Billy’s Brain Disease

By: Brian Grisham
September 18, 2008

Billy Jenkins closed his eyes despite the pain and tried to fall asleep. The voice in his head wouldn’t let him.

“You live for me,” it said.

“You live for me.”

Billy rolled over in his bed to focus on the toys on his shelf, but they appeared as silhouettes beneath the orange glow of his nightlight. He ran a hand over his head, feeling the alien texture of gauze and bandages. He didn’t like the image his fingertips presented. The bandages felt constricting, as if trying to squeeze the life from his throbbing skull. And that dull, hard ache hurt his eyes when he closed them.

Despite the complicated surgery and the chemo, he knew he was going to be all right. Not that he was decidedly optimistic, but simply because the voice in his head told him so. The voice wielded a charm and character slick to the bone. Like the shushing of running water, or the rush of blood that drives one’s pulse.

“You live for me.”

Billy kept his eyes shut as tight as he could, fighting the pain. By the time he opened them, he could make out his toys through the early morning sunlight. They weren’t just misshapen figures in his nightlight anymore, but plastic dinosaurs, toy soldiers and die-cast cars in clear detail. He shifted his gaze from the shelf to the wall. On The Lord of the Rings poster, Gollum’s eyes stared at him with terrifying madness.

His full-headed Halloween mask of a crazed boar hung on the wall like a trophy above the toy shelf. The mask was covered with globs of painted blood, as if dripping down teeth and tusks.

Billy remembered when his parents bought it for him a year ago. It had been three days before Halloween and he still hadn’t had a costume. His parents drove him to a little Halloween shop just outside of town. Most of the popular masks were sold out. Fortunately, the storeowner had a surprise for him behind the counter.

“I saved it back here especially for you.” The owner was a crippled old Indian man who hobbled with a cane and spoke with a dry, brittle voice. “This mask is made from the blood of my people. The Outtwa tribe.”

Billy swallowed and glanced at his parents. They were going through the costumes on the racks at the other end of the store. “Just this mask?”

“Oh, no,” said the storeowner. “There’s bird, coyote, and fox masks too. But this-” He pointed at the mask. “This one’s for you.”

The boar mask hummed with energy in his hands. It was his first real mask. Not like those cheap grocery store ones, but something hand made. Something artistic. He had been nine years old, but through the monstrous snarl he saw a beauty deep within. A gruesome and terrifying beauty. And he liked it.

The old Indian man sat down in his rocker. “The spirits of the windigo showed me how to make it for you. Try it on.”

Billy’s eyes drifted downward. The old Indian man’s pants had risen up and two metallic rods gleamed where his legs should’ve been.

The old Indian man grinned. “Vietnam. They stole my legs and my youth.”

Billy looked away, almost embarrassed, and placed the mask over his head. A sharp spike of pain shot into his skull. Billy flinched and reached to tear the mask from his head, but the pain had already gone.

“You live for me.”