Chapter One: I Hate Jesus
Late October, Thursday, 7:00 PM
Another shift finally comes to an end.
Iciness wraps around me as I step outside into the now lighter rain, the brightness of the moon offering only a temporary distraction from surrounding squalor and dilapidation. It’s not so much the smell of fried chicken on my clothes, nor the ever-present scent of piss and liquor that makes me sick to the stomach, but the thickness of the fear in the air. It’s stifling, claustrophobic, and relentless. You can almost taste it.
“Gets my fucking goat.”
Safe to say, dread’s bony fingers have been wrapped around this town’s throat for some time, but now the place is on its knees, its death rattles soon to follow.
The dimly-lit faces of my co-workers gawp back as I slide the door closed behind me, their mouths no doubt further polluting the air with their bile and tittle-tattle. Toxic exchanges about the new guy who hardly speaks a word and does what he’s paid to do instead of slacking. Only been there a week, but I’m sure they hate me already. How is that possible? I keep my head down, trying to appear as normal as possible, smiling and nodding in the right places. Yes, sir. No, sir. Yes, shove the balls in as well if you like, sir.
People tend to jump to hate at things they don’t understand or that threaten the self-imposed regulations of their tiny little universe. They’ll see, though. I’ll open their eyes to a bigger world.
They have no idea who I am about to become.
An involuntary snicker leaves my lips, prompting an approaching elderly couple—no doubt on their way home before the unwritten curfew kicks in—to cross the road and increase their pace.
“Good evening,” I say, following with a smile.
Nothing.
Residents, who once held their heads with pride, keep their stare fixed on the cracked pavement, afraid to make eye contact, scared of their own shadow. It’s rare to catch them outside after seven. The poor things usually huddle together behind thick curtains and triple-bolted doors, watching the Price is Right and praying for just one night without harassment and a flaming bag of dog shit through their letterbox. Not too much to ask, surely?
But there’s no trust around here anymore, no shared human bond.
During my time behind bars, I pledged to Mother I would do better. Bring some hope back into the world. I’m not even sure what I feel towards her anymore. Too young to understand at the time, I’m beginning to comprehend why she was always so highly strung. Pent up to the point of insanity, she just wanted the chaos to end.
“It gets my fucking goat!” she used to say, eyes wild, fingers white around her feather duster as she eyed the stranger’s car parked outside our house. “Without rules, without respect, Simon, we are nothing but animals.”
Yes, it’s time for me to step up.
As I make my way past the boarded-up windows of once-treasured stores, my eyes draw to the house across the road, the word ‘cockmuncher’ sprayed across the rotten panels of the fence. A dirty, yellow streetlight shows the paint still glistening as I march across, eyeing the discarded aerosol in the overgrown lawn.
Edith, is it? Yes, Edith, the name of the woman who lives here. Mother knew her. She said the lady had a Shih Tzu that held true to its name, pebble-dashing our driveway with its little brown nuggets one morning. Eighty, if a day—the woman, not the Shih Tzu—and I suspect the old lady munches on cough drops over cocks these days.
Feeling helpless, I bend down and pick up the discarded aerosol.
“I saw who did it.” The feeble voice emerges from the partially open door. “Little shit had a skateboard tucked under his arm. One of them inbred faces too.”
Over the muffled sound of her TV, I hear smashing glass and howls from night walkers, accompanied by the ever-present soundtrack of thumping bass and distant sirens.
“Did you call the police?”
She offers a croaky laugh. “You’re a funny bastard, aren’t you? Had an incident last month, and it took two hours before the pigs showed up.”
She knows as well as I do most are paid off or have given up the fight. So-called “drug lords” taking over the town, everyone in their back pocket while the place goes to shit. The sirens are just for show, an attempt to placate, but those days are long gone.
“Things are going to change around here,” I say. “Mark my words.”
“Some twat came to the door a few months ago promising the exact same thing,” Edith says. “Shoved a leaflet in my face and told me his party would put this town back on the map. He was in the papers a week later, caught with his pants down in the disabled bogs, some hooker choking on his meat stick. You know—his love truncheon, pecker, womb ferret, purple-headed—”
“Yeah, yeah, I get it, dearie.”
“Anyway, certainly not the sort of thing you want to be on the map for.” She opens the door a little further, exposing a tuft of hair resembling iron wool, albeit with a blue tinge. “Do I know you?”
“Just know that things will get better.”
“Why, are they dropping an effin’ bomb on the place?”
“No.” I clear my throat. “A saviour is coming.”
She sighs, opening the door further to reveal the flickering frown across her forehead. “A bloody bible basher, I should have known. Christ, you’ve got some nerve, kid, touting the Lord’s name around here.”
“No, no, no, you’ve got me all wrong.” Time for a change of tactic. “I despise all that stuff. In fact, I hate Jesus.”
A strange, garbled croak leaves through the tiniest hole in her lips, and her eyes grow just as narrow. “You hate Jesus?” She takes an urgent step across the threshold, looks to the heavens, and makes the sign of the cross on her chest.
“Yeah, but…but”—some days you just can’t win—“I mean the way you can love someone with all your heart but sometimes hate them. You know, like your parents or your partner, for example.”
“My parents are worm food, and my Bernard had a coronary four years ago.”
Fuck. Fuck. Fuckity-fuck.
As the woman continues her heavy wheeze, I make a mental note that saying things like, “I hate Jesus,” will not necessarily win people over. Back-pedalling as fast as I can, I raise my palms in a gesture once again. “Help is coming, Edith. The caped disciple will bring order back to town.”
“The caped disciple?”
Knowing I need to work on my PR skills, I offer a feeble nod and keep my mouth shut.
Shaking her head, the old lady puckers her lips again and looks up and down the street before taking a step back into darkness. “Look, son, you might mean well, but you’re wasting your time around here. Even God moved out from these parts a long time ago. Found himself a nice little piece of real estate in the nice little town of ‘I Don’t Give a Fuck.’
“I’m sorry. All I’m trying to do is—”
“Just drop your leaflet and bugger off, will you? Antiques Roadshow is next, and I’ve got a casserole for one in.”
Before I can respond, the door slams in my face. Stop the chaos. I guess she’s every right to be sceptical, one empty promise after another shoved down her scraggy little throat. And questionable faith, jumping from devout to insincere at the drop of a hat, but again, I guess it’s been tested many times living in this shit hole of a town. Feet together, I stiffen my posture, lift my chin, and offer a salute of sorts. “I promise to restore hope, Edith. This town will be good again. I will bring order back, you’ll see.”
After tossing the empty aerosol into Edith’s wheelie bin, I continue on my way, contemplating just how much work is required. Suburbia’s soundtrack continues around me as neon light spills onto damp streets, basking them with seediness and giving discarded fast-food wrappers a radioactive tinge. Blurry puddles offer the illusory effect of rippled portals to an underworld, the rain stinging as if tiny acidic tears of the once happy residents, each droplet loaded with a misery beyond memory.
It’s chaos, Simon. Anarchy.
Even alleys are alive with moving shadows and whispers, only the desperate or foolish venturing into the darkness. The druggies are starting to come out, too, blood-stained or borrowed cash in their pockets, always on the lookout for more.
Yes, it’s time. I will make a change. This town will get its hero.
I can’t remember the last time I heard a bird sing around these parts. Or even the last time I heard a laugh not tainted by evil. Perhaps people can still find joy somehow, behind closed doors, their televisions providing a portal into worlds of colour and unfiltered happiness. For me, it was always the latest superhero comic—exciting tales of heroic acts in the battle of good vs. evil. A belief that things could change for the better because Christ knows we needed it. It was escapism without limits, and I guess one thing I’m thankful to my father for.
I’m close. Yeah, here we go. Not this right, but the one after. Red door, if I remember correctly, about halfway down. The house number has slipped my mind, but the address carries too much significance—Hope Street. What are the chances?
A shudder runs down my spine as Mother’s voice catches me by surprise. Imagine if everyone did that, Simon. A blind eye here, a blind eye there, and before you know it, we’re hiding in the broom closet eating tinned peaches. It starts with the little things, Simon. You must rinse your bowl out. It’s just laziness, Simon, a lack of self-respect. Rinse! Rinse! Rinse! Bastards next door parked in front of our house again. It gets my fucking goat! Crumbs on the countertop, Simon. It’s chaos! How many times have I told you? And I know you’re not fucking stupid. Not like your sorry excuse of a father over there, sitting in that chair while the world turns to shit. Jeff! Jeff! I’m talking to you. Someone’s cat has taken a shit on our front lawn. What are you going to do about it? I’ll poison the fucking thing, see if I don’t.
“Let me be, Mother. I’ll uphold my pledge to you and clean up this town, but please, just let me be.”
If you sit back and watch, you’ll become just another casualty of the chaos, Simon. You have to set an example. You have to fight. Grow some balls. If you do nothing, you’re as much to blame as the others. Don’t give up like him over there, the useless sack of shit. A quitter. Always has been, always will be.
“Mama, stop!”
Look at him, just sitting on his fat arse as if nothing is happening. You have to set an example if you want people to follow. Jeff, why aren’t you doing something? Jeff! Jeff! Idiots down the street playing their loud music again. It gets my fucking goat! Go and tell them, Jeff. Jeff, can you hear me? Kids playing cricket in the street again. If that ball comes anywhere near my begonias, so help me God. Go and tell them, Jeff. Are you ignoring me, Jeff? Jeff! JEEEEEEEEEEEEEFF! Simon, for the love of God, promise you won’t turn out like your weak-as-piss father or his pissant of a brother. PROMISE ME, SIMON!
And that was my childhood—witness to a relentless barrage of instructions and discipline, nervously observing from the staircase as my father absorbed most of the impact. Scared of his own shadow, he became nothing more than a shell. I hated her for it but hated my father more, especially when Mother turned her attention to me when nothing was left of him to peck at.
That’s not going to be me, though. No fucking way. I’m the man who will make a difference and put this town back on the map. Just see if I don’t. When the sun goes down, no more Simon Dooley. It’s time to meet The Rectifier.
The Rectifier.
Rectifier.
Shit! It sounded good the first few times, but now it just sounds lame, like something to treat a breathing condition or crooked teeth. We’ll call it a work in progress. After all, Rome wasn’t built in a day.
