part0010

Mia hurried downstairs to the front door. The doorbell hadn’t rung, no one had knocked, but she knew the Easter basket, with the package inside, would be waiting out there for her; just like it had the last three years on Easter morning.

She held the hem of her robe up a little as she shuffled quickly down the steps, trying to be as quiet as possible; she didn’t want her seven-year-old daughter to wake up and see her with the Easter basket in her hand when she brought it inside—she didn’t want Amy to ask why she had it, or ask what was inside.

The air was chilly as Mia stepped out onto her front porch. The sun was just peeking over the horizon, and her neighborhood street was still dark and quiet.

And there it was—just like she knew it would be: an Easter basket with one single object nestled down among the fake green grass. She was frightened to see it, yet she was sure she would have been much more frightened if it hadn’t been there.

How many more Easter baskets would there be? How many more years would this go on?

Mia picked the basket up from the porch and hurried inside. She locked the door and glanced up the stairs to make sure Amy wasn’t there, at the top, watching her.

She brought the basket into the kitchen and sat it down on a chair at the small kitchen table. She put some coffee on—she needed some coffee. She’d been awake most of the night, anticipating this morning, falling asleep a few hours ago only to be jolted awake by her alarm clock.

The coffee machine chugged to life, making loud gasps and sighs as the steaming liquid slowly filled the pot. Mia walked over to the Easter basket and stared down at the one plastic Easter egg inside—a pink one. Nothing else among the fake grass. No note. There was never a note.

She already knew what was inside the plastic egg.

Mia thought of her husband, Jerry. He’d been gone now almost five years.

They used to fight, a lot. Well, Jerry did all of the fighting. They had gotten along so well when they were first together, but after they were married, Jerry turned violent. First it was verbal abuse, then a few shoves and slaps. And then it got worse. Much worse. Even after Amy came along, Jerry didn’t stop.

“You ever leave me and I’ll kill you.” Jerry’s words echoed in her mind. “I’ll hunt you down and find you. Then I’ll kill you. And Amy, too. You hear me? I’ll kill both of you.”

Mia was trapped, living a lie, living in fear while everyone thought she had a great marriage. Of course Jerry controlled how much contact she had with people, especially her family.

Five years ago today, on Easter Sunday, it had gotten so bad Mia wondered if she wouldn’t be better off dead. They had gone to her parents’ house for a rare visit and Jerry believed that she had said something to her mother… some kind of secret plea for help. She’d said nothing to her mother—it was only his paranoid delusion. And it was just another excuse for Jerry to hit her, to hurt her.

They had stopped at a convenience store on the way home, so Jerry could get some beer (more fuel for the fires of his rage). Amy was only two years old then, crying in her car seat in the back because Jerry was yelling at Mia, smacking and punching her, as they sat in a parking space at the far end of the convenience store parking lot.

Mia was crying and cowering against the passenger door when Jerry got out and went into the store. She turned around and tried to get Amy to stop bawling.

A knock at her passenger window startled her. She turned to see an old man standing there in the fading light, the sun down behind the trees now. He was smiling and he had the kindest eyes that were full of concern. He made a roll-the-window-down gesture. The car was still running (Jerry knew she would never have the guts to drive away while he was in the store—it was like one of his tests) and she pushed the button to roll down the window.

“You okay, ma’am?”

Mia just nodded, wiping at her nose with a wadded-up tissue. The left side of her face was burning from Jerry’s slap; there would probably be a bruise there tomorrow.

“I saw what happened,” the old man said. “Do you need me to call the police for you?”

Mia’s heart jumped in horror. “No. Please. I’m okay. Really.”

She glanced at the store. She could see the checkout counter through the plate-glass windows, but Jerry wasn’t there—yet.

Mia looked back at the old man, wishing he would go away before Jerry came back out and went ballistic. “Please,” she croaked and managed a smile. “I’m fine.”

She was ready to roll up the window on the old man, but there was something steely in his light blue eyes, something that held her there, almost hypnotizing her.

The old man glanced into the back seat at Amy, breaking into a wide smile. God, she wished Jerry smiled at Amy like that. “Hi, there,” the old man said in a slightly higher voice—little kid talk—and he gave Amy a little wave of his fingers. His eyes darted back to Mia. “What’s her name?”

Amazingly, Amy had stopped crying; it was as if she was fascinated by this old man, perhaps soothed by his voice and his smile.

Mia looked at the store again. Jerry was checking out now, a twelve-pack of Budweiser on the counter in front of him. He seemed like he was laughing, joking around with the cashier—a young female cashier.

“You know eventually he’ll start hurting Amy, too,” the old man said in his soft voice.

Mia looked back at the old man. His smile had slipped away. He had crouched down beside the car to get eye-level with her.

“Please. You need to go.” She glanced back at the store windows. Jerry was still flirting with the cashier as she handed him his change and he grabbed the twelve pack of beer. And now he was coming this way.

“He won’t stop hurting you,” the old man said. “It will only get worse.”

But it had already gotten worse. She had the scars on her body to prove it.

“Please, you need to go,” she said again, a trembling finger resting on the button to roll the window back up.

“I can help you,” he said, his words barely a whisper, yet they were so clear in her ears. He had produced a white business card with a shifting of his fingers, like a magician performing a trick. He dropped the business card into the car before she could get the window rolled all the way up.

Jerry was coming. Mia kept her eyes on him, while she slipped the business card into her purse before he saw her.

But Jerry wasn’t watching her—his eyes were on the old man: a new target.

“Hey, buddy!” Jerry shouted at the old man. “You got a problem?”

The old man just stood there, near the sidewalk, in front of the store. He looked a little taller to Mia now, a little broader in the shoulders, a little more formidable.

“Get the hell away from my car!” Jerry yelled and Mia thought he was going to go after the old man, maybe attack him, or at least threaten him.

The old man just smiled at Jerry, an enigmatic little grin, a secretive smile. He made a gun with his forefinger and thumb, and Mia read the word on his lips: “Pow.” And then he walked away.

“Crazy old kook,” Jerry said, as he got in the car. “Must’ve let him out of the loony bin a little too early.”

Mia didn’t say anything. She watched the old man walk away into the dusk.

“Was he bothering you?” Jerry asked. “Begging for money or something?”

“No,” Mia whispered.

“I see you finally got Amy to shut up,” Jerry grumbled, as he backed out of the parking space.

A week later, Jerry had unleashed one of his worst beatings, so far. Mia was afraid she had a cracked rib or two; or maybe an organ was punctured. There was a sharp pain in her side every time she took a deep breath.

He had burned her, too. He liked to burn her. He would use cigarettes, an iron, a hot frying pan, whatever was handy. He liked to burn her in places that she could hide with clothes.

It’s only going to get worse. The old man’s words echoed in her mind. Soon, Jerry was going to kill her, and then, he would be alone with Amy. She couldn’t let that happen.

After Jerry went to work the next morning, Mia got the white business card out of her purse. The only thing on the card was a phone number.

The old man answered on the third ring.

“Hi, this is Mia. We met at a convenience store parking lot—”

“I remember you, Mia.”

“You … you said you could help me.”

“I can. And actually, you’d be helping me, too.”

“How?” Mia asked, and then she couldn’t help it—she broke down in tears, everything gushing out of her.

The old man waited patiently for Mia to stop crying. “I’ll explain everything when we meet.”

Mia met the old man at a park. They sat on one of the farthest benches, near the woods. Maybe it was dangerous, meeting a stranger in a remote location, but it would be even more dangerous if Jerry found out she was with some “guy” while he was at work.

The old man stared at her with his light blue eyes, such kind eyes. He looked like he was in his early sixties. Tall and thin, but he looked strong, somehow. A wave of tranquility seemed to emanate from him like heat from a radiator, soothing her jitters.

“I can make your problem go away,” he told her.

“What do you mean?” But she was pretty sure she knew what he meant.

“You don’t need to know the details. Sometime in the next few days, Jerry will just be gone. You don’t need to know anything about it. The less you know, the better.”

Mia wanted to think about it, but every time she took a breath, that sharp pain shot through her like a hot, twisted piece of sharp metal. The area where Jerry had burned her throbbed. Pretty soon, she would be nothing but scars and injuries—if she even lived that long. And she had to think about Amy.

“Okay,” Mia said.

The old man smiled. “You’re making the right choice. Every year, around this time, at Easter, I’ll send you something to let you know that your husband will never hurt you again.”

“Can I ask your name?”

“Just call me Peter.”

And now, as Mia cradled a cup of coffee in her hands, she stared down at the Easter basket. She didn’t want to open the pink plastic egg, but she knew she would have to.

She sat the cup of coffee down, and pulled out a pair of latex gloves from a box in the pantry. She had learned not to open the egg with her bare hands.

Inside the egg were two human ears, crusted with blood … Jerry’s ears.

Last year, it had been all of his front teeth and his tongue.

The year before that: several of his fingers and both of his thumbs.

The first year: some of his toes crammed inside the plastic egg like little sausages.

She closed the egg back up. She would have to bury it somewhere in the backyard. Bury it down deep. It’s what she’d done with the other ones.

Mia could only imagine where Jerry was: caged or chained up in some dark place, kept alive by Peter, year after year, so he could slice off pieces of his body and send them to her every Easter.

“You said I would be helping you, too,” Mia had asked Peter, during their meeting at the park that day. “How will I be helping you?”

Peter smiled at her, that kind smile that crinkled up the wrinkles around his eyes. “I used to be a doctor. I’d always wondered certain things about the human body … and the mind. Thresholds. There were experiments I’d always wanted to perform, but they would be … well, let’s just say unethical, at the very least. You’ll be providing me with someone to play with.”

Play with. That was exactly how he had worded it.

Mia wondered what would happen once Peter was done “playing” with Jerry. Would Peter come after her? She had moved twice, but Peter had always found her—the Easter baskets were there every Easter morning, at her front door. She wondered if these plastic Easter eggs were a reminder of their agreement, a reminder that he would always know where she was and how to get to her.