Crush Read Online Free PDF Page A

the evils of bestialitywhile I sit, shifting from annoyance to anger to shame to nausea. By the time Pastor has finished his sermon, I feel as tall as a microbe. After our little get-together in his office, he goes back to barelyspeaking to me.
The shame pierces me deeply, and I hate my Mom all the more. Thinking Pastor’s fixed everything all hunkydory, she tries to make small talk with me, tries to invite me out to movies on her days off.
I ignore her.
I pray to a God whose existence I question, Please don’t let me be evil…please don’t let me hurt any more dogs…or cats…or birds…or any other animals…and please don’t let me hurt any people…please make me a good person. I don’t want Mom to be afraid of me…please make me good…please…
    When I begin high school at the age of fourteen, I should be a fledgling serial killer, but somehow, I defy the standard behavioral trajectory predicted by FBI profilers. Hormones begin flowing, and instead of wanting to kill prettygirls, I just want to fuck them. I lose interest in the compulsions of serial killers and in swiping Natalie’s Barbie and Ken dolls. My desires turning away from death and destruction, transforming into a voracious appetite for sex.
    I’ll show that bastard that I’m better than those new boys of his.
I begin banging every chick that will let me within ten feet of her. I appreciate how abnormal my interests have run the past year or two, and perhaps being a teenaged horn-dog doesn’t make me a “good” person, but when compared side by side with being fascinated by murder and blood, it’s the lesser of the two evils.
I don’t read those journals anymore. I’d like to throw them and their unspeakable contents into the trash, but I’m afraid someone will find and read them. I’d like to burn or shred them, but I don’t have a shredder, and there’s no place I can light a fire around here without drawing attention to myself. So I stuff them into my bookcase, behind a neglected set of orange Funk & Wagnall encyclopedias.
I leave my gun-loving, bird-shooting friends behind, begin attending church willingly (I want to be a good person, remember.), and reconnect with my old pals Ray and Benny. The robin I killed will haunt me for years after. Luckily, none of the cats I ever shot at have suffered. I was never close enough to get a good shot.
I’m so ashamed when I realize how awful I’ve been, how mean. Whydid I desire to hurt other lives? I remember the Golden Rule from Sundayschool…do unto others…
I’m changed…
I’m a good boynow…
But I’ve forgotten to thank God for answering the prayer I said some months ago.
I’ve forgotten that I had even said a prayer.
I don’t know I’m a victim.

chapter four: jamie pearce (aged thirteen to fourteen)
    The neighbors across the road tell the police that theyheard loud pops, but that theyweren’t sure if theywere gunshots. It’s the stench of putrefaction, of human flesh gently cooked by an unseasonable late April heat, that prompts them to call. The cops break in and find my Mom and Daddy rotting. Every room is searched. The house is beyond filthy. Drug paraphernalia are everywhere. Dirt and hair are so thick on the floors that it sticks to their shoes. Moldy food sits in pans on the stovetop. More mold floats on the dishwater. The toilets are coated with shit and grime.
    They use bolt cutters to get the locks off of my door and find me laying in purulent pools of feces, urine and vomit. I can’t answer any of their questions. “How long you been locked in here?” “What’s your name?” “Were they your parents, or were you abducted?” I can’t even tell them how long it’s been since the shooting. Time has burned awaynoiselessly.
    In the ER, I throw up my most recent meal, which has been sitting undigested for days in my gut: paint chips, wood chips, a scrap of bedsheet, all mixed with black, clotted blood so horribly foul that the police and the nurses and doctors