Sam Pink - The Self-Esteem Holocaust Comes Home

BOYFRIEND: [looking at the policeman] His shadow is the same shape as his body [tone suggesting obviousness] Except where the sun comes in through the head I mean.

The girlfriend undoes the bolt on the rifle and more spiders fall out. Then she pokes her boyfriend’s head with the hot rifletip.

GIRLFRIEND: You are a weak motherfucker.

The boyfriend laughs. The girlfriend laughs and puts the rifle over her shoulder. They hug, girlfriend facing the window, boyfriend other way. They both feel around on each other’s bodies and determine the thinness. They are gentle while they feel.

BOYFRIEND: [looking over girlfriend’s shoulder, at the dust] Everything is made-up.

GIRLFRIEND: [watching the policeman stand up, stare back] I agree.

It gets darker but the sun is still out.

A woman lets a man into her apartment. He sits at the table in her kitchen. On the table there’s a withered plant. The plant has areas of brown on its leaves.

MAN: [flicking some leaves off] Almost there.

The woman shuts and locks the door then comes into the kitchen.

WOMAN: What?

MAN: [folding his hands and looking up to her] Did you get your period yet?

They look at each other quietly. They forget every word that ever existed, even “forget.”

A small clearing in a forest preserve at the bottom of a slope. Standing in the clearing there’s a pedophile with his arm against a tree. The tree is filled with skeletons. A nest of them. The pedophile wears an old gray sweatsuit. His head is shaven in random patches and there are scabs all over his head and face, covered in dry dirt. He is looking up at the skeletons when a small boy comes tripping down the slope, into the clearing. The boy wears a winter coat, and carries a rake. He stands, breathing and watching his breath.

THE BOY: Hi [hands rake over] Here. Here you go [relieved, breathing heavily] I’ve been thinking about outerspace all day. I’m worried about it falling over the whole planet. I’m worried about it being very cold, not all warm and nice like my real blanket [breathes heavily]

The pedophile takes the rake without turning. With his other hand he reaches into his pocket and takes out a mask made from a garbagebag, puts it over his head.

THE PEDOPHILE: [still looking up] Every year this happens [steam from mask] When it stops, I think it is done. When it continues I remember it will never be done.

The boy looks up and breathes. Watches his breath. He licks sweat off his lip. The pedophile lifts the rake up into the bare branches of the tree and knocks down a skeleton. When the skeleton hits the ground, its skull powders on a rock and reveals a replica underneath — a replica made of blue glass. The pedophile holds the blue glass skull in his arms like a baby and looks at it.

THE PEDOPHILE: Every year, the same thing happens. They always come. I don’t think things will ever be different [breathes] I’m never going to die [then brightening] But, I mean, there’s nothing you can do right? They are going to come either way.

THE BOY: I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m the one who will never die.

The boy runs back up the hill, out of the clearing. The pedophile sets the blue glass skull on the ground and breaks it with the rake.

THE PEDOPHILE: They are still with me.

[Next Day.]

The boy enters the clearing, another rake in hand. The pedophile stands by the tree, one hand on his chin and one hand on his hip. He takes the rake, knocks down another skeleton. The skeleton falls right by the boy’s feet.

THE PEDOPHILE: [taking the rake prongs down from the branches] I like when they break, it makes me feel intense pressure in my groin.

THE BOY: Sorta. It only broke — right there [pointing]

He wipes snot off his face with his hand. Then he kicks the skeleton and it collapses.

THE BOY: [laughing] Now it’s broken. Now it is definitely all broken.

He throws his hands into the air and screams and jumps and falls to the ground, laughing. He kicks and his boots thud against the ground, ground stiff with ice. The pedophile’s throat backs up with semen. And he tries to swallow it all before he chokes and cries, but he can’t. He stares, entranced by the thudding of the boots on the ground.

THE PEDOPHILE: [to himself] Maybe that’s what his skull would sound like, repeatedly pounded with the handle-end of the rake. I want to know [gags more] Over and over. It feels better each time.

The boy squirms, and the pedophile watches, putting his sleeve into his mouth to soak what’s spilling. His sleeve is already hard, and it horrifies him going into his mouth. The hard sleeve scratches the roof of his mouth and makes him gag violently.

THE PEDOPHILE: This feels horrible [coughs more semen] Everything is so terrible [he sees the boy squirming and laughing] You are the silliest person I know. And I like you.

Semen hangs from his mouth and hand. It hits the ground. His mouth is rimmed with it.

THE PEDOPHILE: I like you. I like you and I like when you are here. We have fun. I like each of your little legs. They are so small. They are little flutes. Can I play one? Can I try one?

He goes to tickle the boy as the boy gets up. The boy dodges him and laughs.

THE BOY: My legs are not flutes.

THE PEDOPHILE: Let me play one. I will make it sound nice. I can hold your leg and make it a flute and no one would know. I’ll play a song that makes you go blind.

The pedophile takes off his garbagebag mask and the muscles in his face loosen and his face sags over his eyes and mouth.

THE PEDOPHILE: Give me your little flute, you slut bitch. Give it to me. Why don’t you want to kiss me? I think you want to kiss me. Right? Do you want to kiss me? [drooling semen over shirt] Fucking little faggot. Kiss me. Right? Huh? Give me a kiss.

THE BOY: [looking up at the tree] You are not right.

He runs back up the hill. The pedophile looks at the tree, and the skeletons.

THE PEDOPHILE: [after long breath] If I don’t remove them, I will have no place to sleep. If I don’t remove them they will pile until they poke a hole in outerspace and subject the world to the bigger sun on the other side. The one that is too powerful. If I don’t remove them, I will never have privacy.

The pedophile puts the garbagebag mask on.

THE PEDOPHILE: I should at least pull down a few more.

He throws sticks at the skeletons. The boy has taken the rake. And the pedophile sits down, tired.

[Next Day.]

The boy doesn’t come. The pedophile stays at the bottom of the hill and looks at all the skeletons piling up in the bare branches of the tree. They are threaded and piled thickly. More now.

THE PEDOPHILE: I am too tired for anything.

He looks at some broken sticks on the ground and slouches, breathing evenly to keep from crying.

THE PEDOPHILE: My terrible mind is my periscope, and I need it to see islands.

He kneels and leans his face against the tree.

[Next Day.]

The boy remains absent. The pedophile looks at the branches of the tree, piling up the skeletons, one hand on his chin and one hand on his hip. Even more now.

THE PEDOPHILE: They are still with me. Is it good that this happens? It is unbearable sometimes [pause, thinking] But I was taught to love everything on earth [arms out to the skeletons] I love you guys.

He hugs the tree.

THE PEDOPHILE: [cheek against tree] I don’t recognize myself on a daily basis.

Then the muscles on his face slacken, and he rubs his face on the tree to see if he has feeling or not.

THE PEDOPHILE: I love everything.

The semen crowds his mouth. He pushes it back and hits himself in the throat, no look on his drooping face as he tries not to gag from the scrape of the hard sleeve. One hand on the tree to stand up.