Found

by Todd Rigney

I’ve seen lots of horror movies and the heads in those things don’t come close to looking like the real thing. I can’t explain what it feels like to hold one of them. At one point it had thoughts and feelings and it kissed someone it loved. Now it’s just a bloody head in a bowling ball bag. I hope I don’t end up that way.

What if he comes home and looks at the head and I put it back in the bag facing the wrong direction? If he’s a killer he probably thinks about things like that because he’s crazy. The first person he’d blame would be me. Big brothers blame little brothers for everything. Dad says that’s just the way it is.

Whenever I’m home alone I go through my family’s private things. Mom keeps all her old love letters from Dad under her bed. Dad keeps his dirty magazines in a big shoe box in the back of his closet. And I’ve already said what my brother keeps hidden in his closet. Mom and Dad would flip if they ever found out he was keeping human heads in the house. That would get him kicked out for sure.

I rush to the bathroom and wash the blood off the gloves and put them back under the sink. By the time she’s inside and calling my name, I’m in the living room watching cartoons like a good boy. She doesn’t have any idea what’s going on inside her own house. I think it’s better that way.

She got me Cheese Nips. They’re my favorite thing in the whole wide world. I could eat these things until my stomach pops open and the gooey orange gunk comes oozing out the hole. And while everyone was screaming and pointing at the gross stuff coming out of me, I’d just keep right on eating those Cheese Nips. I’ve never tasted anything so good.

Mom doesn’t like to use dirty words so she uses good words to substitute for the bad ones. She says fudge when she means fuck. I don’t know why she does it. Dad cusses everyday.

This is an interesting irony to me since his mom isn't willing to curse but will tell her son about how her boss called her stupid after she messed up a report. As a kid who cussed like a sailor (privately) since the time I was 7, hearing that an adult verbally abused one of my parents would be more shocking at a young age.

Dad says he doesn’t like my comics because they’re too violent. I draw them in black-and-white but I use a red color pencil for the blood. And there’s always lots of blood. Now that I know what a severed head looks like I draw them all the time in my books. People are always getting decapitated.

Dad doesn’t like it when she tells me these stories, so she does it when he’s at work. We have an agreement. “Grandma just saw on television where a guy in Lexington ripped out his eyes when the cops were trying to arrest him.” She pretends like she might be sick. This makes me laugh. “Isn’t that gross?” “Yeah,” I say, giggling.

What’s really weird is that she has a problem with me watching horror movies. And even though my dad doesn’t like the violence in my comics or Mom’s bloody stories, he doesn’t mind letting me watch horror movies.

Mom doesn’t like to talk about things when she’s upset. I don’t, either. But if I’m upset about something she’s always asking me what’s wrong. She knows I don’t like to talk about things. I like to figure stuff out on my own. It makes me feel more grown-up.

And the last thing I want to do is make things worse between Mom and Dad and Steve. Why can’t we be happy like in The Cosby Show? Where all of our problems are always solved when the show is over. Unless it’s a two-part episode.

“Can we go see a movie?” I ask. “I dunno,” Dad teases. I know the answer is going to be yes by the way that he smiles. Then he looks at Mom. “Can he go see a horror movie?” “Absolutely not,” she says in a stern voice. She means business. “Who’s gonna sit up with him when he has nightmares?” I’m ten-years-old. Almost eleven. You’d think I was five by the way she talks.

After everyone’s done, I help with the dishes. I don’t mind doing the dishes. Mom says it’s the worst part of her day.

I set my clock radio for sixty minutes and listen to a station out of Louisville. They talk about politics and entertainment and sometimes they talk about sex. Most of the stuff is over my head but it makes me feel grown-up listening to their debates. Someday I’ll be on a talk radio station and I’ll let everyone know how I feel. And I’ll answer telephone calls from angry listeners who tell me I’m wrong.

Steve gives me advice like that whenever he’s in a good mood. That’s rare, though. I guess he still wants to do the big brother thing sometimes. It’s weird to get advice from a killer. It makes me wonder if I should listen to what he has to say at all.

Those of us with lunch boxes are allowed to sit down since we don’t have to wait in line for our food. They serve pizza sometimes and Mom will let me buy it when they do. She says she doesn’t trust their nutritional system, though. I don’t really know why she wouldn’t trust them. Hundreds of kids eat their food every day and nobody’s died yet. But I really don’t care. Mom packs really good lunches.

I climb the stairs two at a time. That way it doesn’t take me very long to get to the second floor.

It's funny how the author manages to perfectly nail the 10-year-old point of view.