so. you came all this way just to kill me, didn’t you? all these years of searching, and here i am, an old man resting peacefully in a wheelchair, with an afghan over his chilly old legs and a cup of warm earl grey tea in his slightly shaking hands. now, you think, after all these years, the time has come for revenge! for the things i did to your mother and father when you were just a boy. and other people. lots of other people. there. you’ve had my confession. cart me off to jail where i can die among the other murderers, thieves, and sexual fiends locked up there. but while i confess i would remind you that you keep looking at one side of the facts. i murdered your parents, yes, i raped your mother while your father bled to death, yes, i am not excusing my actions as i am a troubled, troubled man, but there is the other side. your older brother, for instance. where do you think he got his rambunctious ways? why do you think, late at night, he would go out in the backyard to find field mice to dissect? do you really think your boyhood dog chester just up and ran away one day? no. of course not. your brother is a fucking murderer, boy, and the only person who knew was me. and the only reason i knew is because i’m a fucking murderer, and i spent the last two years of your parents life learning everything i could about them.
at first it was just your mother, back in the 70s my method was to track down young brunette women with wavy hair. i did this because they reminded me of my own horrible, troubled mother. i hope you’ll appreciate my frankness on the subject; i’ve spent nearly a decade in various therapies and psychoanalyses trying to figure out what is wrong with me. problem is, it’s hard to pinpoint the problem when you can’t tell your therapist that you frequently saw the limbs off people you’ve stalked. anyway, i had tailed your mother for a week when i noticed her and your father engaging in strange activity. you were, what, ten years old or so? maybe you’ve repressed those memories, i don’t know. i won’t go into detail because i can see from the look in your eyes that you already did your research. i saved your life, boy, saved you from a lifetime of bad decisions. but i wasn’t able to save your brother.
and now you’ve come back to avenge your freak parents, aren’t you? you gathered up all the clues that led you here. congratulations. i guess you’re no better than they were. it’s alright. i understand. i was once like you, destined to follow in my father’s footsteps. i killed seventy-five people. did you know that? mostly women like i described before; i have a notebook logging each one. i suppose i should keep that a secret but what the hell, i’m going to kick the bucket whether it’s from your bullet or just being an old bastard. i killed seventy-five people because i hoped they would fill this hole my father left in my soul when i was six years old. each murder left me more and more disappointed, until it became rote to research the life of my next kill. it was like eating food; i had to do it to feel human.
now i’m too old to give a shit. i don’t have the strength to kill anyway. i’m tired. maybe you shooting me in the head would ease this tired old soul, once and for all. but remember: it’s not about me anymore. my days are over. your are still in the prime of your life. you shoot me, you start down that path. remember that. you don’t come back from that path. you don’t come back.
