From: grendel@canetoad.UUCP (Rage y Romance)
Newsgroups: talk.bizarre
Subject: BOY TOY: PART I
Distribution: world
Date: 13 Oct 92 00:07:37 EDT
Organization: The Satellite of Love


I look down from my computer screen and tell the shareholder 
to please hold.
My personal line is ringing.
"Hello?"
My ear is inundated with the sounds of a buys street.  I grin 
from ear to ear.
Boy.
"How ya doing big guy?"
"I want to go to the beach," he calls out. I laugh as I imagine him 
standing on toe tips, chubby little hand stretched above his head 
as he attempts to speak into the receiver.
"You want to go to the beach? In the middle of October?"
"Yes."
I laugh again as I think of how much I enjoy this 4 year old's company.
"Sure, why not? Where are you?"
"Outside your office on 39th street."
I look at my watch. Hmm, 3:00 pm. "I'll be down in ten minutes." 

I stumble to my feet holding onto my sides. My headset snaps off 
my head and scatters the pens on my desk.
"Oh goddd, I feel sick."  I make the appropriate 
choking-gagging sounds. My co-worker from Alaska looks up and says, 
"Grendel, you going to blow chow? If you need to, hey, go ahead, 
we'll understand." I stumble away and into the elevator mumbling 
something about Montezuma's Revenge and maybe I'll be in 
sometime tomorrow.
 
When I get downstairs I see Boy standing, statue still in the middle 
of the sidewalk. 
He isn't smiling. He isn't frowning. He doesn't laugh. He doesn't cry.
Boy shows no emotion at all.
I love Boy.
People walk by and stare at him. Maybe it has something to do with 
his hair.
The fact that it looks like Ronald McDonald is his dad.
I saunter up to him, pick him up and have him straddle my hip. 
My sweet little baby.
"What's with the hair?", I say running my hands through the 
bright ringlets.
"I felt like a change. Do you like it? It seemed like something that 
you might appreciate."
I kiss him on the his rosy crown, "It's beautiful." He gently pinches 
my cheek and says, "Let's go."

I lie in the sand and watch the sun prepare for its decent. 
Boy uses the stick from his popsicle to make a small castle, a rose 
and Venus de Milo in the sand. 
He turns the sand to glass and brings them to me as gifts.  I pluck 
the castle from his hand and look at the setting sun through its contours.
I turn it slowly and watch rainbows caress his placid face.
He lays them around my feet and then picks up the rose again.
"This is not right." A wine color seeps into its delicate petals and 
emerald stains its stem and leaves.
I smile, "Always a perfectionist."

It is getting darker and colder. I take off my suit jacket and rap 
it around Boy to keep his small precious body warm. We lie on our 
backs and stare into the sky, waiting for the s
                                               t
                                                a
                                                 r
                                                  s
                                                   .
                                                    .
                                                     .
    Dr ea mi ng of
                  g
              s    l
                s a               H   N
                     spi ders...S   I   Y  BBBBbbbbbllllaaaaccck...
B
 I
  G
   
    B
     L
      A
       C
        K

           S     P     I     D     E     R     S

m A d E  o F. g...l...a...s...s...s...s...s...s

My eyes flicker open, a cold drool spot where Boy's head rest on 
my chest being a catalyst...or...is...it....
I see something glistening...
Two figures in wet suits come shooting out of the sand.

Dammit. I roll over Boy and scoop him up and take off running.  
I feel him squirming and drop him.  I spin around and face the 
two figures.

I see more figures come out of the water and the night goes bright 
with the light of an incoming helicopter. Shit, they mean business.

"BOY, RUN!", I shout above the engine's sound.  He glances around 
us, at the men in front of us, the men coming out of the surf and 
the helicopter above us.
He does not run.
I take an aikido defensive posture and hum deep in my throat as 
I center my rage into one solid lump of power deep in my abdomen.
The wet suited figures bring up guns.
I see the spit of flame and feel the sting.
Hornets.
Hornets, stinging...me...pricking...pricking...my flesh.
Every nerve ending catches fire; my teeth come together 
with an audible click, and all my muscles pull bowstring tight till I am
driven to my toes. I feel their venom burn through my body.
I ffall to mmy knnees aanndd thennn to to mmmy sssidde.
T h e  s k y  t u rns rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrreeedddddd
                                               a
                                              n
                                               d

                                               t h
                                                  e
                                                     s
                                                    a
                                                      n
                                                     d
                                                    
t u rrrnss B  l  a  c  kkkk.

I see through the haze of annnn eeleectricaaalll sttoorm Boy 
crumbled...
like paper...
uuungg.
unnggg.
cann'tt breeeaatth.
Bbboy...
Almost...o.b.surred bby the blllackk san..
ssspii...dd...ersss h a v e  h i m.
B
 o
  y...


--
"The moooon...the mooooon."         | ...uunet!canetoad!grendel
                        Dean Koontz | canetoad!grendel@uunet.uu.net
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