Paul Cleave - Collecting Cooper

“Where did you bury him?”

“In the woods.”

“What woods?”

“It doesn’t matter,” Cooper says, slumping his shoulders. “What matters is it’s over now,” he says, and he looks away, but not away too far because he needs Adrian to see just how sad he’s pretending to look.

Adrian takes another step forward. “What’s over?”

“The killing.” He rests his forehead against the window. “The very thing you like about me is the very thing I won’t be able to do anymore.” Unless you let me out, Cooper thinks but doesn’t say. It’s too soon. Baby steps. Anything more than that and he’ll blow it.

“I have thought about that.”

“You have?” he asks, looking up, genuinely curious.

“Yes. And I have something that can help.”

“What?”

“It’s a surprise. I’ll tell you tomorrow.”

Baby steps. He’s clenching his fists but Adrian can’t see him. He can only imagine what it’s like to strangle somebody, his imaginary friend didn’t struggle, but when he gets out of here he’d like to find out how it feels with Adrian.

“Okay, Adrian. Thank you,” he says, and it’s a struggle not asking what the surprise is. “You know, I always knew the killing was going to come to an end.”

“I guess,” Adrian says, scratching at a red blemish on the side of his face. “But it doesn’t have to.”

“How’s that? You’re not going to start bringing me people to kill, there isn’t much. .”

He trails off when he sees Adrian smile. Oh, Jesus, that’s his plan! He’s sure of it. The surprise Adrian has for him is going to be somebody for him to kill. His stomach tightens at the thought.

“Just wait until tomorrow,” Adrian says, almost confirming it. “You didn’t answer-why did you become a serial killer?”

Is the person he’s supposed to kill already here? A man or a woman? Somebody he knows?

“Cooper?”

Wait, this can be a good thing. It can be somebody who can help. They can help each other.

“Hey, Cooper?”

“Huh?” He looks at Adrian. Adrian is looking concerned.

“Are you okay?”

“Sure I am.”

“Why did you become a serial killer?”

“What?”

“Are you listening to me?”

“What? Yes, yes, of course. It’s just that, well, it’s a hard question to answer,” Cooper says, trying to focus, trying to recall what he’s learned and taught all these years. “It just kind of happened. The first one was almost accidental. I was breaking into somebody’s house,” he says. “I was looking for money and this woman just, you know, kind of just came home at the wrong time.” It’s a standard answer. Every day somewhere in the world somebody comes home to find a stranger in their house and gets killed for it. A burglar goes in to steal money and is presented with a career changing opportunity, it happens all the time, burglars upgrading from thief to rapist to killer.

“That’s how it can often start,” Adrian says, nodding. “It’s in the books.”

“One thing just led to another.”

Adrian stops scratching at the blotch on his face to study his fingers. “Did you rape her?”

“Like I said, one thing just led to another.”

“Did you kill animals when you were a kid?” Adrian asks, returning to his scratching.

“Did you?”

“Umm. .”

“Remember the deal, Adrian? I was going to answer your questions but only if you answer mine.”

“I remember.”

“Was it a cat or a dog?” Cooper asks.

“How did you know?”

“But it’s never gone beyond that, has it? You’ve never killed a person?”

“No, never,” Adrian says, looking down, and Cooper can tell he’s lying. Adrian is a killer. The odds at getting out of here slip a little more. Hopefully the other people Adrian has killed haven’t been people he collected in this room.

“Tell me about it,” Cooper says.

“It was a long time ago,” Adrian says. “At school, I used to get bullied.”

“So did I,” Cooper says, though that isn’t true. He never got bullied and he wasn’t a bully. He was more of a ghost-people didn’t really see him.

“It was all the time. I didn’t get beaten up every day, but I got teased every day, and punched or pushed at least every week. I hated school.”

“It can be tough,” Cooper says, “but you survived it.”

“One day these kids beat me up really bad. I had to go to hospital. I was in there a while. They kicked me heaps and put me into a coma. The coma didn’t hurt, but the rest of it did.”

“That sounds awful,” Cooper says, wishing the kids had finished the job.

“It was awful. I wanted to get revenge on them but they were all bigger than me and there wasn’t anything I could do. I wanted to kill them. I would follow them home, but, but. . like I said, they were all bigger than me.”

“So you started killing animals?”

“Pets. I started killing their pets. There were eight boys that beat me and they all had pets. Cats or dogs. At night I’d sneak out of my house and hang outside their homes. It took only a few days to learn what kind of pets they had. I didn’t think they’d all have them, but they did.” Adrian moves back to the coffee table. He begins to straighten up the books again. “Eight cats and two dogs because some of them had more than one pet. I started with the cats because they were easier to get to. I took a packet of cat food and when I caught one I held it down and wrapped it in a blanket so I wouldn’t have to see it, then I’d just jump on it. They would move around like a thousand volts was being pumped into them, and then they’d stop moving. When I unwrapped it the cat would always feel floppy and warm, like it was fast asleep. I’d leave the animal on their front lawn. Because I wasn’t going to school anymore, I could hang out near their house most of the day. I’d watch where they buried the pet, then that night I’d go back to visit the grave.”

Cooper says nothing. He can feel his mouth hanging open. The room still smells of vomit, and he is sure he’s going to be sick again. He takes a deep breath and thinks about what he’s just listened to. “You went back to the houses to gloat?” he asks, knowing it’s extremely common for serial killers to visit graves of their victims. The original theory had killers doing this out of guilt or remorse, but they learned serial killers were doing it to relive the excitement, to gloat. But not when the victims were animals.

“No. Not go gloat,” Adrian says.

“You felt bad?”

“No.”

Cooper doesn’t understand. It’s always one of those two reasons. “Then what?”

“I used to dig them up.”

“What?”

“It wouldn’t take long because the earth was always loose. I’d dig them up and hang them outside the front door. The people stepping out in the morning would always scream, and I’d be standing a few doors down to watch. There was a lot of waiting involved, but the payoff. . the payoff was always worth it. I loved seeing their faces. I wanted to kill every pet those kids had. I got caught jumping on the fifth cat. The police came and then everybody thought it would be best if I got sent away, not just for their safety but for mine. So I got sent here, to the Grove.”

“The Grove?”

“It’s what we called it.”

It’s unlike anything Cooper has ever heard or read about, and it’s one of those rare moments in his life where Cooper just doesn’t know what to say next. He gets the idea there may be many of these moments over the next day. Adrian’s behavior back then is certainly outside the scope of the textbooks.

Even under the circumstances, part of him is thinking there has to be a paper in this. Maybe even a book. He just has to get out of here.