By Megan Feringa
is happily disturbed, his dream is
to murder, be a killer for hire but
a genuinely nice guy, says so
with a smile.
ROTC, twenty-three,
believes in Satan and pentagrams and making his poodle
dress up for Halloween. He watches South Park,
laughs at Christmas cards, hung a bunny by its ears
in the branches of a backyard willow
and shot it with a BB gun until only
the tips were still tied to the limb
drip, drip, drip, drop.
Buzzed hair, green eyes, three nipples, a revolver
under his pillow for the tooth fairy or
the boogey man or Jesus. A beard like Jesus,
but he doesn’t believe in Jesus. Sprays deer antler
musk on his tongue and smells like shit. Lots
of deer antler musk to make his penis enlarged
like Jesus.
He brings home a girl every night—
all twos,
claims they’re fours,
they’re sometimes fours,
but mostly twos
because his penis isn’t as big as Jesus.
He claims
there’s no better feeling
than aiming at a target
with eyes, ears, mouth and nose
head, shoulder, knees, and toes
and pulling the trigger –
He wants a girlfriend,
someone to hold onto at night and whisper
his dreams to. Sometimes I let him
whisper to me but I sit on the couch
by the window with the blinds up
and the TV on.
He plays the piano, hates shoes in his room,
bare walls, no pictures, No Easy Day on the bed stand,
nine T-shirts rolled, eight khakis folded,
four button downs and one suit
worn more times than his age.
He drinks aged whiskey
straight, not gay, straight
like straight pants and straight hair and straight shirts and a straight smile
but crooked eyes, like he’d gotten them stuck
while laughing at the bunny in the backyard willow.
He loves fajitas, makes them himself
and tortillas too. Learned from a boy
in Basic named Isaac. Basic Isaac got
sent to Afghanistan and the recipe got
sent to Bill before Basic Isaac got
sent to heaven after a car bombing
outside Kabul. Bill wore his suit again.
Twenty-four, he said. But he wasn’t counting.
He had a teacher last year
wanted in twenty-four different countries,
strapped three guns on him always.
His chest, his ankles, his back. Like freckles.
Two million on his head,
double in Syria. “That’s what I want,”
said Bill, juice dripping from his mouth
with Basic Isaac’s fajitas.
“A bounty on my head
for fucking up so many lives,
so I know I did my job right.
We gotta do our job right.”
But he plays the piano for me
at night when the blinds are up
and the TV’s on. He asks if
I’ve found him a girl yet, a pretty one
with eyes, ears, nose, and mouth
to kiss and say his name
over and over and over
when he’s gone
and can’t play the piano anymore.
Megan Feringa is a junior at Auburn University who enjoys hiking and yoga. She is majoring in Journalism.
