Man of Wax (28 page)

“How does that—” I started to say but stopped. In the silence there was the beeping of the machines, the sound of the wind, the slight rasping coming from within Howard Abele’s lungs. “You killed her, didn’t you? You ... killed your wife.”
 

“Like I told you, I could do whatever I wanted. Besides, she was no good to me anymore. She failed to understand the system. I gave her more chances than she deserved, and she forfeited every one.” The old man coughed his raspy cough and said, “None of this sounds familiar to you, does it? Weren’t you ever paying attention in any of your World History classes? The greatest civilization ever to rule this planet was the Roman Empire.”
 

A faint echo of something Simon had said to me rose in my mind, but I ignored it and asked, “Why are you telling me this shit?”
 

“To be honest,” Howard Abele said, “it’s not for your benefit. It’s for theirs.” And with his weak hand he pointed at my face—only I knew it was the glasses he was pointing at, the camera in the middle. “Not everyone who watches is a member of the Inner Circle. So they must be reminded of the true reason behind all of this. Because these games are only a small part of what’s going on. They’re merely ... entertainment. But these other people, the ones who like to watch for the fun of it, they must understand soon this world is going to change, that it needs to change, and if they wish to survive, they must give full allegiance to Caesar.”
 

I was slowly shaking my head. “You are fucking insane. You know what you sound like? You sound like some extreme Islamic fundamentalist spouting off what will happen if we don’t all bow down before Allah.”
 

The old man stared back at me, his expression grave. “
Terrorists
?” he said. “You equate us to
terrorists
? We are nothing like them. Those people, their goal is to destroy the world. We ... we are trying to rebuild it.”
 

“Why did you have cameras placed in our house?”
 

The old man sighed. “The cancer hit me right away. I wasn’t strong enough to go to work anymore. I was forced to start working out of the house. But then I began letting my business managers run the show. I was still making money so I didn’t care. But I was bored.”
 

“You were bored.”
 

“That’s right. And I wanted to see what my ‘Julia’ was up to. It was fun to watch. It was especially fun watching you. I always liked watching you. Whether it was sitting on the couch watching TV or jerking off to the Internet, you were always entertaining. Almost more entertaining than the games.”
 

“So you’ve watched the games before.”
 

“Of course.” A pause, followed by another rasping cough. “Like I said, I’ve been a member of the Inner Circle for years. Back then it was different though. Back then they just locked the players in a room and brought them children or animals every once in a while, forced them to copulate. Other stuff too, which I’m sure you can imagine.”
 

I shook my head.
 

The smile crooked appeared again, and Howard Abele asked, “What are you thinking right now?”
 

“That all that is ... disgusting. That
you’re
disgusting.”
 

“Am I? First I’m insane, now I’m disgusting. But let me ask you this. Is what you’ve been doing all your life not disgusting? Looking at naked women having sex with each other, putting their fingers and tongues in their cunts and assholes. That’s all right then?”
 

“It’s”—I cleared my throat—“not the same.”
 

“Not the same?” He chuckled again. “You actually believe it’s not the same? That’s rich.”
 

I said nothing. Forced myself to keep staring back at him but ended up shifting my eyes to the long window beyond the bed.
 

“That’s what I thought,” Howard Abele said. “I had you checked out after the first time Jennifer brought you to meet me. I had a team of investigators bring me everything they could about you. It was bad enough that you came from a poor family, that you’d never done anything with your life and never would. But the incident your freshman year at college was what stuck out most. Not that you did nothing while that girl was being beaten, but that you confessed to the police later you wanted to help. It just proved to me that you were weak. That you would never even begin to understand the new system of the world, the vision Caesar has been working on for decades now. And that girl? That girl no doubt deserved it. Had you just watched for the simple pleasure of watching, I might have actually come to like you. But you said you wanted to help her. And even though you said that, you still did nothing.”
 

I was still staring at that window, at the darkness beyond. “Are they dead?”
 

“Who?”
 

“You know who.”
 

“To be honest, I don’t know, and I don’t care. This game has nothing to do with them. It’s all about you.”
 

At that moment, somewhere in the house, a sudden salvo erupted: four solid cracks of gunfire followed by a second or two of silence, then a continuous series of
crack! crack! crack!
 

I was up immediately, the gun gripped now by two hands, and started around Howard Abele’s bed. The gunfire continued and I glanced down at the gun in my hands.
 

Shit, I thought.
 

Howard Abele began chuckling. “Looks like you have trouble. Does that mean you’re going to stand by like a statue and watch?”
 

Standing now facing the door, my back to the window, I said loudly over the gunfire, “What did you mean it’s all about me?”
 

The smile appeared again. The old man actually looked genuinely happy that I’d asked, despite what was now happening inside his mansion.
 

He again raised a hand—his left this time—and motioned for me to come closer. Keeping my eyes on the door, gripping the gun tightly, I took first one step, then another, and leaned down. When he spoke his voice was a harsh whisper that seemed to put the gunfire in as much importance as the machines beeping around him.
 

“When you know you don’t have much longer to live—when the doctors have even given you a set amount of time—you start to question everything you’ve ever done. People like to say they want to know if they’ve made a difference but that’s bullshit. People don’t care, at least not deep down. They only care about what they missed out on. What the one thing was that could have really made them happy. They want to fulfill whatever desires they hide in the deepest and darkest part of their hearts. So I started thinking, trying to decide what would make me the happiest, and I came to you.”
 

He started coughing then, harder than ever before. The gunfire continued, more sporadic now: a few cracks here, a few cracks there. None of it sounded like it was coming toward us though, so I knew we still had time.
 

“Me,” I said. “Why me?”
 

“Because I liked watching you. You were always self-conscious about yourself, even when you were alone. Even when you were jerking off at the computer. Those were the best moments, by the way, right when you came and you made that sigh. God, it was perfect. That was when you became the most real. When you became the most human. And I wondered to myself, how would you do if you played the game?”
 

The gunfire continued but it had somehow become background, just like the machines beeping and the wind screeching against the window behind me.
 

“I don’t believe you,” I said. I kept my gaze centered on the door. The gun felt very heavy now in my hands. “There has to be more to it. You didn’t spend all that money just to put me through this hell.”
 

“But I did spend all that money. I spent nearly my entire life’s savings so they could do it my way. It’s entertainment. That’s all it ever is. It’s what keeps the world spinning. You were the only one I could think of, the only one that I enjoyed watching the most. I told them I didn’t care what you did, that I had no real request. Well, except for what happened at Hickory View. Phillip Fagerstrom used be a classmate of mine. He was a closet faggot and I hated him. I found out he was still alive and wanted to see him die. I would have preferred you killed him yourself, but it worked out just as well. Come now, I’m sure you’ve learned something valuable from all of this.”
 

Footsteps sounded out in the hallway, frantic, and I heard Carver shouting at me. Moments later the door burst open. He came in, guns in both hands, and started to say something. Then his eyes got wide and he aimed both guns at me.
 

“Ben,” he shouted, “down!”
 

He started firing before I even had a chance to hit the floor. The gunfire which had momentarily become background invaded my world again, each crack so loud they were deafening. It didn’t occur to me until a few moments later that it hadn’t been Carver who first opened fire. No, through the sudden melee of noise I realized that somebody else was firing too. I was crouched behind the bed, my hands over my head, and what felt like stones were raining down on me. Then the chilling kiss of wind began assaulting me and I quickly glanced back.
 

The window had shattered. Out in the darkness a man wearing all black was falling to his knees. An assault rifle dropped from his hands as he landed in the scattering of glass shards.
 

Carver hurried forward, keeping his guns aimed. Now that the wind had found an entrance to the mansion it was pouring in, chasing away the touch of warmness and stench of decay.
 

“What’s happening?” I heard myself say, over the howling of the wind and what I only realized a moment later was Howard Abele chuckling on his bed.
 

“Company,” Carver said. He made sure the man was dead, then took his rifle and extra ammunition. He pocketed both of his guns and checked how many rounds were left in the rifle. “We need to split.”
 

“How many?”
 

“No idea. We managed to take down six. Well, now seven.”
 

Somewhere throughout the house, another salvo started up.
 

Howard Abele continued chuckling. The sound somehow overrode the wind and gunfire. During the three times I’d met him I never once saw him smile, let alone laugh, and here it seemed as if he just couldn’t stop.
 

I stared down at him. He was smiling back at me.
 

I said, “I need a few more minutes.”
 

“Fuck no.” The rifle now in his hands, Carver started toward the door. “We need to go now.”
 

“Hold on,” I said, and leaned down very close to the bed. In Howard Abele’s ear I whispered, “I have learned something. Reality TV isn’t about the people starring in it. It’s about the viewers. It’s about what they see. Seeing is believing, right? What really happens doesn’t matter at all.”
 

For the first time confusion passed over the old man’s face.
 

He said, “I don’t ... understand.”
 

“Of course you don’t.”
 

And stepping back, I pointed the gun at his face and pulled the trigger.

51

There were six chambers in the gun, all filled, and I used each and every one of them. The gun kicked in my hand with each shot. I may have scrunched up my face, may have screamed something unintelligible; I can’t remember exactly. All I know for certain is once I pulled the trigger a seventh time and heard the dry click I turned at once and headed for the door. Carver was waiting there, the rifle aimed down the hallway. Behind me, Howard Abele may have tried saying something but it was lost in the wind.
 

“Is it clear?” I said to Carver. He nodded and I stepped out, shutting the door behind me. I tossed the gun on the floor. Somewhere down the hall there were a few more rounds of gunfire.
 

Carver pulled one of his guns from his pocket. He handed it to me. “Now do you think you can handle the real thing?”
 

The gun Carver handed me was a nine-millimeter. He’d checked the magazine, told me there were five bullets left, and that if I wanted to shoot something, I better make sure I had a safe place to take cover.
 

“Are you ready?”
 

“Yes,” I said, though the word was simple and small and I think it was lost behind a sudden wail of more gunfire.
 

“Make sure the safety’s off,” Carver told me, and when I stared down at the gun, he reached out and flicked something on the side.
 

Then he hefted the rifle and turned and we started down the hallway.

•
   
•
   
•

B
ACK
THE
WAY
we came less than a half hour ago, the mansion had transformed itself in a very bad way. Some of the bare walls were now marked with bullet holes. Bits of glass and mirror and plaster covered the wooden floors. We passed a body wearing all black. His eyes closed, his mouth open, blood coming from his chest.
 

Carver stepped over him like he wasn’t even there.
 

A few seconds passed without any gunfire and for some reason this felt wrong. Carver sensed it too. He stopped his slow and steady pace and then just stood there, listening.
 

Silence.
 

“Does that—” I started to say, whisper really, but Carver snapped his head back, gave me a glare which caused me to shut up at once.
 

We listened.