Whatever Possessed You? (4 page)

Gerard tried to move his fingers as they hovered motionless over the keyboard. He could not regain control.

His fingers resumed typing, and he read.

You know most books are written by demons, right? Words and music are the best way to get someone to let you right into their head.
The demon who writes for Stephen King, now that’s one lucky fucker. Once people read one of his books, he’s in for good - he can go right in and out of them from thenon.

I wish I knew that demon’s secret. I only know how to get someone to let me in if they say one of my chants out loud, and that’s hard to get people to do. Dr. Seuss had it down pat, but I’m not sure I’ve got children's books in me. Horror is the way to go – and you helped me write my masterpiece.

Gerard’s cell phone began to ring.

Answer it,
his fingers typed.

He stared at the phone, motionless. His agent’s New York number flashed on the caller I.D.

His fingers pounded the keys furiously:
Pick up the fucking phone!

Before Gerard had even decided to answer, his right hand grabbed the phone, clicked the answer key, and held it up to his ear.

A man’s voice was on the line.

“Hello? Hello?”

Gerard’s left hand typed again.

Say hello or I will make you kill your children.

“This is Gerard,” he croaked.

“Gerard, you okay?” the voice on the phone asked.
“Jerry here. Got your manuscript, and I have to say…I didn’t know you had it in you! That was a ballsy move, changing the whole story up at the last minute, but you pulled it off!”

***

Aimless House Publishers loved the changes, absolutely
loved
the book, Jerry had said; but there was a tight publishing schedule.

The book would make it to press if all editing was complete tomorrow, ready for the printers. If he couldn’t have it ready, kiss it good-bye until this time next year – that is, if the publishing editors still loved it as much
then
as they did
right now
.

Jerry was quite emphatic: they probably wouldn’t.

Would a six-figure advance would be enough motivation to have it done in the next twenty-four hours? They could always negotiate his asking price on the movie rights later, Jerry said.

The real Gerard was gone by that point in the conversation; but Maazo
Maazo took over for him, finalized the details, and started to work on the requested revisions.

Sonia got home around three-thirty. She had dropped the kids off at their grandmother’s house for the afternoon, eager to resume the
ir love-making session from earlier.

She found Gerard at his desk in his study, where he was typing faster than she had ever seen him type before.

She slid a single bare leg through the doorway and wiggled it seductively, calling to him.

“Hey there,
loverboy,” she cooed, “the kids are at grandma’s. Can I interest you in, oh, I don’t know – a little fucking-my-brains out? Please?”

He ignored her. She stuck her head into the study.

“Pretty please? I really, really need you to do me like you did before,” she pleaded.

Gerard continued typing. “Get the fuck out,” he said flatly.

“But Gerard, I need you so bad!” she begged.

Gerard’s body stopped typing and turned to face her. His eyes were black and full of anger.

She stepped back, startled.

“Seriously, Sonia, get out,” he demanded in a tone she had never heard. “Get out of the house and leave me alone. Stop wasting my time and let me finish writing my goddamn book.”

Gerard’s body turned away from her and began typing again.

She started to walk away, but reconsidered. She crossed her arms in defiance and dropped the sexy voice.

“You are
not
going to talk to me that way, do you understand?” she said.

“Get out,” he repeated.

“I will destroy that computer
and
your stupid-ass book if you say that to me one more time. Say it -
I dare you
,” she hissed.

Gerard turned and hurled his cell phone at her with all his might. It missed her head by only inches and shattered against the wall, broken pieces clattering to the floor.

That was the final straw. She was pissed.

“You want to play rough?” she screamed, and charged him. She grabbed him by the shoulder and whipped him around.

“Who do you think you are, you limp-dick, worthless fuck? The ride you gave me today is the only - and I do mean
only -
thing you’ve done right in your entire pointless life. You can get out of my house and out of my li…”

Her rant cut off mid-sentence. In a single fluid motion, Gerard jumped to his feet, grabbed her by the throat, and slammed her head onto the desk. The
computer monitor shook as she struggled and kicked, trying to free herself from his iron grip.

He picked her head up and slammed it down again, hard, squeezing
her throat harder. Her eyes bulged grotesquely as she strained to breathe.

Gerard’s black eyes settled on the decorative dip pen, the gift she had given him; it lay on the desk next to her swollen face. He scooped it up and stabbed the gold-plated nib deep into her carotid, grinding it in a circular motion as deeply as he could before pulling it back out in a spray of blood.

Sonia’s body went limp, and he released her. Her lifeless body slid off the desk and flopped on to the floor in a heap. He surveyed her awkward position with amusement for a moment, and then shoved her away from the desk with his foot.

He read the inscription on the pen: “
To the best man who ever wrote his way into the story of my life; make sure it has a happy ending! Love, Sonia
” Blood dripped from the nib; seeing that elicited a chuckle.

“Let me get back to writing your happy ending, my love,” he whispered to the corpse on the floor.

As he turned back to his work, he noticed Gerard’s face reflected on the screen. For a fleeting moment, Maazo Maazo felt a new sensation run down his spine; he suspected it was pity.

He shrugged it off and began to type.

A few hours later, Gerard’s finger hit the
send
button on an e-mail, the final draft attached.

It was finished.

***

Gerard awoke later that day. He was in his bed, again not knowing how he had
ended up there. This time, though, the linen sheets and comforter were covered in a mess of dried blood.

He found Sonia’s battered body on the floor of his study, the shattered bits of his cell phone crunching underfoot.

Something inside him broke when he realized she was dead. He sat down beside her at his desk, in a state of shock.

He sat motionless - slumped over his computer, eyes staring off into
space, blood-encrusted fingers perched above the keyboard - waiting for Maazo Maazo to communicate with him again, to tell him what he should do.

But his fingers never moved.

He was still there, gaunt and catatonic in front of the computer, several days later when the police broke through the front door of his home. He didn’t move as they approached him, guns drawn, didn’t even blink as they gingerly worked their way around the festering corpse of his wife to apprehend him.

Gerard offered no resistance as they hog-tied his hands and feet behind his back. He chanted the words “Maazo Maazo” over and over as they dragged him through the front yard to a waiting police car
, while his neighbors watched with puzzled faces.

***

The book was perfection, sent to the press just in time for an immediate release. The publishers were so impressed with the commercial possibilities of
Serenity’s Termination
they doubled the size of the first edition run.

But a savvy reporter made the connection between the book and the author’s arrest, and the lurid story made headlines everywhere. It was juicy news: the new novel,
Serenity’s Termination,
foretold how the author killed his wife in gruesome detail.

Media outlets ran the story for days. Millions of people ran to their nearest bookstore to buy a copy of
Serenity’s Termination
before it could be pulled from store shelves.

The relentless publicity helped the first edition sell out in a matter of days. After much debate, the publishers decided to keep the book in print, declaring in a public statement that it would serve as a “fine moral warning to the public” - a decision undoubtedly influenced by the fact that the book was on track to become the biggest seller in publishing history.

***

Gerard Faust, despised wife-killer and infamous best-selling author, found himself incarcerated in a maximum security prison. Cut off from the outside world, he had no idea that his book (or as he called it, “Maazo
Maazo’s book”) had become an international sensation.

Gerard only knew that Maazo
Maazo was gone, leaving him with nothing but a dead wife, a cold prison cell, useless and ill-gotten fame, and the very real possibility of a death sentence.

Gerard passed time in his cell watching an endless procession of interchangeable guards shuffle around a desk down the cell block. The shift changed every twelve hours, but one thing stayed constant: the disgust and hatred they communicated
in every glance at him. Anyone within earshot let him know the whole world wanted him to burn in hell - not only for murdering his wife, but for bragging about it in his book as well.

Death, they said, was too sweet for a demon like him.

One day several weeks after his arrest, a guard walked up to Gerard’s cell and showed him the book he was reading.

Gerard was surprised to see his own name in print under the title:
Serenity’s Termination
.

“I’ve been reading your book, you sick fuck,” the guard told him matter-of-factly.

Gerard stared at him, sure that
anything
he might say would be the
wrong thing
.

“Maybe even a sick fuck like you can write one hell of book,” the guard said while flipping through the pages, searching for something.

“I wanted to ask you about this part – everyone, everywhere is wondering what it means. I thought, hell, I can ask you directly.”

The guard began to read aloud.

“Mah-zoe Mah-zoe toso nimi so,”
he read, chanting.

Gerard ran to the front of the cell and grabbed the bars, shouting.

“Stop, please stop! Don’t read that
out loud!”

The guard continued reading aloud as though Gerard hadn’t said a word.

“
Tumay noso oolaya ma-yi

Noso
olaya anona ya na-mi

Tumay noso oolaya ma-yi

Mah-zoe Mah-zoe toso nimi so.”

The guard fell silent and the book dropped from his hand, falling with a dull thud onto the concrete floor. The guard stared at it, confused; then he looked at Gerard and stepped towards the cell.

Gerard backed away.

The guard smiled as he pressed his mustache against the bars, his pupils so dilated that his eyes looked black. Even from several feet away, Gerard could feel the guard’s hot breath tickling the skin on his face. It was hot, too hot, almost scalding, like steam blowing from a kettle.

“You know what, boy?” the guard said, his voice surly and strange. “Your book inspired me. I think I might become a writer myself, someday.”

***

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