019d trained the pistol on me after we\u2019d settled in around the campfire and said \u201cI reckon you better tell me all about you and Francine. And don\u2019t leave anything out, because she\u2019s done told me all about it.\u201d<\/p>\n I wasn\u2019t mad at Francine for letting me come out here in the woods with her maniac husband knowing that we\u2019d been carrying on behind his back for six months; I was hurt. I couldn\u2019t believe she\u2019d do me like that after the way we\u2019d been with each other. Now I couldn\u2019t believe I\u2019d fallen for it, though I might have ended up telling him even if he hadn\u2019t tricked me. It had been bothering me since it started, and every time Francine and I got together I swore when she was gone that it would never happen again. I\u2019d started to tell him myself on several occasions, but it just never seemed like the right time. I guess if you wait around for the right moment to confess something like that, you\u2019d be waiting for a long time, or at least until there was a gun pointed at you.<\/p>\n But what was there to say? I\u2019m sorry? That every other time I\u2019d started carrying on with a woman all I could think about, in the beginning anyway, was her, that I\u2019d catch a phantom whiff of this new lover while I was at work or hear a song and want to play it for her, but that with Francine all I thought about was him and how guilty I felt for screwing his wife? That it both unnerved and excited me to think about him finding out as she lifted my shirt and kissed my belly hair? That I wondered if she made the same little noises with him as she did with me? That Francine took some kind of pleasure in telling me all sorts of things about him, how he liked her to punch him in the chest while they were doing it, when they used to do it, or that he wanted her to cup his balls in her hand every night as they fell asleep? That it shocked me that she was unfaithful enough to tell me those things, but that they fascinated me anyway? That I loved her?<\/p>\n In the end I’d just stammered something about being sorry, and the whole thing had devolved into a question and answer session:\u00a0 How long<\/em>? I don\u2019t know, about six months. How often?<\/em> A couple of times a week, usually in the afternoon while he was playing golf. Nothing going on while he was away in the war?<\/em> No, I swear.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The catfish flopped weakly against my shoe and died just as the sun went down and Bruce was about halfway through his second half-pint of whiskey. He gutted the fish and laid it in a pan over the fire. He sat by the fire, pushing it around with a fork and singing softly to himself. He tilted back the bottle and his singing got louder. Tried to give you consolation when your old man had let you down<\/em>, he sang, like a fool I fell in love with you, you turned my whole world upside down<\/em>. I tried to place the song, but I couldn\u2019t, at least until he got to the chorus and gestured toward me with the fork like it was a microphone and he was urging the crowd to sing. Come on, y\u2019all know the words<\/em>, he said and wailed Laaaaaaaaaaay-luh. You got me on my knees. Laaaaaaaaaaaay-luh. Beggin\u2019 darlin please.<\/em><\/p>\n He stopped abruptly, the fork still held in front of his lips and said \u201cwhat, you not in the mood to sing a song with your buddy tonight? Let\u2019s see if we can find one you\u2019ll like.\u201d He took a nip from the bottle and cleared his throat to sing again. When I was just a baby<\/em>, he began, and then switched to a lower key and started over. When I was just a baby, my mama told me son, always be good boy and don\u2019t ever play with guns. But I shot a man in Reno just to watch the sumbitch die<\/em>.\u00a0 He stopped singing and turned the fish in the pan. \u201cI don\u2019t guess you like that one much, either,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n I didn\u2019t think I could eat anything, but I told Bruce that I wanted some of his catfish when he offered it so he would untie my arms. I don\u2019t know why, but if he was going to shoot me I didn\u2019t want to die with my arms tied behind my back. I managed to get most of it down, though I was too nervous to eat and gagged on every bite.<\/p>\n When we were done he cleared away the dishes and stood over me. \u201cWell,\u201d he said. \u201cI guess it\u2019s about time to get the show on the road. You want a swig of this liquor before I do it?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cFuck you, Bruce.\u201d I said. I hadn\u2019t meant to talk.<\/p>\n \u201cFuck me. What kind of way is that to talk to your friend? Like I\u2019m not the one\u2019s been getting fucked all along.\u201d He paused for a moment and staggered back a step or two before he tilted up the bottle and finished the last sip. \u201cOf course, I mean fucked<\/em> in the\u2014what do you call it?\u2014figurative sense. I reckon you\u2019re the one\u2019s been getting it literal.\u201d<\/p>\n He paused for a moment and scratched his chin with the barrel of the pistol as if he was trying to figure out his next move. \u201cI\u2019m going to undo the ropes here in a second. Don\u2019t try anything, because I\u2019d hate to have to shoot you in the back.\u201d He went around behind the tree and I felt the ropes go slack. I stood up and he poked me in the ribs with the gun. \u201cWalk over there about halfway to the creek,\u201d he said. I did, thinking about running and diving in the water, but before I could bolt, I felt the pistol against the small of my back. \u201cNow turn around real slow and get down on your knees.\u201d I did.<\/p>\n \u201cNow,\u201d Bruce said, shifting his weight off of his fake leg, \u201cyou got anything to say before it\u2019s over?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYou\u2019re going to regret this,\u201d was all I could manage.<\/p>\n \u201cYeah, yeah, yeah. We been through all that this morning, remember? I was thinking maybe you had some last words or something. You\u2019re good with words. Seems like you could come up with something kind of poetic you wanted to say.\u201d<\/p>\n He looked up at the stars for a second and I started to lunge at him, but he looked back at me, straight in the eyes, before I could move. \u201cLet\u2019s say I\u2019m just fucking with you, that this gun ain\u2019t even loaded. Let\u2019s say I just want to scare you a little bit, and then we\u2019ll get back in the canoe tomorrow morning and go back home and it\u2019ll be all awkward and shit for a little while, but then one day down the road, maybe a year or so, I\u2019ll figure, hell, he ain\u2019t the first guy ever did something lowdown for a piece of pussy, or love, or whatever the hell you want to call it, and by then me and Francine\u2019ll be divorced and one day I\u2019ll call you up and I\u2019ll say \u2018hey, let\u2019s go play some fucking golf,\u2019 and then we\u2019ll play eighteen holes and both shoot about eighty, and then we\u2019ll come home and sit on the porch and get drunk and laugh about the time you started screwing my wife and you pissed your pants because you thought I was going to kill you.\u201d<\/p>\n He bent down a little closer to look me in the face, the gun just out of my reach. \u201cOr, let\u2019s say I am<\/em> going to shoot you right now,\u201d he said. \u201cLet\u2019s say I\u2019m a crazy motherfucker, and I did kill Francine\u2019s cheating ass this morning like I said. Let\u2019s say I\u2019m planning on shooting you in the guts and listening to you cry for a few minutes until I get sick of it and put a bullet right through your goddamn forehead and then I\u2019m going to take a piss on your dead body and wade out in the creek and blow my own brains out. And you still don\u2019t have anything at all to say?\u201d<\/p>\n I didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n \u201cWell, I got something to say,\u201d Bruce said. He lifted his fake leg and let out a long, whining fart. He doubled over laughing, stumbled a little, and I dove at his knees, knocking him over in the dirt. His prosthetic had come off, and I grabbed it by the shoe, brandishing it like a baseball bat. He slid away from me, crab-walking on his three limbs, and I swung his fake leg, hitting him square on the jaw. He crumpled over face down in the dirt and I hit him again, twice, in the back of the head, bringing the leg down on his skull like I was chopping wood. I kicked him softly in the ribs to make sure he was out, then I looked over my shoulder, expecting to see Francine sitting by the campfire.<\/p>\n After a while I picked up the gun where it lay next to Bruce\u2019s outstretched hand. I aimed it straight into the black water of the creek and squeezed the trigger. Nothing. It was unloaded, and I pulled the trigger over and over again, hearing nothing each time but an empty, metallic click. I sank to my knees and turned Bruce over. His head lolled crazily off to the side and one of his teeth was broken, embedded in his lip. He was just as dead as the Malcom Shumpert-looking kid who\u2019d had his brains blown out on that highway in the desert. I thought about what I was going to tell the law, and I found his bullets in the tent, reloaded the pistol, and tossed it onto the ground beside him. Then I rolled him over and sat looking at him where he lay, kissing the ground.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" “The scar shifted with each movement, crawling like a snake across his torso, emerging from his shorts just to the right of his belly button, cutting across his chest and ending where his nipple would have been had it not been gouged away by the shrapnel.” <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":15747,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[101,764,2044,525,1406],"class_list":["post-15514","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fiction","tag-adultery","tag-friendship","tag-gulf-war-vets","tag-murder","tag-ptsd","writer-joey-poole"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15514","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15514"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15514\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15749,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15514\/revisions\/15749"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15747"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15514"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15514"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15514"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}