And She Whispered into My Ear with the Voice of a Child...

Girl Cracked...

"Elle a obtenu un pistolet!" screamed Mr. Jingle Maryweather as he dashed from the chaotic room. Desperately trying to reach the safety of a bound and gagged Heather Mary, Jingle vaulted the still out-cold Edgar DuHaven and with a loud "merde" and a soft splash, he found himself paw deep in a warm puddle of pee now forming on the floor between Edgar's out-stretched legs. Step, shake...step, shake, Jingle muttered angrily, "Vous estes un garcon stupide!" And he couldn't have been more correct. I am a very stupid boy.

Turning my attention away from the tiny wet paw prints and back to Kristina, I found myself once again staring down the barrel of a very loaded gun. As if under ten feet of water and still plunging downward, all sounds went murky - the traffic outside the window, the TV next door, all noise sodden but one. One tiny, quiet voice way back in the back of my head and as clear as day, "She's hot!" it said. I glanced away from the gun and found Kristina's eyes, "Yeah, she's hot," I agreed, "too hot." The voice, louder now replied, "It's OK, you're fireproof, baby." I shook my head, "No. Not anymore." The voice laughed, "You just need to cool her down a little, that's all." Kristina's eyes shifted, "Who are you talking to?" she said, looking around the room. But I didn't hear her, all I could hear was the voice. "Let me throw some cold water on her, that'll do the trick," it said. "I can't, I can't." Kristina touched the gun to my head and said angrily, "Who are you talking to?" I took a deep breath and swallowed hard and unlocked the the old wooden door to a name I hadn't said in months - "Tommy," I said. Confused, looking again around the room, Kristina cautiously asked, "Who's Tommy?" "He's the voice that lives inside my head. He tells me to do things," I answered calmly. She asked, "What kind of things?" I answered, "All sorts of things." She asked, "Bad things?" I said, "Sometimes." "Oh God," she said. I laughed, "It's OK. See, you're not the only crazy person in the room, you're among friends."

"Stop it!"

Both our head jerked toward the sound. It was Heather Mary, freed from her gag. "Stop it! Stop talking like that!" she begged. Pissed at the interruption, Kristina rushed into Heather Mary's room, "I should have known, if I put anything close to that mouth of yours, you're gonna eat it." Heather Mary shouted as Kristina tried gagging her again, "You don't know who you're messing with, girl. For your own sake, you need to get the fuck out of here!" "Shut up, Heather Mary, what is your fat ass gonna do, huh?" Kristina yelled back. "It's not my fat ass you got to worry about. It's his. You're scaring me, Paul David, please stop!" Kristina had had enough, "Why do you talk so damn much?" and back goes the gag. I looked at Heather Mary trying to break free, "It's OK, I got this under control." Then back to Kristina, "Now where were we? Oh yes - gun to head." Kristina slowly and nervously raised the gun back up. "Gun to head," I said again, "do it Kristina, you got me right where you want me." Kristina instead takes a step back - the first moment of weakness...Tommy likes.

Flustered now, Kristina said softly, "Look, I just want to know one thing. Are you breaking up with me?" I laughed. Gun to my head, friends tied up and knock out cold...and I laughed. "You threw your dead dog at me." As if to make sense of it, she replied, "I didn't know it was you. You broke into my house." And tit for tat, I said, "You got a gun stuck in my face." "Well," she said, "I guess we're even then." "No where near," said Tommy. "No where fucking near."

"You're good, Kristina, very good. You fooled a lot of people, but trust this - Tommy would have seen you coming a mile away...and he would have stopped, and he would have waited for you, slowed down his stride for you, all so you could catch up. Tommy would have enjoyed that. But sadly, that's not what happened, Paul David instead talked to you and listened to your stories and thought he was getting to know you, but that was all a lie, wasn't it? You see, Tommy doesn't listen to stories, he's not interested. People don't interest him, their stories are a bore. Like listening to someone talk about the dream they had last night or the hilarious thing little Billy did yesterday at the park - no one cares about your dreams, no one cares about your kid. Tommy doesn't care about your stories. It's a good thing for Paul-David, cause while he's been listening, Tommy's been watching. He knows you. Tommy knows all about you, Kristina."

And with her last bit of bravery, defiantly, she said, "You don't know me and stop calling me Kristina! That's not my name!" A bit shocked, Tommy replied, "Really? What should Tommy call you?" Brushing the hair away from her face, she said, "Kristyna. My name is Kristyna." Pardon me? She continued, "With a Y, no I." "Is it pronounced the same?" Tommy asked. "Basically," she said, "but that's not the point." "Very well, Kristyna," said Tommy, watching the gun drop lower and lower, "ah ah ah, watch the gun, it goes up here, right at the temple for the most damage. More bang for the buck." Kristyna shook her head, "You're losing it." To which Tommy replied, "Not yet."

"You're different, Tommy will give you that. You have a shell around you, egg thin but a shell none the less. Most people don't even have that. But I can crack it. Oh come on, let me crack it...just a little? Just a lil bit? Where should I begin, Kristyna? Tommy did say that correctly, with a Y, no I, yes? Putting up signs for your little lost pup, hoping for any, any human contact at all. Boy, did you get more than you bargained for. So lonely, no friends, always eating alone, party of one. One slice of pizza, one piece of cake, just one straw in your vanilla milkshake. I see the way you walk down the street, always looking over your shoulder, but who are you looking for, have you been a bad girl? Is that gun getting heavy, I bet it is. Or maybe not, maybe you're used to it, the weight, the feel of it. Pulling the trigger. Did daddy teach you how to shoot? Did you get real good at it? A little too good? Did mommy and daddy regret the day they ever put a gun into those stubby little pickles you call fingers. I watch you, but I could be wrong...but probably not. Alone, all day in that big empty house of yours, listening to your own private voices screaming in your head, telling you how bad you are, how worthless you are, how disappointing you are and will always be. "You're nothing, Kristyna." "You're ugly, Kristyna." You got a stupid name, Kristyna." Make the voices stop! But you can't, your conscience has no volume control, it's always turned up and up and up. While Paul-David stared into those big dark eyes of yours, it was Tommy who noticed you almost never blinked. Never close your eyes. Afraid of what might be standing in front of you when they open? You should be afraid. You should yell out but you can't, someone outside your head might answer back. So in that big house of yours, in the many rooms, you sit quietly, not saying a word, afraid someone will hear you and find you and do to you what you have done to others. But don't be afraid, nobodies around, you're all alone. No need to be quiet, nobody can hear you. It's just you...just you and that stuffed dead dog of yours hiding in the closet. So scream, Kristyna, scream your fucking head off. Scream, baby. Scream, scream, scream!"

And she did.

In the corner of the room, she fell into a ball and she screamed. And her screams pierced my ears and woke me up, like I had been in a dream, watching all this shit from a distance. I ran to Heather Mary and pulled off her gag. "I went too far," I said. "You went too far," she agreed.

I rushed to Kristyna and knelt beside her broken frame. "I'm sorry," I whispered, "I'm so sorry." She looked up, eyes red, "I want to tell you a secret," she softly said, and whispered it into my ear.

The Things Left Behind...

Full of cupcakes and banana pudding, Edgar DuHaven and I bounced back to the apartment. Thanks to the sugar, our varying medications, some taken, some not and the natural adrenaline flowing through our veins, we both got a quick glimpse of our former selves, those days in Hollywood, like walking through a parking lot surrounded by cars, seeing in the peripheral our transparent reflections in the windows. A flash of recognition, then gone. All that plus Edgar having to "piss like a race horse" had us running through the Lower East Side like a couple of mad men. It was nice, it was exciting and it was dangerous - a moment outside the lines. Steps from home, Edgar turned to me and smiled, "This was a good day." I laughed and shook my head, knowing these "good days" could only be few and far between. I, for my own sake could not afford many more...but it was a good day. A day of color, like as a kid with my crayons and book, making barns yellow and the chickens red, unbound by boarders, encouraging the pink land to touch the orange sky...flying while still firmly on the ground.

Edgar ran to our apartment building door, hopping from one leg to the other yelling, "hurry hurry," while I searched my pocket for the key. Not in the left front or the right - Edgar's worried face began to redden. Not in the right back or the left - nothing but Lil'Bit's tail. "Come on!" Edgar screamed. I searched my pockets again and again, but no keys, just the tail. "They must have fallen out...back at Kristina's?" I said to Edgar who was now buzzing the apartment, "She can mail them to you," he said quickly. I looked around the ground, hoping they might be found on the sidewalk, but nothing, "This is bad," I said to Edagr who was now speaking into the intercom, "I have to pee!" he said loudly into the little silver box, "let me in!" Walking to the door, I shouted, "She can't let you in, her Reaching Pole isn't long enough to hit the buzzer." But no sooner did I finish my sentence, the door buzzed open and Edgar ran inside. How is this possible? I know she didn't get a bigger Reaching Pole, she would have told me. "Wait!" I screamed to Edgar, but is was too late, he was inside and up the stairs.

Thanks to all that sugar, medication and the natural adrenalin of the day, I jumped forward, watching the door to the building quickly shut, I knew I had but a split second to act. Using muscles I had never used (I'm gonna be sore tomorrow) I ran, twisted and jumped toward the door, it closing fast...almost to it...just another inch and by the grace of God and my new found cat-like agility, just as the door was about to slam shut, I jammed Lil'Bit's tail inside. I entered, I yelled for Edgar but no answer. It was quiet. Too quiet. Slowly I walked the three floors to my apartment and saw the door slightly open. "Edgar?" I whispered, "Heather Mary?" But again, no answer. I put my hand on the door and slowly opened it to a dark room and every horror movie I had ever seen came flooding back to me. This would be the time to run away, to not, and I will repeat, to not walk into the dark and eerily quiet apartment, but something inside myself pushed me further...something old, crazy and dark itself, something stronger and scarier than anything lurking behind that door. I checked my feline reflexes, listened to my heart pounding faster than it had in years and I smiled...don't mess with Tommy, this cat's got claws.

I stepped inside, my eyes adjusting to the dark. I took another step and tripped on something laying on the floor. My hand reached for the light switch, but before I could turn it on, I heard the thing I tripped on moan. I looked down and saw that it was Edgar lying among the shadows. Then with a SLAM, the door shut behind me, the lights came on, I turned around and saw Kristina standing in the corner pointing a gun straight at my head. I looked in Heather Mary's room and saw she had been tied up and gaged, I looked down at Edgar, blood running from his head and then back to Kristina, her hands gripping that cold metal, still, stoic, her hair wild, her eyes wilder. God, she's hot. "Welcome home," she said. I smiled.

Too bad this will end badly for her.