Dr Jew

slow about it. She was gonna lie down probably and fake sleep again.
    "What do you think – " I said and grabbed her and threw her face down on the bed.
    "David!"
    "Shut your mouth!"
    I got my knee on her back up near her shoulders and her head turned sideways for more of her squawking but I got my leg covering her to handle that. With my right hand I grabbed the belt off the bed and started in. I wasn't aiming for the back keeping it all below the belt. And I'm pretty good at keeping scars off.
    I gave it to her not more than five minutes, that I 'm sure. Not that she deserved any less but I was also tired from flying.

X.

    With the pain on my backside I had to lie there at least an hour biting back tears. I would not give him that pleasure though I screamed it all inside. And the boy. Oh, the boy. What was this house to become and that boy's life to become with David hovering over and spitting on his life. But if he ever laid a hand on the boy –
    With me I can bear it. But leave that boy alone. But I don't think he would dare. The boy is a boy, but a giant. He must be at least six inches over David. No, David won't touch him. He is a bully who only touches the smaller ones. He must have some reason to bring him all the way out here from Mississippi. That coward always finds a way to use people and he wouldn't bring him here unless he had a purpose, a way to corrupt him.
    I thought he was sleeping. Oh God, he's awake. No more. For God's sake. He's up. NO, he's got something else in mind, maybe just the bathroom. God, where's he—
    He was back quick with that smirk like he always had when he 's gonna do something to suck the life off all that's good in the world. Oh God, he's got the gun.
    "Wake up," he said. "I know you ain't sleeping. I said wake up."
    "Why do you have it, David?"
    "Shut up and take it."
    He handed me the gun. It was heavy and I needed two hands.
    "Aim it at me," he said.
    "I don't –"
    "Aim i t at me!"
    I was shaking and wanted to cry more than when he whipped me.
    "David – "
    "Aim it!"
    He slapped my face, and that hatred flared within me that I never had till we'd been married six months and he started changing. Or started showing his real self, whichever it was. I'm not sure a person could change so much in six months. But I felt that hatred again when I saw what he was capable of. I seem to forget it or make myself forget it to keep my sanity. But that slap and the weapon in my hand. I didn't need to hold it back. I didn't understand why he did it and I didn't care what happened afterward since nothing could be worse than this.
    He held my hands and my hands held the gun and he moved it up to aim squarely at his chest. And he would not be walking away from this. He would be no more, all that I have ever asked. For someone I once thought I loved. For the one who later taught me how to forget love.
    "Pull the trigger," he said. "Do it."
    "I – "
    "Stop talking and pull the trigger. Shoot."
    It would be a paper-thin moment and a flicker of mus cle – all that separated me from liberation. Something had given me this opportunity and I'd be a fool to waste it. But I did question, hesitate.
    "Shoot!" he said.
    I was shaking from my heart, my shoulders, arms, hands, down to my fingernails.
    He slapped me again and I kept the end of the gun on his chest.
    "Shoot!" he said.
    I pulled the trigger.
    Click.
    Where there should have been an explosion of noise and blood there was only a click, like a box of matches hitting the floor. I pulled the trigger again. Click.
    Click. Click. Click. Click.
    He took the gun. He took the gun and punched me in the face.
    That night I did not sleep.

XI.

    The next day Dave took Swan downtown to handle some business. First stop was a blistered brick building in the Tenderloin. Dave had to steer Swan away from a naked old man on the sidewalk who sang Guns N' Roses songs and tried to swim in the cement. Swan had never seen things like this, literary fractals leading nowhere. Deciding that immersion would be better for the boy and not particularly wanting to leave him outside, Dave took Swan into the building with him and they scaled toilet-paper stairs to the third floor. Dave went to a door and knocked.
    Swan wasn 't sure where they were or why. Behind the door a muffled sound wheezed. Dave knocked again, louder. "Open up. It's Dave."
    Locks and bolts uncurled from behind and the door opened and an old woman with gray skin looked them over with myopic scales