Felt Tip was a joke, you know? Just a big fuckin’ stupid joke. I don’t think anyone’s gonna miss the guy. A few dopeheads who couldn’t get in with a real dealer if their lives depended on it, maybe, and a few dumb dickheads like him—his gang, I guess you’d call ’em. But nobody else. Felt Tip was just one of those guys. A born asshole. He was always fuckin’ people over, he never did shit in school, never did much of anything but start trouble. Shit, Felt was trouble. And that was all he was. Like I said, nobody’s gonna miss the guy.
◊◊◊
“Don’t call me Felt, asshole,” he’d tell me, swingin’ around his switchblade in front of the teacher and everybody, smilin’ away like he thought it was the funniest thing in the world. “Only my friends call me Felt. You just call me sir, or I’ll cut you a few new holes, you got that?”
That was Felt Tip for you. He thought there wasn’t nobody in the whole goddamned world he couldn’t fuck with and get away with it. He thought he was so bad ass, he thought he had everybody under his thumb. And I guess there must’ve been somethin’ to that, ’cause, as much of an asshole as he was, he had power over a lot of people. He fucked over too many people too much without payin’ for it for him not to have had some power. So I guess there must’ve been something to all his bullshit about how bad ass he was. But for the most part, I still say it was just what I called it—bullshit. It was just that a lot of people bought it—too many people, I guess—and maybe I did too, for a while.
“I think I’m gonna cut ya an ear-to-ear smile, dickless,” he’d say, flashin’ his switchblade right in front of my nose, that same goddamned grin on his face. “If you don’t learn to smile yourself proper, then I’m gonna cut you one that ain’t ever gonna go away. You got me?”
And I’d just nod and apologize for whatever he told me to, give him a little money like he’d ask, and then just keep my mouth shut. He was just that kind of guy—anybody else, I probably would’ve been down in the office in ten seconds, maybe. But not with Felt Tip. I bought the bullshit, I guess you could say. And I know I wasn’t the only one. I mean, I heard stories about him. God, I heard stories. Heard he raped a girl right in the fuckin’ stairwell and told her if she breathed a single goddamned word he’d cut her tongue out and make her eat it. Mr. Charisma himself, this guy, you know? Heard he went and broke one of the teacher’s arms—broke it with a goddamned baseball bat—and, sure enough, the woman had been comin’ to school with her arm in a cast for the last couple of weeks. But Felt never got suspended, never even got called down to the office, as far as I know—not for the girl, not for the teacher, not for anything. And he did a lot more shit than just that—some things just rumors I heard, some that I knew he’d done. A lot of bad stuff, a lot of stuff most people couldn’t’ve ever gotten away with, not in a million years. A lot of stuff that should’ve put his sorry ass in jail. But Felt tip got away with it. At least, he did for awhile.
I don’t know when things really started changing. I just know that they did. Felt’d come down the hall, actin’ bad-ass as always, mean and ugly and slappin’ people around for no reason at all. He’d corner me in the bathroom, flashin’ his old switchblade in front of my face and grinnin’ that pain-in-the-ass grin of his. “I’m gonna carve your head up like a jack o’lantern, dickless, just like a fuckin’ pumpkin,” he’d tell me, same way he had a million times before. But somethin’ had changed. Maybe it was just me, but it felt like it was everything. Like the air was heavier, like the light was different, like nothin’ tasted the same anymore. Like that goddamned grin on Felt Tip’s face was a little more strained than it used to be. Maybe it was just my imagination. But I don’t think so.
◊◊◊
It was one of those days—one of those days where I’d sit out at the park, the sun this funky blood-red against the roofs of the tenements across the street, thinkin’ about how things had started seemin’ different—that I found that crowbar. The park’s just a couple of blocks from my house, so I went there a lot—and shit, it’s not like there was anything else to do. There’s this old elementary school right in the middle of it—the place was a sort of glorified playground, I guess—and I was just walkin’ around, pickin’ up sticks and beer bottles and shit, trying to break some windows. Breakin’ windows helps me think, and, right then, I wanted to do some serious thinkin’. I was thinkin’ about Felt, ‘course. The bastard hadn’t left me alone, not for a minute, almost for a straight month. He was always on my case, always callin’ me some shit, always trying to start trouble. He had gotten himself a girl, some stupid slut who didn’t know any better, but it hadn’t done anything to improve his disposition. ‘Cause things just kept gettin’ crazier. Some fires got set inside the auditorium one weekend; I heard Felt was the one that did it. I heard Rick, this stupid, four-eyed geek, had gone and gotten himself into a fight with Felt, and Felt had ended up moppin’ the floor with the little runt. With a bunch of students and about three teachers watchin’. I heard Felt and Tucker, his new girl, had taken to going’ at it just about anywhere in the whole damned school they pleased—and shit, I knew that was true. I’d seen them.
Things had gotten crazy. Tucker had been at the school maybe a month, and already Felt had a ring through her nose. She had to know about that girl he nailed on the stairs, and that girl in the bathroom, and that cheerleader behind the bleachers—hell, just about everybody knew. Nothin’ ever got done about it, but everybody knew. Tucker must’ve, too. I guess she just didn’t care. And, I guess I can’t say much, ‘cause to tell the truth, neither did I. Not until I found that crowbar.
The thing was just lying there, right on the walkway in front of the door. I was looking for another empty quart bottle of Budweiser—that way, if the window didn’t break, at least the bottle did. I wanted somethin’ to break. But I guessed the crowbar would do—what the hell? Somethin’ that heavy was bound to break through about any window I threw it at. But after I picked the thing up, I didn’t want to throw it. It was like it had just jumped up and become a part of my hand. I mean, it felt good there—heavy and dangerous. And it was hot—hot like the metal hadn’t finished coolin’ off yet, hot like the thing had been made maybe half-an-hour ago. It just plain felt good—like it belonged in my hand, like it had always belonged there. We hit it off right away, me and that crowbar. We felt good about each other. I wasn’t sure just how it had gotten to where I found it—I mean, I’ve heard about how important it’s supposed to be to raise a street-smart kid these days, but I don’t think they’ve taken to handin’ out crowbars in grade school just yet. But it didn’t matter. ‘Cause once I had it in my hand, I knew it was my property, and it was gonna stay my property. And that was just fine with me.
◊◊◊
“You ain’t ever gonna try and fuck with me, right, man?” Felt’d ask, holdin’ that goddamned switchblade right under my chin, that old ugly grin lookin’ more strained than ever. “I know you’s a smart boy, and I know you don’t wanna go up against me, right? Right?”
Things were changin’, all right. I think everything was changin’. And, as far as Felt Tip was concerned, things just kept gettin’ crazier. I mean it, they were gettin’ downright insane. Felt Tip had maybe three friends in the whole goddamned world, and they were stupid dickheads, just like him. But they were takin’ over the school. And I mean they were takin’ over. It got to where I could’ve gone down to the office and told the principal and everybody about his flashin’ switchblades and tellin’ me how he was gonna cut my goddamned ears off, and nothin’ would’ve happened—if anything ever would have happened to begin with. Felt Tip was runnin’ the place. By then, him and Tucker had taken to goin’ at it right in class. I’m talkin’ gettin’ naked and bailin’ hay. But nobody stopped them, which I guess ain’t so strange, ’cause there wasn’t nobody left to stop them. A lot of teachers quit, a lot of students left—the good students, anyway. What was left was more like a nuthouse than anything else. And it was Felt Tip that made it like that. Nobody else in the whole fuckin’ world could’ve made things so crazy—but Felt did. He was just one of those guys. A born Hitler. One of those nuts that just couldn’t get put away. The world couldn’t make him straight, so he made the world a goddamned loony bin. He had that sort of power. Like I said, he was just one of those guys.
But there was more to it than that. It wasn’t just school. Everything had changed. And maybe it wasn’t all Felt Tip, either. The world just plain smelled different. Nothin’ seemed like it was in the right place anymore. The air was too thick. Everything was just, I don’t know, a little too big. Whatever it was, it didn’t fit. Nothin’ was the right color—everything was a shade off. I’ll tell you the truth, though: that really didn’t bother me so much. More and more, I was actually startin’ to like it. I guess it was partly because I had pretty much taken to spendin’ the afternoon in the garage, bashin’ shit up with my crowbar. And that felt good. There was an old sink in there that hadn’t worked since the pipes under the garage had frozen over and cracked a couple of years ago, and I busted it to hell. There were some old benches and shelves, a couple of stools, and I busted them up, too. What the fuck? It helped me think things out, and as crazy as everything was gettin’, I needed to think. Besides, it kind of got things rollin’ between me and my crowbar. It helped me get a feel of the things we could do together. And, when I started gettin’ that feelin’, I started thinkin’ of just all the things that we would do together. All the things that I wanted to do. And I guess that that was when I really stopped buying the bullshit.
◊◊◊
I still spent a lot of time at that stupid park, hangin’ around that dumb-ass elementary school, which I guess is how it finally happened. I kind of liked it there, and besides, I’d run out of things to bust in the garage, but there were still lots of bottles and bricks and cinder blocks and shit all around the park. But mostly, I just liked it there. I liked watchin’ the sun going down behind the tenement buildings ‘cross the street, makin’ the sky all blood-colored before it got sucked down and the whole world turned black. I liked the fluorescent lights all around the park at night, I liked the way they made the grass look blue. It reminded me of somethin’ somewhere, somethin’ I couldn’t really remember. But I liked it.
There was a bunch of milk crates stacked up by the wall of the school, and sometimes, late at night, I’d climb them up to the roof, just get on up and sit there, lookin’ at the park under the fluorescents. I loved that grass. I loved the hum of the lights. How you could feel the breeze—dry and cool and always blowing—up on the roof. And I guess I wasn’t the only one. I guess Felt must’ve, too.
See, I had been hangin’ around on the roof, kickin’ the gravel, throwin’ shit down the vents and stuff, watchin’ the grass turn blue and the roof light up as the sun went down and all the fluorescents kicked in, like I did at least a couple of days every week, when Felt showed up. I didn’t know it was Felt, not at first. I just thought I heard somebody talkin’ about somethin’, so I stopped screwin’ around and listened. Then I knew I heard somebody talkin’, and climbin’ up those milk crates by the side of the building. So I disappeared real quick, back behind one of those big vents where it was real dark ’cause none of the fluorescents hit it. And when he got to the top, that’s when I knew it was Felt. His voice got clear, and I could hear him talkin’ that old Felt bullshit at somebody. I suppose it only made sense—someone had to have stacked those crates by the school so they could climb up. I just’d never stopped to think that it might’ve been Felt. But I knew he didn’t live much further away from the place than I did, and if anybody would’ve showed up where there were bottles to smash and windows to break, it would’ve been Felt Tip. And it was.
I knew what was goin’ to happen, then. I guess I’d known it for awhile. It’d just been a matter of time, and I knew the time had come. I’d stopped buying the bullshit a while back. I wasn’t scared of Felt Tip—I was just pissed. Maybe I had been scared of him at first, him and his twirlin’ switchblade, him and his crazy grin. But not anymore. Now I just wanted to beat his fuckin’ head in. I guess that’s all I’d wanted for a long time now—just to wipe that goddamned grin off his face. Once and for all. Like usual when I climbed up on the roof, I had that crowbar stuck through one of my belt loops, ridin’ heavy against my thigh, and soon as I knew it was Felt comin’ up there, I pulled it out. Then I just hefted it in my hand, feelin’ the weight, feelin’ how hot the goddamned thing was, psychin’ myself up. I’d spent a lot of time out in the garage, bustin’ the hell out of shit, just wishin’ it was Felt I was beatin’ on. And now I had my chance, ’cause here was the bastard himself. Maybe he had his switchblade with him, maybe he didn’t—I really didn’t give a shit. By then, I don’t think I would’ve cared if he had pulled out a fuckin’ submachine gun. ‘Cause I had my crowbar. And that night, that was all I was gonna need.
I heard a bottle break, and Felt yelled out somethin’ I didn’t understand, and laughed at himself. Then I heard gigglin’, girl gigglin’, and I sure knew that wasn’t Felt. Took me a second or two to place that voice, but when I did, I felt better than ever. ‘Cause I knew just who it was. It was Tucker, Felt’s girl. She had come with him. And I knew then that that was my lucky night. I mean, it was like fate or somethin’—I wouldn’t get a better chance if I waited ten million years. ‘Cause now I had Felt and Tucker right there, on my territory. It was my chance to do the world a favor and get rid of both of them. And, feelin’ that crowbar all hot and dangerous in my hand, I knew I could do it. I peeked over the vent, watchin’ them, and there they were, just lying down on the roof, lookin’ up at the stars and saying some sort of shit to each other, not payin’ attention to anything else. So I went for it—I wasn’t scared, and I didn’t feel like waitin’.
I took my shoes off first—the roof had all this gravel on it and I knew I’d make too much noise with them on. Then, goin’ slow as I could, I moved out from behind the vent and started walkin’. I was quiet, and I really didn’t need to worry about them catchin’ on to me—they were too busy talkin’ to each other, all nice and loud and laughin’ a lot. I guess it was somethin’ like five minutes before I got close enough and Felt finally noticed, but it happened. He just suddenly quit laughin’, turnin’ his head to the side and his eyes rollin’ up to look at me—and then I jumped on ’em.
Tucker was easy. I don’t think she even knew what hit her. Before she even looked up, I was comin’ down on her, puttin’ all my weight on my knee and slammin’ it down on her stomach, swingin’ the crowbar as hard as I could, hittin’ her ‘cross the jaw. She made somethin’ like a gurgle and I saw her eyes rollin’ up into her head, but that’s all I saw before I was up and goin’ for Felt Tip, swingin’ that crowbar out in front of me. I got him one blow on the shoulder before he was up and backin’ away, twirlin’ that switchblade around with his fingers. But this time, at least, Felt wasn’t doing no smilin’.
“I’m gonna cut you up now, dickless,” he told me, holdin’ his switchblade out in front of him like I was supposed to be scared of it or somethin’. “I’m gonna cut out your fuckin’ heart and eat it for dinner. I’m gonna kill you for what you just did. You get me?”
I didn’t say anything back. I just smiled, keepin’ a real careful eye on the hand with the switchblade.
“I told you not fuck with me, homeboy,” Felt said, his face all slick and shiny, his eyes big and white and ugly. “I don’t know what you think you’re doin’, but I’m gonna kill you for it, you get me?”
I stepped up real fast, still smilin’ at him, and he took a swipe at me with his switchblade, backin’ up a little. I just ducked, grabbed his hand at the wrist, and hit him ‘cross the knuckles with my crowbar. He dropped that blade like nobody’s business, lettin’ it clatter on the gravel, and I kicked it away. His other hand was already reachin’ for my neck—I’d guess crackin’ him one ‘cross the knuckles would’ve hurt, but it didn’t really seem to bother him much. He just looked pissed, and was goin’ at me again. Not that I cared. I just swung up my crowbar and gave him one on the elbow, makin’ him let go, and then slammed it hard as I could into his crotch. He made this weird noise, like he was burpin’ or somethin’, and doubled over, his hands slidin’ inbetween his legs. He looked up at me, his face all twisted up and ugly like some Halloween mask, and then I knew he was mad—mad as hell. So I gave him my crowbar upside the head.
Felt fell with this dull, thumpin’ sound, gravel slidin’ everywhere, makin’ these tiny little noises—it kind of sounded like he was squeakin’. Like a mouse. And I gotta say, I liked it. All I kept thinkin’ was how goddamned good it felt to have Felt hurtin’, and how I wanted to make him hurt some more. So, calm as a guy pickin’ his toenails in the bathroom, I walked over and kicked him in the stomach, then kicked him again. And Felt didn’t do nothin’ but sit there and take it, makin’ little grunts and groans and drippin’ sweat. Some bad ass he was—he hadn’t laid a goddamned finger on me, and I already had the bastard down. I wasn’t even breathin’ hard.
I was still busy kickin’ him when I heard the noise behind me, like somebody stumblin’ ‘cross the gravel, and I didn’t waste no time. I hadn’t come down on Tucker too hard—I had just wanted her out of the picture long enough to beat the shit out of Felt Tip; I’d figured I could come back and finish her off later—so I knew it was probably her, and I knew whatever she was coming up behind me for, it wouldn’t be too nice.
So I jerked around, swingin’ that crowbar out far as I could—swingin’ blind—and slammed Tucker one in the neck. Then I looked. Her eyes got wide, just big white circles with tiny little black dots in the middle, and she backed up, holdin’ her hands around her throat, her whole face turnin’ this weird purple color. So I moved in quick, swingin’ that crowbar around like a goddamned Ninja swingin’ a sword, gettin’ her one in the gut, one right on the back of her neck, the one right smack in the middle of her forehead, and kept at it until she fell on her back. And then I just kept hittin’ her. I’m not sure why—it just felt good, so I went with it. She held up her hands over her face, tryin’ to stop me, but it didn’t do any good. I just gave her a kick in the ribs. And I just kept kickin’ her, tryin’ to knock her hands away from her face with my crowbar, trying to get in a good shot so I could bash in her goddamned head. And I guess it was sometime in there, while I was doin’ that, that I noticed it wasn’t just her face that was turning purple—everything was. Her arms, her legs—she looked like a goddamned grape. And her hands didn’t look right, either. They were turnin’ purple, just like the rest of her, but there was somethin’ else. Like her fingers were all too long. Like she didn’t have any thumbs.
“Gonna rip your fuckin’ head off, homeboy,” Felt told me. He wasn’t as noisy as Tucker—I didn’t hear him at all until he had his hands around my neck. “Gonna turn you into dogshit, you get me?”
I didn’t say anything—I just jerked up my shoulders, bendin’ over a little, tryin’ to knock his arms away, but he had a damned good grip for someone who’d gotten racked with a crowbar maybe two minutes ago. I couldn’t shake him.
“Not gonna be so easy this time, dickless,” he whispered, his breath hot and muggy in my ear, and he started to drag me backwards. “I’m not gonna let it be easy. You should’ve left while you were ahead—maybe I coulda let you live. But now I’ve got to kill you. I ain’t got no choice. “
I swung my arm back, landin’ Felt a good solid blow with my crowbar, then another, and then another, but it wasn’t like it was the first time—he hardly seemed to be feelin’ any of it. He just took it.
“I told you, it ain’t gonna be so easy this time, homeboy,” he whispered. “You pushed this thing too damned far. You don’t got no easy way out anymore. You gotta die. “
I smiled. That same old Felt bullshit. That crowbar was gettin’ hotter in my hand, it was gettin’ heavier—I just had to wait. Not sure how I knew it—I just did. Felt was in for a surprise.
“You gotta be careful ’bout who you try to fuck with, dickless,” Felt Tip was saying, still draggin’ me back, the gravel scratchin’ my ankles all to hell. “‘Cause you don’t know—there might be more to ’em than you think. Lot more. Shit you just can’t deal with.”
He had me almost to the side of the buildin’ before I knew the time was right—that crowbar was gettin’ so hot I could hardly hold it. “I didn’t want to do this,” Felt said, stoppin’ at the edge of the roof. “I really didn’t—you just didn’t give me no choice. You die. “
He turned me around, showin’ me the two stories down to the school parkin’ lot. “Too bad you had to go and get clumsy,” he was sayin’ when I swung that crowbar with everything I had. What I heard sounded more like a small explosion that metal hittin’ flesh, but Felt let go—he let go of me quick. He said somethin’, somethin’ real fast and ugly soundin’, but I didn’t pay much attention. I just turned around, crouchin’ down and goin’ past him, puttin’ a little quick distance between me and the edge of the buildin’. I took a short look at Tucker as I moved, just to make sure she still out of the action, and she was—was she ever. Maybe it was just the light, but she looked like she was meltin’.
“Wanna do it the hard way, huh, big man?” Felt asked, comin’ up on me. “I can do it like that. “
He came at me pretty fast. I stood my ground, holdin’ my crowbar out in front of me—the goddamned thing was so hot it felt like it was burnin’ my hand up, but I couldn’t’ve let go of it if I’d wanted to. It was like it was welded there. And anyway, hot as it was gettin’, I didn’t want to let go.
“I can do it hard,” he told me, comin’ closer, his face all tight and eyes lookin’ like two yellow slits cut in his head. “I can do it harder than you think, dickless. ‘Cause you don’t know. You just don’t know. “
I guess it was then that I noticed Felt looked bigger than he should’ve—taller and wider all of the sudden, with more muscles on him than a person ought to have. I thought it was the light, or maybe just me, at first, but it wasn’t. Felt was gettin’ closer, and I could see him pretty clear. And he didn’t look so much like Felt Tip anymore. He was lookin’ less and less like him every second.
“You just don’t know,” he said slowly, almost right on top of me. His voice was deeper. Bigger sounding. “Might be more than you think. A lot more. “
Felt’s T-shirt ripped right then, from the neck down to the middle of the shirt, the sleeves splittin’ open. His nose looked like it was pulling back, turnin’ into to black holes stuck in the middle of his face, his mouth becomin’ somethin’ I don’t think anybody could smile with. By then, he had pretty much stopped looking like Felt altogether. But it didn’t make no difference. Felt could’ve turned into the Jolly Green Giant for all I cared. I still had my crowbar.
“Lot more,” he said again, his voice gettin’ ugly as his face and gettin’ all—I don’t know, maybe wet is the word. It sounded like he was talkin’ through a mouthful of glue. “Shit too big for you to handle. “
Then he was up on me, lookin’ at least four feet taller and maybe three hundred pounds heavier than he should’ve, more muscles than anything else. He put his hand down around my head—his hand was that goddamned big. “I can do it hard,” he told me, startin’ to squeeze. “I can make it hurt. “
I did the only thing I could do. I hit his fuckin’ tree trunk-sized wrist with my crowbar, hard as I could—and the damned thing was white-hot now. There was this big thud that sounded like an explosion, ‘cept louder than before, and I saw a flash—and Felt let me go, that big old body stumblin’ back like he was drunk or somethin’. The buildin’ shook under all that weight, and I saw a place or two where it buckled and those big feet of his—and I swear, it looked like he didn’t have a single toe—almost punched through the roof.
I held my crowbar out in front of me, and I could feel the heat comin’ off of it and hittin’ my face, I could see it glowin’, I could feel it swellin’ up in my hand, takin’ the rest of me with it. Felt stumbled back, still gettin’ bigger and bigger, and I went after him, gettin’ a little bigger myself. It was the crowbar—I felt it goin’ up into my hand, blowin’ me up like a guy blowin’ up a balloon. And I was faster than Felt—my shirt split down my back, around my shoulders, the collar rippin’ apart, and then it was gone, all in a couple of seconds. I felt my jeans bustin’ at the seams, splittin’ down my thighs and then tearin’ the rest of the way. It was all goin’ off. Everything around me looked like it was shrinkin’.
For a couple of seconds, I was too busy noticin’ what was happenin’ to me to look at Felt Tip, but when I did, I was glad to see what I saw—those ugly yellow eyes were wide and glowin’—it looked like he had two of those GE bulb bugs screwed into his head—and he was lookin’ straight at me. That crowbar was shinin’ white now, and my hand was open, holdin’ it out. I didn’t even have to keep a grip on it anymore—it was just there, stickin’ out from my hand like it was shoved down through my wrist, right next to my thumb. I pointed it at him, and he held one of his tree trunk-sized arms out in front of his face. But I knew that wasn’t goin’ to do him no good, and I think he knew it, too. It was time to put an end to this shit—Felt was gonna stop makin’ things crazy.
I got up to him, and got up to him quick—I took about four steps and I was at the edge of the roof. He hit me with his fist, still holdin’ his other arm in front of his face, but I hardly felt it. I guess he was still growin’, but like everything else he was tryin’, it didn’t make any difference—I was growin’ faster. I was a foot taller, two feet taller, three. I just kept climbin’. I pulled his arm away from his face, holdin’ back the one with the crowbar, ready to get him, but he just covered his face with his other arm. I crouched down, grabbin’ his free arm in my hand and twistin’ it back, and back, and back, ’til I heard it crack. He screamed—actually, I think roared was more like it—and I grabbed his other arm, and pulled it away, bendin’ it back like I did the other one, and Felt screamed again. I could feel his arm swellin’—he was trying to grow some more. But I matched it and went past it—I just kept getting bigger, and my crowbar with me. And that was what I was about to crush Felt’s head with when we fell through the roof.
We landed on the second floor, but it gave way just as quick, and then we hit the ground. I had to let go of Felt, just for a second, ’cause rocks and dust and shit was going’ everywhere, and he didn’t waste no time—the minute we landed, he started to try and get away. But I just went after him twice as fast, plowin’ through the rubble, and grabbed one of his feet as he tried to get out on the playground, twistin’ it until I heard the pop. I pulled him back, throwin’ him down on the mess of concrete and steel in front of me, and he just lay there. Now he wasn’t even tryin’ to protect himself—he just layed there, waitin’ for me to finish him off. So I did.
“It’s over,” I told him, my voice so deep I felt my whole body shakin’ when I said it. “This is it. And you know it. You’re through makin’ things crazy.”
He just nodded a little, and I brought the hand with the crowbar in it down, slammin’ it right between those eye-slits, right through his head. I felt the thing pull out of my hand then, I saw the flash, I heard the noise—now it sounded like a goddamned atom bomb—and there was fire, like millions of little orange sparks goin’ up into the air. And Felt Tip was gone.
I got out as fast as I could, the world around me gettin’ a lot bigger awfully quick. I picked through the rubble, trying to find my crowbar and my clothes, but I didn’t have much luck. I found a piece of something that might’ve been my jeans, but it didn’t take me long to figure out that there was no way I was gonna find my crowbar in all that mess. And after puttin’ my hand down in some sort of slimy, grape-colored glop, I pretty much decided I was gonna stop lookin’.
I climbed out of the rubble—I collected a few cuts and bruises on the way, but nothin’ to worry about—and went home. I took back ways, mostly, so nobody’d see me runnin’ down the street butt-naked, and whistled to myself, pretty much feelin’ like I’d done accomplished my mission in life. I’d gotten rid of Felt Tip, and I was damned glad. It’d been hard, but I thought I’d done the world a favor. The people at school would start noticin’ Felt Tip wasn’t coming by no more, and maybe things would start gettin’ normal again, and we could all just forget Felt Tip had ever happened. And I kinda thought we would. Hell, I was forgettin’ him already.
Like I said, nobody’s gonna miss the guy.
◊◊◊
The Interstitium 