August 25, 2006

Bob the Sadist

Bob the sadist couldn't help himself. He liked to throw things. All kinds of things. But mostly sharp things. He'd throw them at anyone he saw, like he'd never run out. The thing was, he wasn't really a sadist. He didn't really mean to hit you. But he wasn't very accurate. He was out of practice, or something, I suppose.

I don't know how I ended up working for Bob, working with Bob -- being around Bob. He was just one of those people who always seemed to have something on you. In this case he had my wife and daughter living with him. He had two of my daughters living with him, actually. One of them was very young and I cared about her an unreasonable amount. Bob could've been Warren Beatty's twin, which may explain something about him, or it may not.

He lived in an old apartment house off of 51st and Winslow. His neighbor Richard looked exactly like Kevin Spacey and hardly ever wore clothes. He seemed sympathetic though. And I think he was on my side. Anyway, I got mixed up with Bob one way or another. And I was at his place most days, just trying to talk to him when out of nowhere he'd start throwing things at me, almost like he's stricken with a kind of Tourette's Syndrome. He does these things when he knows he shouldn't. He hurts us and he knows it's wrong and that's what makes it irresistible.

He always starts with crazy knives, and big things which are totally out of his control. They somehow miss me. Certainly they would have killed me, I thought, if they'd have hit me. As you can imagine, I move toward the door directly now because even though I know Bob doesn't really want to hit me I don't trust him. I have no faith in him, physically. He's a lousy shot.

I reach out with my left hand, for the door, and a sharp searing pain tears upward from the inside of my elbow up through my armpit. Bob has landed a small butterflied piece of perforated steel just above my forearm. Out of the corner of my eye I see that Bob is winding up to throw again and I know that if I run or twist or try to squirm out of this that I'm going to be hit again. And that it will be worse. To move, even a little, would tilt things in such a way, would wreck his perspective and shake his confidence at this crucial time, in this the next to last moment just before he gets it right for once. So I stay still.

Bob somehow laces three loops held with chain, through the perforated steel still hanging there, out of my arm. The hoops, I know, are razor sharp and would do quite a lot of harm had the aim been less true. Yes. This is exactly what he -- what we, intended.

The problem with Bob is just that he doesn't get enough practice. He's got a real gift, naturally. But that kind of talent takes time to develop. That's why I say he's not really a sadist; he doesn't like hurting us. And soon, when he gets better, he won't. In the meantime, I tell them, it's best to stay perfectly still, and hope for the best.