A Deadly Kind Of Love
Billy Harper hung his large shovel back in the shed and went indoors to wash the dirt from his hands. A few minutes later he emerged from the kitchen carrying two cups of tea and placed them on the small table in front of his mother. He sat down in his armchair opposite and smiled fondly at her. It was good to have her back again, he thought to himself. She had only been gone for a few days, but even that had seemed like an eternity to him. For the first time, he new what it was like to live alone, and he didn’t like it. The emptiness of the house scared him and he felt almost suffocated by the loneliness that it brought. Now that he had his mother home again, he was happy. Billy studied his mother with adoring eyes. She was sitting primly in her old wooden rocking chair next to the blazing fire. Billy thought of how elegant she looked in her new dark blue dress. The pretty lace around the collar accentuated her long slender neck and complimented her thinning silver hair. As always, two tortoiseshell hairclips, decorated with tiny flowers held her hair tightly in place. Billy could not remember a single day that she did not wear them in her hair. A few days earlier he had walked the four miles into town, through driving rain, especially to buy her a new dress. He knew exactly which one he was going to buy her. The dress he wanted had stood proudly on an old mannequin, in a charity shop window. He had spotted it a few weeks before, when he had gone into town alone, to get some medicine for his mother. He had used some of the money he had saved. He kept it in an old tobacco tin hidden under his bed. His mother would have disapproved of him spending money on presents, but it was a special occasion and he wanted his mother to look her best. He was sure his mother would understand. As he handed over the money to the lady in the shop, she had smiled and asked if it was a present for his girlfriend. Billy had been a little taken back by the comment. He had never thought about having a girlfriend. The idea of being with a girl seemed strange to him. He thought about how horrified his mother would be. The question had embarrassed him and Billy had quickly told her that it was a present for his mother. The lady had smiled again and told him that she was sure his mother would be very pleased. Despite being almost forty years of age, Billy had a boyish magnetism that the older generation found charming, but which his piers found slightly creepy and immature. But Billy didn’t pay much attention to what other people thought about him. His mother loved him and that was all that mattered. For a brief moment, as he sat stirring his mother’s cold tea, he wondered about his father. He had never known him, and his mother had never spoken of him. It had always been just him and his mother. He liked it like that, just the two of them. Besides, he resented the idea of having to share his mother’s love, even if it might have been with his father. The chiming of the clock above the fireplace roused Billy from his thoughts and he suddenly wondered how long it would be before somebody realised that his mother had been moved. This would be the first place they would look of course; even Billy could figure that out. He would be ready for them, and this time he had decided that they were not going to take his mother away from him again. He had his shotgun ready and loaded at his side, and as he glanced out of the small shuttered window, he let his large hands caress the long barrel of the gun. When he had watched them taking his mother away a few days before, the doctor had spoken quietly to him, trying to comfort him. But Billy had just stared straight through him, as if he wasn’t there. The shock of seeing his mother leave in the ambulance had made him angry and confused, until he found it hard to think straight. The Doctor had always been concerned about Billy’s unusually strong attachment to his mother and was now worried about Billy’s present state of mind. He was afraid that Billy might do something stupid to harm himself or somebody else for that matter. He had told the police about his concerns and they promised to keep an eye on him. In reality though, he knew that they thought Billy too dim-witted and docile to cause any real harm. Billy walked away from the window and knelt down beside his mother. He took her frail hand into his and rubbed it gently. Her hands felt so cold. His mother always loved the warmth of the fire and he hated the idea of her getting cold, so he threw some more logs into the spitting flames and pulled her chair closer to the hearth. Billy began to talk to his mother. He talked to her about what he had done since she had been away and what things he had planned for them both. He gently shook her hand and tried to wake her, but her eyes stayed shut and did not move. “Mother. Wake up.” He shook her hand more forcefully now, but could not understand why she would not wake. She was usually such a light sleeper. “Please wake up.” Billy said again, as he began to get more and more agitated. “We can go for a walk in the woods tomorrow.” he said enthusiastically. “Like we used to do, just the two of us.” Billy felt tears welling up inside him, as he stared at his mother. She had now slumped sideways into the chair like a rag doll. “Why won’t you wake up? Please mother, open your eyes.” Then Billy suddenly froze and turned his head towards the window. In the distance he heard the rumble of cars coming down the dirt track towards his home. “Don’t worry mother.” Billy said through his tears, as he grabbed the shotgun from the wall. “They won’t take you away again. I promise.” As the headlights of the approaching cars got nearer to the house, Billy walked to the door and calmly unlocked it. He stepped back toward the fire and sunk back into his armchair. He stood the shotgun between his knees with the barrels pointing upwards towards the rafters. He sat facing the door and waited. A few moments later, he heard the cars stop and then the sound of doors opening and slamming shut. Outside, two uniformed men got out of one of the cars and made their way to the front door, quickly followed by an agitated Doctor. They stepped up onto the wooden porch and the taller of the two men approached the door and started to hammer on it. After the first knock the door swung open effortlessly. The officers stood motionless as they looked in. Doctor Peter Meadows peered over the shoulder of one of the police officers and let out an involuntary cry of shock. “Oh my God! Billy, what have you done?” The doctor tried to push past the officers, but they held him back. “Careful.” Said one of the police officers quickly. “He’s got a gun.” Billy now had the barrel of the shotgun pointing towards his mouth and was staring wildly at the three men stood in the doorway. All three men stood staring blankly into the dimly lit room. They looked in disbelief at the twisted, slumped, body of Billy’s dead mother as it rocked grotesquely back and forth in front of the fire. Her skin had turned an ugly grey colour and her flesh had started to puff and split across her cheeks. Fresh earth clung to her face and clothes, where Billy had pulled and dragged her out of the ground a few hours earlier. Doctor Peter Meadows had received a phone call from the police half an hour earlier. They had informed him that an old man tending his wife’s grave had found the open burial. He had alerted the police immediately, and had told them how he had nearly collapsed in shock, as he looked down into the freshly dug hole and saw the open, empty casket of Elizabeth Harper. The police had called Peter at home and told him to meet them at Billy’s House straight away. Billy tensed his grip on the gun as one of the officers stepped closer. “Billy. Listen, everything’s going to be okay. The Doctor is here to take care of you.” Peter made he way slowly towards Billy. “Look, Billy, Its me. Doctor Meadows.” “I’m not going with you. I’m staying with mother.” He said calmly. “We’re going to look after each other.” The Doctor step a little closer and Billy visibly tensed. “She’s dead Billy. You can’t stay with her. We buried her two days ago.” Peter said, trying to shock Billy into understanding the absurdity of his request. “Just put down the gun and we can talk about it at the hospital.” Billy shook his head from side to side as a wave of uncontrollable tears rolled down his face. He was scared now. He didn’t understand why this was happening. Why did he say his mother was dead? He must be lying. How could she be dead? She told him that they would always be together. “Come on Billy. It’s going to be all right. I’ll take care of your mother for you, I promise. Just put down the gun.” Billy lowered the shotgun momentarily and looked at the muddied crumpled corpse of his dead mother. Suddenly everything became clear to him. He realised that if he wanted to be with his mother again, he had only one choice. In the split second that it took for Peter Meadows to reach for the gun, Billy sucked the double barrel into his open mouth. “No!” The Doctor screamed out in anguish, as he watched Billy Harper squeeze his eyes tight and bite down onto the end of the hard steel. The Doctor flinched and turned his head away. There was a deafening bang and then the wet, sickly sound of exploding flesh and bone as it splattered heavily across his clothes. Doctor Meadows reluctantly turned his head back towards Billy. The bloodied mess of Billy’s body lay slumped to one side in the chair opposite his mother. The end of the shotgun lay smouldering into the stump of his neck, where his head had been five seconds earlier. Peter felt one of the officers pull on his arm and he let him guide him outside. He felt the scene choking up his emotions as he looked back again and watched as each body was carefully covered with a blanket. * * * * When Billy Harper had pulled down hard on the trigger, Billy had felt a rush of happiness roll over him. He was going to be with his mother again.
Copyright © 2001 Kevin Cope |