“Stop. Turn around.”
His hands bound in front, Henry pushes him backwards onto a chair with several nails protruding upwards from the seat. Pain forces a grunt. Henry pulls the hood from his head.
“What the fuck is this?”
Henry treads across the cold, unaccommodating room and leans against a table - staring the man down through his pig mask.
“Who are they? You think this scares me?”
Kenneth and the teacher are seated only a few feet away at ten and two o’clock.
Henry approaches with a roll of duct tape and secures the man to the chair.
“If you’re gonna kill me, get to it. You’re not doing any weirdo faggot shit!”
Henry finishes and throws the roll across the room. He backs away, facing his guest.
“Is that why you took my clothes? Why you’re naked too? You sick fuck!”
Henry steps forward, looming over the man.
“You don’t remember me.” he declares.
The man fidgets on the small but punishing chair.
“No, I don’t know any sicko freaks.”
Henry removes his mask and takes two steps back.
“And now?”
He scrutinizes Henry’s face.
“All I know is you’re one ugly son of a bitch.”
Henry walks to the table and returns with a barber’s strap - which he abruptly slams across the man’s face, twice. Left cheek, then right.
“Do tell when I’ve jogged your memory.”
The speech impairment, the slight hobble in his step. Neither artifact giving him away.
He collects a chair from the corner and takes a seat halfway across the room. A pristine quiet falls gently over the entire space.
“I swore to myself that this day would come - and here we are.” Henry begins.
He stands and paces methodically, like a tiger scheming in its cage.
“How does it feel to be on the receiving end?”
The man is silent and expressionless.
“It wasn’t even all the beatings I got - it’s what you did to her. That’s why you’re here.”
His movements swell with decades of unprocessed rage.
“That time she stopped you from almost killing me.” Henry pauses, balling his fists.
A disgusting grin slowly takes form across the man’s face.
“There he is, all grown up - little faggot retard cripple.”
Henry burns holes through him with his eyes, then strides to the old tool box. Atop the rusty pile of implements - a weathered but razor sharp machete.
“She always made such a fuss over you. Little shit. How is Dottie?”
Henry lays the machete on his chair and moves towards his guest. A solid right hook ejects a tendril of blood from the man’s mouth.
“You don’t get to say her name!” he quietly roars through clenched teeth.
Henry picks up the machete and is seated.
“You had me on the floor - kicking me, punching me, swearing, screaming. A seven year-old boy.”
The man snickers at Henry’s painful recounting.
“You were a spineless little fuck. Momma’s boy.”
“She ran up from behind, put her arm around your neck, pulled you off me.”
“Anything for poor little Henry.” the man mocks.
“You pulverized her face for that. Knocked eight of her teeth out. Broke her jaw in six places.” Henry says with a slight tremble.
“She should’ve known her place, let me make a man of you.”
Henry rises from his seat and drags a small wooden table towards his former step-father, leaving the blade on top.
“She passed three years ago.”
The captive sits quietly.
“Tonight, I keep my promise to her.”
Henry stretches his arms and back, cracks his knuckles and starts in slow and steady. The first punch claims two teeth, the third fractures the jaw, the fifth breaks the nose. One after the other, blood covering face and fists.
Twenty-three jabs later the older man is transformed, identifying features lost in the swelling. Alive but only just.
“We’re nearly there.” Henry informs.
He moves the table close and frees the man’s arms from their duct tape bindings, placing them across its surface. The man grumbles before a spate of wet coughing.
Henry holds his left arm down and raises the machete.
“You will never strike another in anger.”
The blade drops with purpose - left hand removed. Then the right. The man so far gone his only response is a sharp cry followed by child-like whimpering. He lies slumped over the table, blood pooling from the wounds.
“Goodbye Arthur.”
Henry returns to his seat to watch the man expire.
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