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Send to FriendThe act was passed about five years ago and he was employed as one of the Watchers, a voyeur watching your every move even in your own home to ensure you truly were a fine, upstanding, patriotic citizen. It ensured no one was in league with terrorists, because if you were, it wasn't a question of phone taps or monitoring your emails or instant messengers; he could hear every word you said right now through the monitors (though most of what he heard now was loud snoring as most people who were still at home slept, though he did hear the din of a few TVs watched by insomniacs and others who liked to stay up late but didn't like going out). It ensured no one used drugs and that no one under the age of twenty-one drank because even in their own home their use would be caught on tape and they would be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. Any conspiracies or considerations or even talk of committing a crime could be used by the authorities to prevent that crime from taking place. And any tampering with the cameras—those silent but well-known, almost familial witnesses; small black domes embedded in the center of the ceiling of each room—was considered a federal offense punishable by immediate execution.
Curtis had sought the job of Watcher because of his voyeuristic nature at the time, always wanting to watch what people did, to witness all of their naughty, embarrassing, and sometimes grotesque activities that they didn't want anyone else to see or have any idea about. He wanted to learn everyone's deepest, darkest, dirtiest secrets not because he wanted to gossip (he would never do such a thing even if he were permitted), but because of the knowledge he'd gain of human nature and the power he held over these people whom he was allowed to get to know and bond with vicariously.
It was a job that he quickly grew bored with, for how many times and for how long could you stare at the same dark empty rooms, gaze at people vegetating in front of the TV, cooking, eating, getting dressed, sleeping. Even that embarrassed teenager hiding away in his bedroom corner, in the darkened shadows in the (futile) hopes that the camera wouldn't see what he was doing so he could masturbate—as amusing as that might have been at first—eventually grew trite. Perhaps if he could see some of the fantasies that they got off to, both the normal and the obscene, it could breathe fresh new life into teenage masturbation but the cameras merely recorded what people did and not what they were thinking about.
The fact of the matter was that with the cameras installed in every room of every home in America, peoples' public personas became their private as well. For they knew that they were being watched every second of every day by that leering, judging, mocking, damning black eye in the middle of the ceiling. When the act was first passed there was an epidemic of constipation, which had quelled since then but even now many people had some difficulty urinating and defecating, knowing that they were no longer allowed any privacy as that perverted black eye bore down upon them, snickering childishly. People showered much quicker now, especially young girls revolted by the idea of some perverted old man aroused by their wetness and nudity. And the bizarre behavior that Curtis had wanted to see was now a rare instance often missed as his mind wandered through the shear boredom of watching everyone else's bland day-to-day lives. It didn't even matter that Watchers were forbidden to tell anyone else of what they witnessed while on the job unless the person was either committing a crime or on the verge of doing so and forget about the fact that one could face up to twenty years behind bars for violating that rule. The fact that there was someone behind the camera, laughing at them and what they were doing was enough to deter many people from engaging and indulging in any of the laughable but harmlessly bizarre activities they used to enjoy behind closed doors. It was really a shame too for it would have added a great deal of amusement to an otherwise deathly boring job, but Curtis supposed it was understandable.
He supposed it was occasionally amusing when some punk kid decided to be a smartass and stick his middle finger up at the cameras but even that got old after the thousandth time.
Curtis sighed and yawned as opened his dog-eared paperback copy of Clive Barker's The Great and Secret Show and began to read. Since his employment as a Watcher, whatever voyeuristic traits had long since been disintegrated by the shear boredom of the job and Curtis no longer gave a shit about what these strangers did or their mundane and boring everyday lives. Instead it was easier to tune out all the random noise that came from each of the monitors and try to read or entertain himself some other way, which had been hard at first but gradually became easier as time went on. He supposed that if he were caught, his actions would be tantamount to sleeping on the job and he could be fired, but at this point he really couldn't care less. And besides, he still paused from his book to look up at the monitors every now and then, to make sure that those boring sleeping drones weren't doing anything naughty so it wasn't like he was completely slacking off.
Guess I shouldn't complain, he thought listlessly, plenty of people would kill for a job where you just sit on your ass doing nothing all day.
Curtis himself had found that aspect of the job appealing in his younger and lazier days, but had now found the very thought of spending another eight hours of his life sitting here in front of the monitors daunting more than anything else.
Curtis blinked, rubbed his eyes, yawned, and stretched as his eyes wandered toward the monitor that revealed the events taking place in the dimly lit bedroom of Room 516, where Bob and Martha Jenkins—both in their mid eighties—were about to have sex. Had he been a hopeless romantic, he might have found it endearing and uplifting that the two had been married for over sixty years and yet they still were just as deeply and passionately in love as they had been when they first met.
Martha sat seductively upon the bed, grinning mischievously, revealing her crooked yellow and brown teeth as black veins radiated along her sagging breasts. Her legs were splayed wide open, revealing a gray snatch struggling for dampness. A lock of her long gray hair draped across her eye and she brushed it aside with a crackling but innocent giggle.
The entire scene should have disgusted him and it had been revolting the first time he had witnessed such a grotesque sight, but by now he had seen it hundreds of times before over the years and had long since grown desensitized to it. He would have much rather seen younger people having sex; at least that once had the potential to be titillating, but even now whatever magic it had held was gone, though he watched anyway, out of obligation, to ensure they didn't perform any illegal acts and that both parties were consenting adults.
I really need to get a new job, Curtis thought with a listless sigh. Why not, right? He was still young. He could go back to school and maybe learn some new skills, seek a job that he might enjoy, something that was at least marginally respectable, something that his friends and family could actually support him on. He closed his eyes and shook his head. Fuck this shit, first thing tomorrow (make that today, he corrected; working the night shift had often made him confused as to which day it was) he was registering for classes. Fuck doing this shit for the rest of his life.
Bob held a glass of water in one hand and a bottle of pills in the other, which Curtis at first assumed was Viagra, but it instead appeared to be some weird generic knockoff that he had never heard of. In truth Curtis had no idea how the old man had attained the pills in the first place, and his assumptions could very well be way off the mark, but looking at how old the man is, and how his dangling veiny penis remained limp between his legs, he could only assume it was to help him get an erection, which in and of itself was not illegal. In that case there was no need to report it or do anything regardless of whatever suspicions might be gnawing at the back of his head. Curtis yawned once more and continued to watch as Bob downed one of the pill and then the glass of water before placing both of them over the nightstand next to the bed.
Almost instantly, his flaccid penis hardened. The black veins that corded his penis pulsated as the seams of his foreskin tore open and threads of blood trickled down the shaft. Bob bore his yellowed teeth in an almost demonic grin as a feral glow lit up his bloodshot gray eyes. The old man lurched forward, raising his arms, and Martha's grin faltered as she flinched back, her eyes wincing and her lips quivering as Bob bore down on her, his hands closing tightly around her throat.
The dog-eared book slipped from his fingers and fell to the ground by his feet with a soft thud as Curtis was taken aback by what he now witnessed. Martha squirmed as her back arched and pressed down hard against the bed, gasping desperately for air, and Curtis knew immediately that this was not some sort of S&M game. A sallow bubbly froth vomited from the old man's mouth and whatever love he once held for her seemed vacant in his savage eyes. Beads of sweat trickled from his throbbing temples and as Martha struggled to shake free, his vice-like grip around her throat tightened as his turgid penis sank into her.
Startled and horrified by what he saw, Curtis leapt off his chair, his arms swinging and wavering. He was about to bolt out of the room before he stopped himself, his feet carrying him a few inches forward before coming to a halt. Breathing heavily, his heart racing, he turned toward the monitors once more, where Bob continued to strangle his wife. Curtis turned toward his keyboard and quickly and loudly typed: Room 6: Bob Jenkins killing wife! He pounded the ENTER key and quickly headed toward the exit.
Curtis stood behind the door to the Jenkins's flat, his gun in hand. Backup would arrive within five minutes and the most prudent course of action would be to wait for that backup to arrive, which was something he would have done normally under these circumstances. But Bob Jenkins was well into his eighties, so the chances that such a frail old man could do harm to a healthy young man (unless he was armed) was very small, to say the least. Still, trickles of sweat ran from his temples as his heart started to speed up, though it wasn't thrashing against his ribcage just yet.
He jiggled the door handle; it was locked. Curtis imagined himself ramming through the door with his shoulder, bursting onto the scene in a desperate but heroic fashion, just like in the movies or on TV (he couldn't stand either anymore, but still had fond memories of when such activities were enjoyable). Instead, he reached hurriedly into his pocket and fished for the master key. His fingers trembled as he held it tightly, fumbling a few times before jamming the key into the keyhole and pushing the door open.
He hurried across the living room and into the bedroom.
Inside the bedroom, Martha lay motionless on the bed, her right arm and right leg dangling limply from the side as her face contorted from the last moments of terror and betrayal she experienced as her eyes gazed blankly at the dark ceiling. Bob stood before her, his back to Curtis. He was breathing heavily and made a few wretched gargling noises, his entire naked, pruned body quivering. He hissed, croaked, and sobbed as his gnarled fingers curled into throbbing, tremulous fists and he let out this wretched gasp and sobbed again. He turned toward Curtis, his bloodshot eyes flooded with tears as the yellow froth continued to pour from his lips like thin, runny tapioca. He took in another deep breath, gasped and croaked, and whimpered: "Oh God...what've I done?"
"You killed her," Curtis said grimly. He spoke softly and without judgment. His fingers remained poised at the trigger, yet his heart sank for this old man. He shook his head somberly. "I saw the whole thing."
"The pill," Bob Jenkins gasped and hissed.
"What was it?"
Jenkins shook his head, squeezing his teary eyes shut. He coughed and bits of yellow tapioca froth flew in the air and splashed Curtis's cheek and the tip of his nose. "It was supposed to be like Viagra, but a lot cheaper. I got it from some guy, I don't know who, outside the surveillance zone."
Curtis's pity remained, yet somewhere in the back of his mind he wondered how this geezer could have been so stupidly irresponsible as to take something when he wasn't even completely sure what it was, from some guy he didn't even know. Had he read of this incident from a distance, completely detached, he most likely would have laughed his ass off at the old man's unbelievable stupidity, but seeing the horrific consequences with his own eyes only filled his heart with sadness and pity. "I called backup," he explained solemnly. "We're going to have to take you in, but with your help, maybe we can find the guy, maybe we can find out what really happened and stop him from hurting anyone else."
"Yeah, maybe," Bob Jenkins whispered, with just a slight glimmer of hope glistening in his teary eyes before it dwindled completely. He backed away into the murky shadows by the drapes, brooding in the darkness, utterly defeated.
Jenkins hissed and grumbled, and once more that feral gaze lit up his eyes. He raised his scrawny arms and lurched forward with a low growl, and for a second through the darkness his fingers seemed to elongate into razor sharp talons. The old man coughed again and a thick wad of froth splashed against the ground by his feet.
"What're you doing?" Curtis asked; his voice rose slightly in both pitch and volume.
"I'm...losing control...again..."
"Just...just get away from the window, come here into the light where I can see you," Curtis ordered, struggling to sound firm. "I can restrain you if I have to. "He looked at his watch, sweating profusely, and wondered what was taking the backup so long to get here. "It's not hopeless, okay? We can get you to the hospital. We..."
"It's...too late for me."
The old man emerged from the shadows into the dim amber glow of the night stand lamp. For the first time Curtis noticed that Jenkins's penis was still fully erect, like steel jutting upward from his crotch, his blackened veins throbbing even more intensely as blood trickled from the urethra. The whites of his eyes were scarlet now and the feral glow was stronger than ever and Curtis shuddered from the sight.
Jenkins lowered his head and the feral glow dwindled from his eyes. "I just wanted to make love to her," he lamented as the tears poured from his eyes, "just like when we were younger. Even after all these decades our love never died; I just wanted to relive the passion...even one last time."
He shrank away into the shadows once more and pushed the bedroom window all the way open with little struggle, and began to climb through. He spared one final glance as Curtis immediately holstered his gun and lunged forward desperately.
Jenkins merely looked up at him, sitting atop the windowsill with his right arm and leg dangling outside. "She's in heaven now," the old man spoke almost serenely; "I have to get to her. I have to make things right." With that said, Bob Jenkins pushed himself through the window and fell to his death.
And it was at that moment that backup finally arrived.
The end
October 24, 2007
September 29, 2008