When I was in grade school there was this kid who was a friend of mine named Kerry. He had the same last name as several other kids in grades above ours. Obviously they were brothers. Well, not as such. This one guy, Bob Samelastname rented them. It was weird, but all through his adult life, I guess this creepy bastard has always adopted young boys, then when they grow up and move out, he gets more to replace them. Always boys. He wasn’t married or anything either. He just liked boys.

Well Kerry came dragging up the street one day when we were playing football, gripping his leg. I remember thinking he was faking a limp. Then he got up to us and had a dark black and purple bruise on his leg, the shape of the end of a two-by-six. Yes, his step fag had spanked him on the thigh with a piece of lumber. He probably did permanent damage with that swing. My mother called the cops and they came and took a report, blah blah blah, and nothing ever got done. I don’t know why. If I knew then any better, I’d have called CPS on his sick child-molesting ass.

I know he was a child molestor. I mean aside from the obvious clue that all his rent-a-childs were boys. I was sitting on the floor in Dean’s room, watching Mason play the guitar. He was awesome! Dean and Kerry were there too. Mason was a friend of Dean’s, and didn’t belong to the family. Anyway, we were all sitting there watching, and Bob was lying there on his side, head propped up on his hand, and starts rubbing my shoulder with a sock-covered foot. And he had that gay ass smile on his face. If I showed you what it looked like, you’d recognize it immediately as the joke smile everyone used to make referring to fags when we were kids. But you wouldn’t believe me. He really was smiling like that. Except, I was too young to know what it meant, or maybe even that there was such thing as twisted assholes like him. I kind of just shrugged it off, but I did feel uncomfortable about it. I went home and told my mom. Of course nothing happened that time either. I don’t know what anyone could have done with what little evidence I had, but I know now as an adult what he was after. And now I know why he adopted nothing but boys.

I hate people like that. I wonder how Kerry is these days. Having a childhood such as he had must have scarred him in some way I can only imagine. I can’t stand to think of all the shit Bob put those kids through, and he’s probably still doing it today. He opened a video arcade in my small podunk home town one time. It didn’t last very long, but I know now why he did it. Lure the bait, suckers. How come no one ever saw through his facade? He even looked like a child molestor. Drove a panel van and everything.

Okay, moving along. Last night at the grocery store, you’d guess immediately whom I ran into. There in the dog food aisle. Standing there looking gay and molesty. It took everything I had not to pull out my gat and end it all for him right there. He had some thirteen-year-old boy with him – probably his newest prize, and they were trying to decide which type of dog food to buy. He eyed me as I walked by. I didn’t look away, but rather stared at him with a look of disgust as I moseyed past. Clearly he wasn’t interested in me sexually, because I was too old. But I think perhaps he recognized me.

So now I’ve moved to a new town – having graduated college and served a good chunk of years in the service. I’m not far from my home town, but I have moved. And he’s there now. In my town. Again. So I’ll have plenty of time to plot some sort of plan that gets him out of his house for a while. You ever read Stephen King’s short, “Dolan’s Cadillac”? That’s kind of what I’m thinking.