Collector

Collecting burned through Randolph Nocton’s veins from the beginning.  As soon as he could roll and scoot, he inched his way towards shiny things, claimed them, and tucked them in his playroom’s corner underneath a life-size, stuffed penguin where, days later while cleaning the room, Randolph’s baffled mother would find the eclectic lot.  Paperclip, dime, watch battery…why her perfect son desired these random items eluded her, but she shrugged it off, returning to more pressing affairs such as the incessant laundry and what would they eat for supper.

            In every way Randolph was an average boy but his peculiar penchant for collecting odd things continued throughout his adolescence. 

In elementary school, the fifth grade teacher, Mrs. Wintermute, uncovered over thirty gummy animals hidden in his desk.  A faint noxious smell led her to peer inside the cubby where he sat, and she was appalled as she extracted edible tarantulas, worms, sharks, and one licorice rat he had pushed into the far corner behind a Super Mario Bros. pencil box.  When Mother asked him why he wasn’t eating these candies, he replied that they were friends and he would be alone if he ate them.  Mother, used to his strange habit, fancied this was something he would one day outgrow.  Knowing girls would all-too-soon replace the comic books and baseball cards other kids were into, she hoped her beautiful Randolph would follow suite. Randolph never gained an interest in women but instead sank deeper into his unusual tastes and, while waking alone from high school, happened upon an item forever changing his life.

            A white glint protruding from outreaching weeds in the feral Dinglestein’s lawn first lured Randolph to the lot’s edge.  Kneeling, he reached into the overgrowth and extracted a chipped cat skull.  It was dirty and cracked over the left eye but the manner in which the empty eye sockets leered moved Randolph.  Looking over his shoulder and confirming no one witnessed his discovery, he tucked the skull under his yellow striped shirt and hurried home.

            Mother, still working the diner, wouldn’t return for an hour, so he utilized the alone time brushing away the remaining dirt with a whisk he found in his deceased father’s beard-trimming kit.  The soft bristles were from hog or horse and removed grime without abrading bone.  Some areas around the crown and left eye were terribly soiled and, after several failed attempts, Randolph applied a dampened cloth.  He was heavy-handed, snapping a diamond chunk off the left eye, and he gasped as the piece fell into his palm.  Wanting no further harm to befall his prize, he proudly set his trophy near the back porch underneath a blooming rosebush father planted.  Careful not to scrape his fingers on the thorns, he marveled at the picturesque world he created.

            Night passed like a glacier.  Desire gnawed on Randolph.  The only thing restraining him from visiting Father’s rosebush and risking discovery was the broken chip he clandestinely rubbed.  He told Mother nothing of his marvelous find and when the hour finally waned, he retired to bed, insane to hold his new friend.

            The next morning, he sneaked to the bushes and retrieved the skull from under a newly bloomed peach rose.  Walking to Bay High, he traced his pointer finger over the jagged cleft and wondered how the feline died.  Had the Dinglestein kid tortured the helpless animal?  Was it hit by a car?  So many mysteries for the mind to ponder.

            He reached school and, by the flagpole near the red cement tornado, he huddled, whispering to the skull.

            “You need a name.  I think I’ll call you Dulcinea.”

            The urge to kiss Dulcinea fluttered, knowing if anyone saw the act, he would realize a new level of hell.  It was cloudless day, and the courtyard was a common hang out area…too risky for a smooch.  The breezeway bathrooms were usually steady, but one of the stalls could provide the privacy he needed.  Glancing around, he brought Dulcinea near his breast and hurried to the men’s room’s red door, passing a couple pouring over a Spanish test riddled with red markings.  He pushed it open, ignoring the acrid stench the restroom harbored and entered.  He stopped and, as the door gently shut, relief swelled.

            He and his beauty were alone.

Multicolored graffiti littered the red and white walls and his footsteps squished as Randolph darted into the first stall, locking the door.  Someone ripped off the toilet seat so Randolph squeezed in the back right corner underneath knife-etched words reading Doug is a bugchasher, cradling Dulcinea.  Light flooding from the opaque transom cast an eerie glare in his love nest, but Randolph wrinkled his nose and smiled—Dulcinea never looked better.

After a brief examination he leaned in, kissed her crown, and shivers erupted through every pore, as if an inner flower opened and its radiant petals realigned Andromeda.  His momentary drunkenness shattered when the bathroom door opened and an invader squished into the next stall.  Holding Dulcinea in trembling hands, Randolph cringed at the sound of the unfolding belt and unzipping pants.  He needed to make a break for it.          

Before more mood-killing sounds emitted from his neighbor, Randolph opened the stall and rushed the exit but, as he reached the red door and swung it open, he bumped into the class bully, Slice.

Towering overhead, Slice was the only guy in the eleventh grade with a full beard.  He wore torn blue jeans, a HIM shirt, and he smelled like stale sweat.  He was absent from class often, and when he did bother to show up, teachers searched for an excuse to suspend him.  He liked to fight and steal—in seventh grade he broke some poor sap’s ribs, earning them both a little vacation time.  The system didn’t want to deal with the problem, so the schools kept promoting him further.  In no time they would be done with him.  The principals figured he would spend his adult life in the clink and couldn’t wait to serve him up.  Justice.

“Nocton, you fag,” he smiled, revealing his nicotine-stained teeth.  “What’s up weird-o?  Wanna drag off my cigarette?”

Randolph lowered his gaze to the damp floor.  “No.”

“Well, what’s that you got there?”

“It’s nothing,” Randolph snapped, trying to push his way out.  Slice grabbed him by the shoulder and shook him.

“Come on, let me see it.”

He shook Randolph again and Dulcinea fell from his grasp, shattering on the floor.

“NO,” cried Randolph as he kneeled to pick up the scattered pieces soaking up the bathroom floor’s muck.

“What the hell was that, Nocton?  A Skull?  What were you doing in here, freak?”  Slice shouted, watching the nerd wallow in the squalor.

Tears spilled from Randolph’s brown eyes and, leaving some of the smaller pieces behind, he fled from the men’s room carrying most of the skull.  He was so disturbed by the incident that he blew off third period and began the seven-block walk home.  Along the way, he stopped by a wooded lot and buried his lost love, Dulcinea, underneath a fallen pine, marking the hallowed spot with an empty Jolt Cola can.

That night, he didn’t eat much of the stew Mother lovingly prepared and retired to his room early.  Mother assumed he was feeling puberty’s awkward travesty and left him alone while she cleaned the table and washed dishes, settling into primetime television.

Randolph passed the evening sketching pictures of his beloved Dulcinea on computer paper sheets and assembled them into a portfolio.  Dulcinea, his first great love, was forever gone and Randolph had little means of coping.  After tiring of drawing, he cleaned his room, throwing away the things he spent his life collecting.  Bottle caps, Butterfinger wrappers, laundry lint, found keys, lighter flints—all in the round trashcan beside his desk.  He filled a plastic garbage bag with sequins, faux jewelry, pill bottles, and all the other things he found and claimed from the roadside and department store floors, throwing them into the large dumpster in front of his mobile home complex.  Mother said nothing as he returned to his room despite satisfaction her son was finally maturing.

That night, Randolph cried himself to sleep.

For the next few weeks he brooded about, even letting his pristine grades slip.  His teachers, concerned there were home troubles, alerted Mother, who assured them it was simply growing pains.  Amongst Bay High’s student body, rumors circulated Randolph was stealing pets, committing unthinkable monstrosities.  People originally avoiding his unique mannerisms now feared and detested Randolph, calling him a ghoul or a fiend in hushed voices as he passed in the hall.  Randolph cared less about their jeers, inwardly searching for escape.

It was a sunny November Friday, when an epiphany befell Randolph after an incident in the gymnasium locker room.

Always conscious of his thin frame and insubstantial muscles, Randolph waited until other students finished dressing out for Phys Ed before slipping into gray sweatpants and a white undershirt.  Endless wedgies and toilet swirls conditioned him to wait and, during one respite period, he noticed Andy Vance stroking a white rabbit’s foot.  It was old and patches of hair were effaced but Andy handled the foot as if were a priceless religious artifact.

“Where did you get that?”  He asked Andy.  Once considered popular due to his natural athletic ability, poor grades and a taste for deflowering virgins before abandoning them rendered him a pariah among the trendiest circles.

“Why do you care, Nocton?” He said with a puerile smile.  Extending the paw in Randolph’s direction he asked, “Do ya wanna touch it?”

Randolph’s eyes widened and he reached out for the charm but Andy pulled it away, his verdant eyes flickered with a hint of silver.

“Freak,” he said.  “You really are a ghoul.”  Andy chuckled and turned his tone figure away from Randolph.

Not sure what to do, Randolph left the gym and cut class, finding himself wandering the western side of campus.

Classroom 212’s door was ajar and Randolph noticed a lone girl wearing scrubs, surgical gloves, and safety goggles bent over a dissecting pan.  Guiding a silver scalpel across the belly of a fetal pig, she didn’t look up as he entered the room and approached her table.

“What do you want?” she asked.

“I—I just want to watch.”  Randolph said, biting his lower lip.

The girl shrugged as she peeled the pig’s belly apart and pinned them to the tray’s black basin, exposing its innards to the florescent overhead lights.  The intestines jiggled and oozed when she pushed in the scalpel’s tip.

“This doesn’t gross you out?”

“No.”

“Most people think it’s cruel.  I think it is science.”

“Why are you doing it?”

“I want to see what its organs look like and compare them to ours.”

“Are we the same inside?” Randolph leaned closer as she cut away the stomach and lifted it from the belly’s formaldehyde stench.

“Sort of.”  She placed the stomach on the tray beside the pig and returned to the gaping hole she created.  “We have larger organs, naturally.”

“Have you ever cut into somebody?”  He quizzed. 

The girl stopped and they exchanged a glance.  “No, but one day I’m going to be a surgeon.  That’s why I’m putting in the extra study time.”

“What’s your name?” He rested his elbows on the table, peering into the pig.

“Sue.”

“You like cutting this animal, Sue?”

“It doesn’t bother me.  Did you know that when you die, they cut out your organs and weigh them?”

“Why do they do that?”

“So they can determine what you died from.”

“What happens to the guts after they’re done?”

“They put them back in—unless you’re a donor.  Then someone needy gets them.”

“What are you going to do with the pig’s organs when you’re done?”

“Probably throw them away.”

Randolph narrowed his eyes.  “May I have them?”

Sue chuckled, “What do you want them for?”

“Just to look at.  That’s all.”

“A little weird, but OK.  Maybe they’ll spark a passion for science and you’ll get into the field.”

Randolph smiled but before he could say thanks, a chubby teacher wearing tan slacks and a turquoise blouse entered the classroom and began erasing the chalkboard.

“Miss Doughnym, how’s it coming?”  She asked.

“Fine, I’ll be finished in about ten,” Sue replied, resuming her scalpel’s probing.

“All right, I’ve got another class in twenty-five so make sure everything’s tidy.”

“Thanks, Mrs. Dauphine,” Sue said as she began removing the heart.  “I’ll meet you at the tornado in a half an hour, OK?”

“Awesome, I’ll see you then,” smiled Randolph.  He turned and began exiting the classroom, nodding to Mrs. Dauphine as he walked out the door.

He passed the next twenty minutes pacing around the tornado, cursing Sue for making him wait so long and hating the school’s silly red and white statue.  He always felt the structure looked more like a pork chop than a tornado and wondered who had the bright idea to erect a hunk of meat for all the cars cruising along Harrison Avenue to laugh at.  He was picking his left palm with his fingernails when Sue finally approached, still wearing her scrubs and holding a liquid-filled Mason jar.

“Here you go,” she said, handing over the jar—several pink objects floated around a dark fig-like piece and Randolph shook the swine snow globe, enjoying his premature Christmas.

“What are they?”

Sue began pointing to the chunks floating in the jar.  “That oval one is a sublingual gland.  That is a spleen.  The big, dark one is a liver and this is a thymus.”

“How long will they last?”
            “Leave the jar shut and they’ll last a while.”  She turned and began walking away.

“Hey, wait,” He called.

She turned, crossed her arms, and smirked.

“See you around?” He asked with a smile.

She looked him up and down before walking towards the breezeway, but her absent response didn’t bother Randolph.  He smiled at his floating guts and began walking home.

Halfway there, happiness erupted in Randolph.  He realized he no longer needed to mourn the loss of Dulcinea.  The jar he now possessed was just the beginning of a collection unlike any the world had seen.  Sure, he still missed Dulcinea’s unblinking eyes but she would always have a special place in his heart.

He knew the jar would upset Mother, so he tucked it beneath the rosebush, rubbing his finger against the lid before retiring inside. 

Mother noticed a change in her son and, relieved he was no longer sulking, she settled back into routine.  His grades picked up and he began doing more yard work, mowing the grass and tending to her roses.  When he cleaned out the back yard shed her husband used for storing rusting garden equipment and unwanted holiday decorations, Mother rejoiced for her prodigal son was growing up.

What she didn’t realize was Randolph’s dubious intentions.

Fearing neighborhood kids would discover and breach the aquarium, he wanted a proper house to display its glory.  Father had been a passionate gardener before succumbing to a heart attack when Randolph was two, and removing his dilapidated equipment was an obvious choice.  Insisting on a yard sale, the next Saturday Randolph hauled tools, shovels, and mowers out font, selling it all at breakneck prices.  He earned two hundred fifty dollars for the wares and, upon handing every penny over to Mother and instructing her to pamper herself with a manicure or massage, he asked if he could assume responsibility for the shed, citing he needed space to study science and chemistry.  She agreed on the condition he let no mice or rats escape.

Randolph was delighted.

He went to Home Depot, buying locks to bar the aluminum doors and electric lanterns to illuminate the interior.  He swept and cleaned up the inside, and on the back wall he placed the jar on the center shelf on top of a cloth mat.  Before it, he set a chair so he could gaze into the jar and dream…

Thus began a collecting frenzy.  The freedom to display and fawn whatever he desired caused him to gather bones of all sorts.  Every time he happened across road kill, he would scoop it up and bring it home, remove whatever flesh remained with skin beetles ordered on the internet, and arrange the bones to look like the animal it once was.  He filled the shelves with these skeletal statues until he was entirely surrounded, his collection becoming so grand he was able to pick and choose.  He owned no double—every skeleton was unique and expertly articulated with wire and rubber cement.  He had a cat, a dog, a raccoon, a deer, a fox, a partial coyote, and several local birds.  Although happy with his collection, he felt he lacked the Holy Grail. 

The missing entry: a human skeleton.

There remained a space on the back wall beside the Mason jar reserved for his collection’s apex and Randolph spent days calculating a manner to obtain one.  At first he tinkered with the thought of robbing a hospital; however, tight security and the threat of jail time swayed him.  There were the hanging bones in Bay High’s science lab, but closer inspection revealed they were fashioned from plastic and unfit for his gallery.  Randolph toiled for a solution but found none, becoming more and more frustrated.  Then, one chilly March evening while walking past Greenwood Cemetery, a realization dawned.  If Randolph Nocton wanted a skeleton he would have to resort to a most abhorred measure of human behavior—grave robbing.

            There they were, hundreds of skeletons stuck in the ground and waiting to be plucked and displayed.  It didn’t seem disrespectful to Randolph.  Displaying them in his museum meant superior adoration and reverence.  Whomever’s grave he chose for upheaval would be treated like family, no longer having to lie alone in the cold ground, forgotten.  Once uprooted, the skeleton would be king of all the other collected creatures.  Randolph was giddy.

            He hurried home to gather one of Father’s remaining shovels, a lantern, and a duffel bag.  Under night’s asylum, he returned to Greenwood Cemetery, creeping over the iron fence into the tombstone labyrinth in search of his king.

            He wandered across several rows, passing headstones he deemed too old for uncovering, and began wondering how deep they were actually buried.  He hoped the night wouldn’t give way before he obtained his prize.  The gentle wind played the magnolia branches like a xylophone, their song relaxing Randolph.  Of course he had enough time.  The real burden was finding someone regal, someone deserving.

            He turned right at a weeping granite cherub and his feet planted themselves before a modest marker.  He kneeled and held his lantern before the epitaph, tracing the engraved letters with middle and index fingers.  The simple words leapt at him:

JENNIFER HUNN

1976 – 1999

ALWAYS LOST

            Randolph knew it was the right one.  All effort in finding a king seemed silly once fate delivered a queen.  Vowing to treat her like a goddess, he struck the shovel into her plot and began digging.

            The grave was relatively new, so the roots he happened across were not too thick.  The process went smoothly, but his hands began to blister under the work.  He couldn’t stop—not after coming this far.  He pressed on, imagining her delicate metacarpals and the work needed to preserve their intricacy.  He hoped her teeth were attractive, but decided if they weren’t, she would still be all right.  How much did her organs weigh at death; did she dole them out to needy recipients?  If so, than not only was she a queen, but a generous one, too.  All the more attractive to Randolph, now waist deep.

            As the hole deepened to his chest, another thought appeared.  If he was digging up a queen, what did that make him?  Since he was bringing his collection a queen it would stand to reason he would be…KING.  Yes, it all made sense.  He was king of the creatures he collected and they his obedient subjects.  His heart pounded and he thrust harder and harder until the shovel scraped the top of the grave liner, a cement block to keep the weight of heavy machinery cemeteries use from crushing the casket.  Continuing until he revealed the edges, Randolph used the shovel as a level and lifted the cement block up, exposing the casket.  Falling to his knees and unable to hold back the grin, his fingers ran across smooth pine, trembling at their payoff.  As he rose, the wind turned banshee, howling at him.  He ignored the wail, hitting the lid with the shovel until it splintered apart in several places.  Kneeling again, he pulled at the pieces and uncovered his queen, Jennifer Hunn.

            Six unkind years turned Jennifer’s flesh into tight leather, falling off her bones in places.  There were holes in her clothes where insects and worms crawled in and out, and Randolph smiled when he noticed she lacked a wedding ring.   She was waiting for me, he thought, reaching in and tugging on her left arm.  A smell burned Randolph’s nostrils; he pulled his black shirt over his mouth and nose as he yanked.  With a snap, her arm broke free and he stuffed it into his duffel bag.  Though the inky sky broke, he had beaten the sunrise, but reaching for her right arm, he heard heavy footsteps and froze.

            It was well known amongst Panama City’s children the bone yard’s keeper, Gavin McGraw, was half-insane and all drunk.  Twice a month the cops would haul him out of some bar so he could dry out, but he never harmed or fought anyone so the cops tolerated the antics.  He kept Greenwood pristine and hated vandals.  If anyone were caught gallivanting within fence boundaries after visiting hours, they would face his wrath before having to deal with trespassing concerns.  Rumor was he tended a special plot for kids trashing his quaint bone yard, and Randolph cursed himself for forgetting about him.

            Peering over the grave, Randolph saw McGraw approaching, holing a half-full bourbon pint.  His face was scrunched up as if he were ready to breath fire and Randolph shuddered to think how long it was since his last bath.  Randolph crouched over Jennifer, his hands clinging to the shovel. 

            He looked down at Jennifer and in the lantern light she looked sad.  Randolph knew it was because McGraw was coming to tear them apart.  They were destiny, meant to meet and be together, and Randolph would not let the old drunk interfere.  His footfalls were almost upon them and, before Randolph faced certain doom, he leaned over, kissing Jennifer and running his fingers through her dry hair.

            “What in the hell are you doing down there?” McGraw slurred, eyes afire with booze and hate.  He took another pull from the bottle and replaced the white cap.

            “Kissing my queen,” replied Randolph.

            “You sick little—I can’t wait till the cops hear this one.  They call Gavin crazy but this, this is crazy”

            McGraw leaned over to grab Randolph, but the ground at the grave’s edge crumbled, and he fell into the pit.  Randolph raised his arms, protecting his head, as the old man came down hard.  There was a snap and the undertaker lay motionless, his right arm spilling into Jennifer’s coffin.

            Randolph stared at the heap for several minutes before poking him with Father’s shovel, and McGraw did not respond to the jab.  He looked at Jennifer, glanced at McGraw, and looked at Jennifer again.  He had a job to finish.

            Randolph Nocton was absent the next few days day at school.  When he did return, he dragged through every class and listened with only half interest in the lessons.  When the final bell rang at three, he went to the western side of campus, to the science wings—there was someone he wished to see.

            In her scrubs, Sue was cleaning a retort in the back sink when Randolph entered.

            “Hey,” he said, “how have you been?”

            “Working on my scholarship.  Enjoying your pig parts?”

            “Yes.  How much do you have around here?”

            “I’m almost done.  Why?” She asked, placing the retort next to several drying test tubes.

            “There’s something I want you to see.”

            “Where?”

            “At my house, on Elm.”

            Sue dried her hands on a tan towel, tossing it into a garbage can.

            “Sure.  I’d love to.”

            They walked the seven blocks to the Nocton home, chatting about using insects to clean bones and then their subsequent preservation.  When they reached Randolph’s back yard, he pulled out the shed key and slid it into the lock. 

            “You’ve surprised me Nocton,” said Sue.  “Your knowledge is impressive.  Are you thinking about going into forensic sciences?”

            “No, I’m not too keen on school,” he said, removing the lock.

            “If you don’t, it would be a waste.  I bet you’d be tops at it.”

            Randolph smiled, “Thanks,” and opened the door.  He reached in, flicking the switch on his lantern, and casting light over the reassembled creatures. 

            Sue, unblinking, let her eyes follow the rows of bones: raccoon, cat, partial coyote, finally settling upon Jennifer, now wearing smeared makeup and dressed in a wedding gown.

            “What do you think of my queen, Sue?”

            Sue smiled.  “You should see my house.”