LITTLE, BROWN AND COMPANY
New York •Boston
One
The P‑38 WWII Nazi handgun looks comical lying on the
breakfast table next to a bowl of oatmeal. It’s like some weird
steampunk utensil anachronism. But if you look very closely
just above the handle you can see the tiny stamped swastika
and the eagle perched on top, which is real as hell.
I take a photo of my place setting with my iPhone, think‑
ing it could be both evidence and modern art.
Then I laugh my ass off looking at it on the miniscreen,
because modern art is such bullshit.
I mean, a bowl of oatmeal and a P‑38 set next to it like a
spoon— that arrangement photographed can be modern art,
right?
Bullshit.
But funny too.
I’ve seen worse on display at real art museums, like an all‑
white canvas with a single red pinstripe through it.
2
I once told Herr
1
Silverman about that red‑ line painting,
saying I could easily do it myself, and he said in this super‑
confident voice, “But you didn’t.”
I have to admit it was a cool, artsy retort because it was
true.
Shut me the hell up.
So here I am making modern art before I die.
Maybe they’ll hang my iPhone in the Philadelphia Museum
of Art with the oatmeal Nazi gun pic displayed.
They can call it Break fast of a Teenage Killeror something
ridiculous and shocking like that.
The art and news worlds will love it, I bet.
They’ll make my modern artwork instantly famous.
Especially after I actually kill Asher Beal and off myself.
2
Art value always goes up once the artist’s associated with
fucked‑up things such as cutting off his own ear like Van Gogh,
1 Herr Silverman is my Holocaust Class teacher, but he is primarily the German
teacher at my high school, which is why we call him Herr and not Mr.
2 On Livestrong.com I read that “every 100 minutes another teenager will commit
suicide.” And I don’t believe it’s true at all, because why don’t you ever hear about all of
these suicides on the news or whatever? Do they all happen in secret or in other
countries? Suicide can’t be that common, can it? And if it is . . . here I am thinking I’m
being daring and original with my own plans. Ha! Here’s more damning evidence,
regarding my uniqueness. According to Wikipedia— admittedly not the most reliable
and in this case it’s totally outdated—“In the United States, firearms remain the most
common method of suicide, accounting for 53.7 percent of all suicides committed
during 2003.” Wikipedia also says, “Over one million people die by suicide every year.”
So according to Wikipedia, suicide takes care of one million fucked‑up people every
time our planet circles the sun. I wonder what Charles Darwin would have to say
about that fun little fact. Natural selection? Nature’s way of protecting the stronger
and more necessary? Is my mind simply an agent of nature? Am I about to make
Uncle Charlie Darwin proud?
3
or marrying his teenage cousin like Poe, or having his min‑
ions murder a celebrity like Manson, or shooting his postsui‑
cide ashes out of a huge cannon like Hunter S. Thompson, or
being dressed up as a little girl by his mother like Heming‑
way, or wearing a dress made of raw meat like Lady Gaga, or
having unspeakable things done to him so he kills a classmate
and puts a bullet in his own head like I will do later today.
My murder‑ suicide will make Break fast of a Teenage
Killer
3
a priceless masterpiece because people want artists to
be unlike them in every way. If you are boring, nice, and
normal— like I used to be— you will definitely fail your high
school art class and be a subpar artist for life.
Worthless to the masses.
Forgotten.
Everyone knows that.
Everyone.
So the key is doing something that sets you apart forever
in the minds of regular people.
Something that matters.
3 Break fast of a Teenage Killeris a sick double entendre, as I am a killer who isa
teenager, and— since my target is a teenager whom I must kill— I am also a killer
ofteenagers!
Two
I wrap up the birthday presents in this pink wrapping paper I
find in the hall closet.
I wasn’t planning on wrapping the presents, but I feel like
maybe I should attempt to make the day feel more official,
more festive.
I’m not afraid of people thinking I’m gay, because I really
don’t care what anyone thinks at this point, and so I don’t
mind the pink paper, although I would have preferred a dif‑
ferent color. Maybe black would have been more appropriate
given what’s about to transpire.
It makes me feel really little‑ kid‑on‑ Christmas‑ morning
good to wrap up the gifts.
Feels rightsomehow.
I make sure the safety is on and then put the loaded P‑38
in an old cedar cigar box I kept to remember my dad, because
he used to enjoy smoking illegal Cuban cigars. I stuff a bunch
of old socks in to keep my “heater” from clanking around
5
inside and maybe blasting a bullet into my ass. Then I wrap
the box in pink paper too, so that no one will suspect I have a
gun in school.
Even if— for whatever reason— my principal starts ran‑
domly searching backpacks today, I can say it’s a present for a
friend.
The pink wrapping paper will throw them off, camou‑
flage the danger, and only a real asshole would make me open
up someone else’s perfectly wrapped gift.
No one has ever searched my backpack at school, but I
don’t want to take any chances.
Maybe the P‑38 will be a present for me when I unwrap it
and shoot Asher Beal.
That’ll probably be the only present I receive today.
In addition to the P‑38, there are four gifts, one for each of
my friends.
I want to say good‑ bye to them properly.
I want to give them each something to remember me by.
To let them know I really cared about them and I’m sorry I
couldn’t be more than I was— that I couldn’t stick around—
and that what’s going to happen today isn’t their fault.
I don’t want them to stress over what I’m about to do or
feel depressed afterward.
Three
My Holocaust class teacher, Herr Silverman, never rolls up
his sleeves like the other male teachers at my high school, who
all arrive each morning with their freshly ironed shirts rolled
to the elbow. Nor does Herr Silverman ever wear the faculty
polo shirt on Fridays. Even in the warmer months he keeps
his arms covered, and I’ve been wondering why for a long
time now.
I think about it constantly.
It’s maybe the greatest mystery of my life.
Perhaps he has really hairy arms, I’ve often thought. Or
prison tattoos. Or a birthmark. Or he was obscenely burned
in a fire. Or maybe someone spilled acid on him during
a high school science experiment. Or he was once a heroin
addict and his wrists are therefore scarred with a gazillion
needle‑ track marks. Maybe he has a blood‑circulation dis‑
order that keeps him perpetually cold.
But I suspect the truth is more serious than that— like
7
maybe he tried to kill himself once and there are razor‑blade
scars.
Maybe.
It’s hard for me to believe that Herr Silverman once
attempted suicide, because he’s so together now; he’s really
the most admirable adult I know.
Sometimes I actually hope that he did once feel empty
and hopeless and helpless enough to slash his wrists to the
bone, because if he felt that horrible and survived to be such a
fantastic grown‑up, then maybe there’s hope for me.
4
Whenever I have some free time I wonder about what
Herr Silverman might be hiding, and I try to unlock his mys‑
tery in my mind, creating all sorts of suicide‑ inducing scenar‑
ios, inventing his past.
4 I Googled “How long does it take to die when you slit your wrists?” There are all
sorts of people asking this question on the Internet and most of them say they are
researching the topic for their high school health class. Most of the posted answers
accuse the asker of lying and urge him (her?) to seek professional help. There are
straight‑up answers from people who claim to be doctors and others who have actually
slit their wrists with razor blades and survived. They all say this is a very painful way
to die (or not die)— that it’s not peaceful, not at all the death‑in‑a‑ warm‑ bath‑
go‑to‑ sleep type of deal in which movies make you believe. The blood can clot, which
keeps you alive and in excruciating pain. But then I found posts about how to slit your
wrists the “right way,” so you will actually die, and that depressed me, because people
actually post stuff like that, and, even though I wanted to know the answer, so I could
weigh my options, that info maybe shouldn’t be on the Internet. I’m not going to list
the right way to slit your wrists or explain it to you, because I don’t want any additional
blood on my hands. But really— why dosome people post the correct ways to commit
suicide on the Internet? Do they want weird, sad people like me to go away
permanently? Do they think it’s a good idea for some people to off themselves? How
can you tell when you are one of those people who should slash his wrists the right way
with a razor blade? Is there an answer for that too? I Googled but nothing concrete
came up. Just ways to complete the mission. Not justification.
8
Some days I have his parents beat him with clothes hang‑
ers and starve him.
Other days his classmates throw him to the ground and
kick him until he’s wet with blood, at which point they take
turns pissing on his head.
Sometimes he suffers from unrequited love and cries every
single night alone in his closet clutching a pillow to his chest.
Other times he’s abducted by a sadistic psychopath who
waterboards him nightly— Guantánamo Bay– style— and
deprives him of drinking water during the day while he is
forced to sit in a Clockwork Orange– type room full of strobe
lights, Beethoven symphonies, and horrific images projected
on a huge screen.
I don’t think anyone else has noticed Herr Silverman’s con‑
stantly clothed forearms, or if they have, no one has said anything
about it in class. I haven’t overheard anything in the hallways.
I wonder if I’m really the only one who’s noticed, and if
so, what does that say about me?
Does that make me weird?
(Or weirder than I already am?)
Or just observant?
So many times I’ve thought about asking Herr Silverman
why he never rolls up his sleeves, but I don’t for some reason.5
5 Sometimes when I stay after class to talk with Herr Silverman about life— while he’s
trying to put a positive spin on whatever depressing subject I’ve brought up— I’ll
pretend I have X‑ray vision and stare at his clothed forearms, trying to end the
mystery, but it never works because I, unfortunately, don’t really have X‑ray vision.
9
Some days he encourages me to write; other days he says
I’m “gifted” and then smiles like he’s being truthful, and I’ll
come close to asking him the question about his never‑ exposed
forearms, but I never do, and that seems odd— utterly ridicu‑
lous, considering how badly I want to ask and how much the
answer could save me.
As if his response will be sacred or life‑ altering or somethingand I’m saving it for later— like an emotional antibiotic,
or a depression lifeboat.
Sometimes I really believe that.
But why?
Maybe my brain’s just fucked.
Or maybe I’m terrified that I might be wrong about him
and I’m just making things up in my head— that there’s
nothing under those shirtsleeves at all, and he just likes the
look of covered forearms.
It’s a fashion statement.
He’s more like Linda6
than I am.
End of story.
I worry Herr Silverman will laugh at me when I ask about
his covered forearms.
6 Linda is my mother. I call her Linda because it annoys her. She says it “de‑moms” her.
But she de‑mommed herself when she rented an apartment in Manhattan and left me all
alone in South Jersey to fend for myself most weeks and increasingly more weekends.
She says she needs to be in New York because of her fashion‑ designing career, but I’m
pretty sure it’s so she can screw her French boyfriend, Jean‑ Luc, and keep the hell away
from her fucked‑up son. She checked out of my life right after the bad shit with Asher
went down, maybe because it was too intense for her to handle. I don’t know.
10
He’ll make me feel stupid for wondering— hoping— all
this time.
That he’ll call me a freak.
That he’ll think I’m a pervert for thinking about it so much.
That he’ll pull an ugly, disgusted face that’ll make me feel
like he and I could never ever be similar at all, and I’m there‑
fore delusional.
That would kill me, I think.
Do my spirit in for good.
It really would.
And so I’ve come to worry that my not asking is simply
the product of my boundless cowardice.
As I sit there alone at the breakfast table wondering if
Linda will remember today’s significance, knowing deep
down that she’s simply not going to call— I decide to instead
wonder if the Nazi officer who carried my P‑38 in WWII
ever dreamed his sidearm would end up as modern art, across
the Atlantic Ocean, in New Jersey, seventy‑ some years later,
loaded and ready to kill the closest modern‑ day equivalent of
a Nazi that we have at my high school.
The German who originally owned the P‑ 38— what was
his name?
Was he one of the nice Germans Herr Silverman tells us
about? The ones who didn’t hate Jews or gays or blacks or
anyone really but just had the misfortune of being born in
Germany during a really fucked time.
Was he anything like me?
Four
I have this signature really long dirty‑ blond hair that hangs
over my eyes and past my shoulders. I’ve been growing it for
years, ever since the government came after my dad and he
fled the country.
7
7 You won’t believe this, but my father was actually a minor rock star back in the early
1990s. His stage name was Jack Walker, which were his two favorite drinks: Jack
Daniel’s, Johnnie Walker. How clever! Do you know him? No?How shocking! You
might remember his band, Tether Me Slowly, or the “East Coast’s answer to grunge,”
according to Rolling Stone,once upon a time. You’ve definitely heard his one big hit,
“Underwater Vatican,” because they play it all the goddamn time on classic‑rock
radio. He toured with the Jesus Lizard, Pearl Jam, Nirvana, and others as an opening
act. Signed a HUGE record deal, had a creative block, became an alcoholic, married
my mom, made a crap sophomore album, developed a drug habit (or should I say
developed anotherdrug habit because— as we learned in health class— alcohol is a
drug), was too much of a wuss to OD or off himself like a proper rock star, had me,
quit making music, lived off what he made from basically one lucky song and selling
his rock ’n’ roll paraphernalia on eBay (including the smashed and signed Kurt
Cobain guitar that used to hang over my bed), became a has‑ been one‑ hit‑ wonder joke
who never even touched a guitar anymore, grew bloated and perpetually red‑ skinned
and unrecognizable, accused Linda of having affairs, began to disappear for days at a
time, clandestinely started overnight gambling in Atlantic City, stopped paying taxes,
woke his fifteen‑ year‑ old son in the middle of the goddamn night to give me his
father’s WWII souvenirs and knock me out with his roses‑ and‑ mustard‑ gas
12
And my long locks piss Linda off something awful, espe‑
cially since she’s into contemporary fashion. She says I look
like a “ grunge‑ rock stoner”
8
and back when she was still
around caring about me, Linda actually made me submit to a
drug test— pissing into a cup— which I passed.9
I didn’t get Linda a good‑ bye present, and I start to feel
guilty about that, so I cut off all my hair with the scissors in
the kitchen— the ones we usually use to cut food.
I cut it all down to the scalp in a wild orgy of arms and
hands and silver blades.
Then I mash all of my hair into a big ball and wrap it in
pink paper.
I’m laughing the whole time.
I cut out a little square of pink paper and write on the
back.
Kurt Vonnegut breath, told me to be a good man, told me to take care of Linda, was
rumored to have fled by banana fucking cargo boat to some Venezuelan jungle just
before the Feds could nab him, and hasn’t been heard from since. Every time I hear
“Underwater Vatican” now, I want to tear down the walls, and not just because every
penny from every royalty check goes to the U.S. government and not me. Linda was
pissed about the money she owed the government, all the lawyer shenanigans, losing
the big house, the cars, but other than that, she was pretty much like “good fucking
riddance” and then her parents died and she inherited enough money to start her
NYC designing business and keep me here in South Jersey. My father— whose real
name was Ralph Peacock— had Linda sign a prenuptial agreement, I’m certain of
that, because no one would have put up with his faded‑ rock‑ star shit for so long. But
the joke was this: In the end, she got absolutely nothing out of the deal. He was pretty
much a bastard. And shitty mom though she may be, Linda still turns heads. She’s
beautiful— just what you’d think an ex‑model would look like in her late thirties.
8 Aka my dad, circa 1991.
9 Like father, unlike son.
13
Dear Delilah,
Here you go.
You got your wish.
Congratulations!
Love, Samson
I fold the square in half and tape it to the gift, which looks
quite odd— almost like I tried to wrap a pocket of air.
Then I stick the present in the refrigerator, which seems
hilarious.
Linda will be looking for a chilled bottle of Riesling to
calm her jangled nerves after getting the news about her son
ridding the world of Asher Beal and Leonard Peacock too.
She’ll find the pink wrap job.
Linda will wonder about my allusion to Samson and Delilahwhen she reads the card, because that was the title of my
father’s failed sophomore record, but will get the joke just as
soon as she opens her present.
I imagine her clutching her chest, faking the tears, play‑
ing the victim, and being all dramatic.
Jean‑ Luc will really have his professionally manicured
French hands full.
No sex for him maybe, or maybe not.
Maybe their affair will blossom without me around to psy‑
chologically anchor poor Linda to reality and maternal duties.
Maybe once I’m gone, she’ll float away to France like a
shiny new silver little‑ kid birthday balloon.
14
She’ll probably even lose a dress size without me around
to trigger her “stress eating.”
Maybe Linda won’t return to our house ever again.
Maybe she and Jean‑ Luc will go to the fashion capital of
the world, the City of Light, auw- hauh- hauw!, and screw like
bunnies happily ever after.
She’ll sell everything, and the new homeowners will find
my hair in the refrigerator and be like What the . . . ?
My hair’ll just end up in the trash and that will be that.
Gone.
Forgotten.
RI P, hair.
Or maybe they’ll donate my locks to one of those wig‑
making places that help out kids with cancer. Like my hair
would get a second shot at life with a little innocent‑ hearted
bald chemo girl maybe.
I’d like that.
I really would.
My hair deserves it.
So I’m really hoping for that cancer‑ kid‑ helping outcome
if Linda goes to France without coming home first, or maybe
even Linda will donate my hair.
Anything’s possible, I guess.
I stare at the mirror over the kitchen sink.
10
10 Linda needs mirrors more than she needs oxygen, so there are mirrors in every
goddamn room of our house.
15
The no‑hair guy staring back at me looks so strange now.
He’s like a different person with all uneven patches on his
scalp.
He looks thinner.
I can see his cheekbones sticking out where his blond cur‑
tains used to hang.
How long has this guy been hiding under my hair?
I don’t like him.
“I’m going to kill you later today,” I say to that guy in the
mirror, and he just smiles back at me like he can’t wait.
“Promise?” I hear someone say, which freaks me out,
because my lips didn’t move.
I mean— it wasn’t me who said, “Promise?”
It’s like there’s a voice trapped inside the glass.
So I stop looking in the mirror.
Just for good measure, I smash that mirror with a coffee
mug, because I don’t want the mirror me to speak ever again.
Shards rain down into the sink and then a million little
mes look up like so many tiny minnows.
Five
I’m already late for school, but I need to stop at my next‑ door‑
neighbor Walt’s
11
so that I can give him his present.
Today, I knock once and let myself into Walt’s house
because he has to walk slowly with one of those gray‑ piped
four‑ footed walkers that has dirty tennis balls attached to
11 I met Walt during a blizzard, just after we moved into the new house. I remember
Linda asking me to shovel the driveway, even though it was still snowing, because she
had to go out to meet another fake designer or some bulimic model or whomever. I
think she was trying to “cure” me by assigning manly tasks because of what happened
with Asher and me, even though she refused to believe me when I tried to tell her
what happened because she’s a selfish, oblivious bitch. And on that snow day, shoveling
was an impossible task, because just as soon as I got one shovel width done, new snow
had already covered the cleared driveway once more. It took me hours, and I was
exhausted by the time Linda said, “Good enough.” I was just about to go inside when
she asked me to make sure our neighbor was okay. “He’s an old man. Ask him if he
needs his driveway shoveled or anything else,” Linda said, which was strange because
she’s not usually considerate— or even aware— of anyone but herself. Again, I think
she was trying to “cure” me without addressing what happened. When I didn’t move,
Linda said, “Go, Leo. Be a good neighbor. We want to make the right sort of
impression. Especially after all that’s happened.” So I walked through a few feet of
snow as Linda pulled out of the driveway. I had planned on just going inside our new
home once she had driven away, but she idled in the street, watching me through the
falling snow. Just as soon as I rang the doorbell, she drove away. When no one
17
protect his hardwood floors. It’s difficult for him to get
around, especially with bad lungs, so he just gave me a key
and said, “Come in whenever you feel like it. And come
often!”
He’s been smoking since he was twelve, and I’ve been
helping him buy his Pall Mall Reds on the Internet to save
money. The first time, I found this phenomenal deal: two
hundred cigarettes for nineteen dollars, and he proclaimed
me a hero right then and there. He doesn’t even have a
answered I thought I was in luck, but then I heard yelling inside and what sounded
like gunshots. It shook me right out of the quiet winter scene I was in and got my
heart going even more than it already was. I waited for a second, thinking I might be
hearing things, but then I heard more gunshots, so I pulled out my cell phone and
called the police. Three cop cars arrived a few minutes later with their sirens blaring
and their lights flashing. They had this bullhorn and they used it to tell me to step
away from the house. So I did. One of the cops went up to the door with his gun
drawn and knocked really hard. No one answered. So he trudged through the snow
toward the back of the house. He looked in all the windows. A minute or so later, the
front door opened and an old man stood there leaning on a walker. “What the hell is
going on?” he said. “Sir, there was a report of gunshots. Are you okay?” the police
officer said. “I’m just watching a Bogart movie, for Christ’s sake.” The cops looked at
me like they were pissed and then we all went inside to sort out the facts. Once the
cops were satisfied that it was all just a misunderstanding, they left. “What were you
even doing at my front door?” the old man said to me. “My mom wanted to know if
you needed your driveway shoveled. That’s how this all started. I’m sorry I called the
police. But the gunshots sounded real.” The old man smiled proudly and said, “That’s
my new surround‑ sound system. They’re redoing the sound on most of the old films,
and I can’t hear so good, so I turn it up. You ever watch good old Humphrey Bogart in
action?” “No,” I said. He opened his eyes so wide and said, “Jesus Christ, you have no
idea what you’re missing! Get your uneducated ass in my living room and we’ll start
with The Treasure of the Sierra Madre.” And that’s how Linda passed me off to the
next‑ door neighbor when I needed a father figure— when I first started getting fucked
in the head. Watching old movies with Walt seemed like a strange thing to do on a
snow day, but it beat shoveling, so I followed him into his living room, declined the
cigarette he offered me, heard Bogart say, “Will you stake a fellow American to a
meal?” and just sort of settled in for what would turn out to be hours and days and
weeks of black‑ and‑ white movies.
18
computer in his home, let alone the Internet. So it was like I
performed a miracle, getting cigarettes that cheap delivered
to his doorstep, because he was paying a hell of a lot more at
the local convenience store. I’ve been bringing over my laptop—
our Internet signal reaches his living room— and we’ve been
searching for the best deals every week. He’s always trying to
give me half of what he saves, but I never take his money.
12
It’s funny because he’s rich,
13
but always keen on finding a
bargain. Maybe that’s why he’s rich. I don’t know.
A “helper” comes and takes care of him most days, but not
until nine thirty AM, so it’s always just Walt and me before school.
“Walt?” I say as I walk through the smoky hallway,
under the crystal chandelier, toward the smoky living room
where he usually sleeps surrounded by overflowing ashtrays
and empty bottles. “Walt?”
I find him in his La‑Z‑Boy, smoking a Pall Mall Red, eyes
bloodshot from drinking scotch last night.
His robe isn’t shut, so I can see his naked, hairless chest.
It’s the pinkish‑ red sunset color of conch‑ shell innards.
12 Maybe you think I’m an asshole, making smoking more affordable for an old man
with shot lungs? I’m not a big fan of smoking, for the record, even though I’m about to
commit suicide. Irony? But Walt pretty much has old‑ time movies, cigarettes, scotch,
and me. Cigarettes are 25 percent of his life. So I don’t judge him for smoking. Why
should he want to extend his life longer? He started before they even knew it was bad
for you, so maybe his addiction isn’t really his fault anyway. Maybe if I were born
eighty‑ some years ago, I’d be addicted to cigarettes too.
13 Seventy‑ inch flat‑ screen TV; Oriental rugs; garage‑ kept brand‑ new Mercedes‑Benz,
which he never even drives; professionally landscaped yard; in‑ground sprinkler
system; original Norman Rockwell painting in the hallway— you get the picture.
19
He looks at me with his best black‑ and‑ white movie‑ star
face
14
and says, “You despise me, don’t you?”
It’s a line from Casablanca, which we’ve watched together
a million times.
Standing next to his chair with my backpack between my
feet, I answer with Rick’s follow‑up line in the film, saying,
“If I gave you any thought I probably would.”
Then I follow it with a line from The Big Sleep, saying,
“My, my, my. Such a lot of guns around town and so few
brains,” which feels pretty cool and authentic considering I
have the Nazi P‑38 in my backpack.
Walt counters with a line from Key Largo, saying, “You
were right. When your head says one thing and your whole
life says another, your head always loses.”
I smile even bigger because whenever we trade Bogart‑
related quotes, our conversations seem to make a weird sort of
sense that is unpredictable and almost poetic.
I go with a Bogart quote I looked up on the Internet,
“There never seems to be any trouble brewing around a bar
until a woman puts that high heel over the brass rail. Don’t
ask me why, but somehow women at bars seem to create trou‑
ble among men.”
He goes back to the Casablancawell and says, “Where
were you last night?”
14 If you took away all his wrinkles and rogue white hair, he’d look like a seasoned
George Clooney.
20
So I finish the quote, playing Rick and say, “That’s so long
ago, I don’t remember.”
He says, “Will I see you tonight?”
It sort of freaks me out, because no one will ever see me
again after today, so the question seems weighty. I remind
myself that he couldn’t possibly know my plan; he’s just play‑
ing the dumb Bogart game we always play. He’s clueless.
I become Rick again and finish the quote: “I never make
plans that far ahead.”
Walt smiles, blows smoke at the ceiling, and says, “Louis,
I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”
I sit down on his couch and end the game the way we
always do by saying, “Here’s looking at you, kid.”
“Why aren’t you in school learning?” Walt says as the flame
from his Zippo lights up his face and another cigarette sparks to
life. But he doesn’t really care. I skip school all the time just to
watch old Bogart films with him. He loves it when I skip school.
He starts coughing and you can hear the terrible tobacco
phlegm rattling.
A two‑ pack‑a‑day sixty‑ year‑ habit smoker’s cough.
Foul.
I just stare at Walt for a long time, waiting for him to
wipe his hand on his robe and catch his breath.
I wish he were healthier, but it’s hard to imagine him
without a cigarette in his hand. Like I bet even in his high
school yearbook pictures he was smoking. That’s just who he
is. Like Bogart too.
21
Man, I’m going to miss Walt so much. Watching old
smoky Bogart movies with him is one of the few things I’ll
truly miss. It was always the highlight of my week.
Walt says, “You okay, Leonard? You don’t look well.”
I shake off the weirdness, wipe my eyes with my sleeve,
and say, “Yeah, I’m fine.”
He says, “You got all your hair tucked up into that fedora
along with the tops of your ears?”
15
I nod.
I don’t want to tell him I cut off all my hair, for some rea‑
son, maybe because Walt’s one of my best friends— he really
cares about me, I swear to god— and he’d know something
was wrong if he saw my fucked‑up haircut. He’d get upset,
and I want to exit on a good note— I want this to be a happy
good‑ bye, something he can remember and actually feel good
about after I’m gone.
“Bought you a present,” I say, and then pull the turtle‑
looking wrap job from the top of my backpack.
He says, “It’s not my birthday, you know.”
I hope he guesses that it’s mine— or that he might figure
it out, deduce it, so I wait a second as he fingers the present
and tries to mentally guess what the hell it might be.
He looks so happy to get a present.
I kind of promise myself that I won’t kill Asher Beal, nor
15 He’s talking about my Bogart hat, which is too big and even covers my eyebrows.
It’s kind of ridiculous.
22
will I off myself, if only Walt just says “happy birthday” to me
one time, as silly and trivial as that seems.
He doesn’t, and that makes me sad, even though I proba‑
bly never even told him when my birthday was and I know
he would definitely say “happy birthday” if I had.
But I really want him to say “happy birthday” to me with‑
out any prompting, and when he doesn’t, I get to feeling hol‑
low as a dry‑ docked boat or something.
“Why do I get pink paper? Do you think I’m a faggot?” he
says, and then starts laughing really hard and coughing again.
I say, “It’s the twenty‑ first century. Don’t be such a homo‑
phobe,” but I’m not really mad at him.
Walt’s so old that you can’t hold his bigotry against him,
because for almost all his life it was okay for him to say “fag‑
got” among friends, and then suddenly it wasn’t.
He also says things like niggerand kikeand Polackand
chinkand light in the loafersand sand niggerand slantand
spadeand spookand camel jockeyand smokesand porch monkeyand just about a trillion other awful slurs.
I hate bigotry, but I also love Walt.
It’s like Herr Silverman teaches us about the Nazis.
Maybe Walt was just unlucky being born at a time when
everyone was prejudiced against homosexuals and minorities,
and that’s just the way it was for his generation. I don’t know.
I’m starting to get sad about all that, so I change the sub‑
ject by pointing at his present and saying, “Well, aren’t you
going to open it?”
23
He nods once like a little kid and then tears into the pink
paper with his yellow shaky fingers. Halfway in he says, “I
think I know what this is!”
When he has the Bogart hat unwrapped, he says, “Hot dig‑
itty dog!” all corny and nestles the hat down on his white hair.
It’s a perfect fit, just like I knew it would be, because I
measured his head once when he was passed out, drunk.
He composes his face, gets all black‑ and‑ white‑ movie‑
star‑ looking, and says, “I’ve got a job to do too. Where I’m
going you can’t follow. What I’ve got to do, you can’t be any
part of. Leonard, I’m no good at being noble but it doesn’t
take much to see that the problems of three little people don’t
amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world. Someday you’ll
understand that.”
I smile because he switched my name in for Ilsa’s. He does
that sometimes when doing lines from Casablanca.
16
He smiles back real nice and says, “Wow. My very own
Bogart hat. I love it!”
16 Maybe you’re wondering why a teenager in 2011 likes watching Bogart films with
an old man? Good question. At first, it was just something to do, somewhere to be
where I felt wanted, because Walt’s pretty lonely. But I really grew to get, understand,
and love Bogart Hollywood land. Walt says the movies were for men who came home
from World War II disoriented, trying to make sense of the new postwar world, trying
to relearn how to be men in a new domesticated life with women. There were no
women around during the fighting overseas, just men supporting men, which is the
reason for the Lauren Bacall– type femme fatales. During the war, men forgot how to
interact with and trust women. And I like the fact that Walt takes me to a place none
of my classmates even know exists. I admire Bogart because he does what’s right
regardless of consequences— even when the consequences are stacked high against
him— unlike just about everyone else in my life.
24
And then I just start lying and can’t stop myself no matter
how hard I try.
I don’t know why I do it.
Maybe to keep myself from crying, because I can feel the
tears coming on strong— like there’s a thunderstorm in my
skull that’s about to break.
So I tell him I got the hat off the Internet on a site that
auctions old movie props. All proceeds go toward curing
smoker’s cough and throat cancer, which killed good old
unkillable Humphrey Bogart. I say the hat Walt’s wearing
right at this very moment was the same hat Humphrey Bog‑
art wore while playing Sam Spade in The Maltese Falcon.
His eyes open really wide, and then Walt gets this sad
look on his face, like he knows I’m lying when I don’t have
to— like he loves the hat even if it’s nota movie prop, even if I
found it on the street or something, and I know that too, that
I don’t have to make shit up because what we have as friends
is real and true already— but I just keep telling mistruths and
he doesn’t want to call me on it; he doesn’t want to make me
feel shameful and fuck up the good moment that is happening.
That sad look on his face just makes me say things like
“really” and “I swear to god” like I do sometimes when I am
lying.
I say, “It’s really really Bogart’s hat, I swear to god. Really.
Just don’t tell my mom about this because I had to spend some
serious money— like upwards of twenty‑ five grand I debited
from her Visa card, which all goes to cancer research, all of
25
it— and I had to get the hat just so that we might have a little
piece of Bogie history, just so we might at least have that for‑
ever. Right?”
I feel so awful, because the truth is that I bought the hat at
the thrift store for four dollars and fifty cents.
Walt’s eyes look all glazey and distant, like I shot him
with the P‑38.
“So do you like it?” I ask. “Do you like owning Bogie’s
hat? Does wearing it make you feel tough and capable of sav‑
ing the day?”
Walt smiles real sad, makes his Bogie face, and says,
“What have you ever given me besides money? You ever given
me any of your confidence, any of the truth? Haven’t you
tried to buy my loyalty with money and nothing else?”
I recognize the quote. It’s from The Maltese Falcon. So I
finish it by saying, “What else is there I can buy you with?”
We look at each other in our Bogart hats and it’s like we’re
communicating, even though we’re completely silent.
I’m trying to let him know what I’m about to do.
I’m hoping he can save me, even though I realize he can’t.
His Bogie hat is gray with a black band and really looks
like Sam Spade’s. It was a lucky thrift store find. It really was.
Like Walt was destined to have this very hat.
I remember this other weirdly appropriate quote from
The Maltese Falconand so I say, “I haven’t lived a good life.
I’ve been bad. Worse than you could know.”
But Walt doesn’t play along this time. He gets real twitchy
26
and nervous and then he starts asking me why I gave him the
hat at this particular juncture—“Why today?”— and—“Why
do you look so sad all of a sudden?”— and—“What’s wrong?”
Then he starts asking me to take off my hat, asking if I
cut my hair, and when I don’t answer he asks me if I’ve talked
to my mother today— if she’s been around lately.
I say, “I really have to go to school now. You’re a fantastic
neighbor, Walt. Really. Almost like a father to me. No need to
worry.”
I’m fighting the big‑ time tears again, so I turn my back on
him and walk out through the smoky hallway, under the
crystal chandelier, out of Walt’s life forever.
The whole time he yells, “Leonard. Leonard, wait! Let’s
talk. I’m really worried about you. What’s going on? Why
don’t you stay awhile? Please. Take a day off. We can watch a
Bogie movie. Things will seem better. Bogart always—”
I open the front door and pause long enough to hear him
coughing and hacking as he tries to chase me, using his sad
drugstore tennis‑ ball walker.
He could die today, I think, he really could.
And then I just stride out of his house knowing that it
was the perfect way to say good‑ bye to Walt. My storming out
right at that very moment was like the emotional climax of
an old‑ school Bogart film. In my mind, I could even hear the
stringed instruments building to a dramatic crescendo.
“ Good‑ bye, Walt,” I say as I stride toward my high school.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s
imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is
coincidental.
Copyright © 2013 by Matthew Quick
All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and
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First Edition: August 2013
Library of Congress Cataloging‑in‑Publication Data
Quick, Matthew, 1973–
Forgive me, Leonard Peacock / by Matthew Quick. — First edition.
pages cm
Summary: A day in the life of a suicidal teen boy saying good‑bye to the four people who matter most to him.
ISBN 978‑0‑316‑22133‑7
[1. Suicide—Fiction.] I. Title.
PZ7.Q3185Fo 2013
[Fic]—dc23
2012031410
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
RRD‑C
Book design by Tracy Shaw
Printed in the United States of America
New York •Boston
One
The P‑38 WWII Nazi handgun looks comical lying on the
breakfast table next to a bowl of oatmeal. It’s like some weird
steampunk utensil anachronism. But if you look very closely
just above the handle you can see the tiny stamped swastika
and the eagle perched on top, which is real as hell.
I take a photo of my place setting with my iPhone, think‑
ing it could be both evidence and modern art.
Then I laugh my ass off looking at it on the miniscreen,
because modern art is such bullshit.
I mean, a bowl of oatmeal and a P‑38 set next to it like a
spoon— that arrangement photographed can be modern art,
right?
Bullshit.
But funny too.
I’ve seen worse on display at real art museums, like an all‑
white canvas with a single red pinstripe through it.
2
I once told Herr
1
Silverman about that red‑ line painting,
saying I could easily do it myself, and he said in this super‑
confident voice, “But you didn’t.”
I have to admit it was a cool, artsy retort because it was
true.
Shut me the hell up.
So here I am making modern art before I die.
Maybe they’ll hang my iPhone in the Philadelphia Museum
of Art with the oatmeal Nazi gun pic displayed.
They can call it Break fast of a Teenage Killeror something
ridiculous and shocking like that.
The art and news worlds will love it, I bet.
They’ll make my modern artwork instantly famous.
Especially after I actually kill Asher Beal and off myself.
2
Art value always goes up once the artist’s associated with
fucked‑up things such as cutting off his own ear like Van Gogh,
1 Herr Silverman is my Holocaust Class teacher, but he is primarily the German
teacher at my high school, which is why we call him Herr and not Mr.
2 On Livestrong.com I read that “every 100 minutes another teenager will commit
suicide.” And I don’t believe it’s true at all, because why don’t you ever hear about all of
these suicides on the news or whatever? Do they all happen in secret or in other
countries? Suicide can’t be that common, can it? And if it is . . . here I am thinking I’m
being daring and original with my own plans. Ha! Here’s more damning evidence,
regarding my uniqueness. According to Wikipedia— admittedly not the most reliable
and in this case it’s totally outdated—“In the United States, firearms remain the most
common method of suicide, accounting for 53.7 percent of all suicides committed
during 2003.” Wikipedia also says, “Over one million people die by suicide every year.”
So according to Wikipedia, suicide takes care of one million fucked‑up people every
time our planet circles the sun. I wonder what Charles Darwin would have to say
about that fun little fact. Natural selection? Nature’s way of protecting the stronger
and more necessary? Is my mind simply an agent of nature? Am I about to make
Uncle Charlie Darwin proud?
3
or marrying his teenage cousin like Poe, or having his min‑
ions murder a celebrity like Manson, or shooting his postsui‑
cide ashes out of a huge cannon like Hunter S. Thompson, or
being dressed up as a little girl by his mother like Heming‑
way, or wearing a dress made of raw meat like Lady Gaga, or
having unspeakable things done to him so he kills a classmate
and puts a bullet in his own head like I will do later today.
My murder‑ suicide will make Break fast of a Teenage
Killer
3
a priceless masterpiece because people want artists to
be unlike them in every way. If you are boring, nice, and
normal— like I used to be— you will definitely fail your high
school art class and be a subpar artist for life.
Worthless to the masses.
Forgotten.
Everyone knows that.
Everyone.
So the key is doing something that sets you apart forever
in the minds of regular people.
Something that matters.
3 Break fast of a Teenage Killeris a sick double entendre, as I am a killer who isa
teenager, and— since my target is a teenager whom I must kill— I am also a killer
ofteenagers!
Two
I wrap up the birthday presents in this pink wrapping paper I
find in the hall closet.
I wasn’t planning on wrapping the presents, but I feel like
maybe I should attempt to make the day feel more official,
more festive.
I’m not afraid of people thinking I’m gay, because I really
don’t care what anyone thinks at this point, and so I don’t
mind the pink paper, although I would have preferred a dif‑
ferent color. Maybe black would have been more appropriate
given what’s about to transpire.
It makes me feel really little‑ kid‑on‑ Christmas‑ morning
good to wrap up the gifts.
Feels rightsomehow.
I make sure the safety is on and then put the loaded P‑38
in an old cedar cigar box I kept to remember my dad, because
he used to enjoy smoking illegal Cuban cigars. I stuff a bunch
of old socks in to keep my “heater” from clanking around
5
inside and maybe blasting a bullet into my ass. Then I wrap
the box in pink paper too, so that no one will suspect I have a
gun in school.
Even if— for whatever reason— my principal starts ran‑
domly searching backpacks today, I can say it’s a present for a
friend.
The pink wrapping paper will throw them off, camou‑
flage the danger, and only a real asshole would make me open
up someone else’s perfectly wrapped gift.
No one has ever searched my backpack at school, but I
don’t want to take any chances.
Maybe the P‑38 will be a present for me when I unwrap it
and shoot Asher Beal.
That’ll probably be the only present I receive today.
In addition to the P‑38, there are four gifts, one for each of
my friends.
I want to say good‑ bye to them properly.
I want to give them each something to remember me by.
To let them know I really cared about them and I’m sorry I
couldn’t be more than I was— that I couldn’t stick around—
and that what’s going to happen today isn’t their fault.
I don’t want them to stress over what I’m about to do or
feel depressed afterward.
Three
My Holocaust class teacher, Herr Silverman, never rolls up
his sleeves like the other male teachers at my high school, who
all arrive each morning with their freshly ironed shirts rolled
to the elbow. Nor does Herr Silverman ever wear the faculty
polo shirt on Fridays. Even in the warmer months he keeps
his arms covered, and I’ve been wondering why for a long
time now.
I think about it constantly.
It’s maybe the greatest mystery of my life.
Perhaps he has really hairy arms, I’ve often thought. Or
prison tattoos. Or a birthmark. Or he was obscenely burned
in a fire. Or maybe someone spilled acid on him during
a high school science experiment. Or he was once a heroin
addict and his wrists are therefore scarred with a gazillion
needle‑ track marks. Maybe he has a blood‑circulation dis‑
order that keeps him perpetually cold.
But I suspect the truth is more serious than that— like
7
maybe he tried to kill himself once and there are razor‑blade
scars.
Maybe.
It’s hard for me to believe that Herr Silverman once
attempted suicide, because he’s so together now; he’s really
the most admirable adult I know.
Sometimes I actually hope that he did once feel empty
and hopeless and helpless enough to slash his wrists to the
bone, because if he felt that horrible and survived to be such a
fantastic grown‑up, then maybe there’s hope for me.
4
Whenever I have some free time I wonder about what
Herr Silverman might be hiding, and I try to unlock his mys‑
tery in my mind, creating all sorts of suicide‑ inducing scenar‑
ios, inventing his past.
4 I Googled “How long does it take to die when you slit your wrists?” There are all
sorts of people asking this question on the Internet and most of them say they are
researching the topic for their high school health class. Most of the posted answers
accuse the asker of lying and urge him (her?) to seek professional help. There are
straight‑up answers from people who claim to be doctors and others who have actually
slit their wrists with razor blades and survived. They all say this is a very painful way
to die (or not die)— that it’s not peaceful, not at all the death‑in‑a‑ warm‑ bath‑
go‑to‑ sleep type of deal in which movies make you believe. The blood can clot, which
keeps you alive and in excruciating pain. But then I found posts about how to slit your
wrists the “right way,” so you will actually die, and that depressed me, because people
actually post stuff like that, and, even though I wanted to know the answer, so I could
weigh my options, that info maybe shouldn’t be on the Internet. I’m not going to list
the right way to slit your wrists or explain it to you, because I don’t want any additional
blood on my hands. But really— why dosome people post the correct ways to commit
suicide on the Internet? Do they want weird, sad people like me to go away
permanently? Do they think it’s a good idea for some people to off themselves? How
can you tell when you are one of those people who should slash his wrists the right way
with a razor blade? Is there an answer for that too? I Googled but nothing concrete
came up. Just ways to complete the mission. Not justification.
8
Some days I have his parents beat him with clothes hang‑
ers and starve him.
Other days his classmates throw him to the ground and
kick him until he’s wet with blood, at which point they take
turns pissing on his head.
Sometimes he suffers from unrequited love and cries every
single night alone in his closet clutching a pillow to his chest.
Other times he’s abducted by a sadistic psychopath who
waterboards him nightly— Guantánamo Bay– style— and
deprives him of drinking water during the day while he is
forced to sit in a Clockwork Orange– type room full of strobe
lights, Beethoven symphonies, and horrific images projected
on a huge screen.
I don’t think anyone else has noticed Herr Silverman’s con‑
stantly clothed forearms, or if they have, no one has said anything
about it in class. I haven’t overheard anything in the hallways.
I wonder if I’m really the only one who’s noticed, and if
so, what does that say about me?
Does that make me weird?
(Or weirder than I already am?)
Or just observant?
So many times I’ve thought about asking Herr Silverman
why he never rolls up his sleeves, but I don’t for some reason.5
5 Sometimes when I stay after class to talk with Herr Silverman about life— while he’s
trying to put a positive spin on whatever depressing subject I’ve brought up— I’ll
pretend I have X‑ray vision and stare at his clothed forearms, trying to end the
mystery, but it never works because I, unfortunately, don’t really have X‑ray vision.
9
Some days he encourages me to write; other days he says
I’m “gifted” and then smiles like he’s being truthful, and I’ll
come close to asking him the question about his never‑ exposed
forearms, but I never do, and that seems odd— utterly ridicu‑
lous, considering how badly I want to ask and how much the
answer could save me.
As if his response will be sacred or life‑ altering or somethingand I’m saving it for later— like an emotional antibiotic,
or a depression lifeboat.
Sometimes I really believe that.
But why?
Maybe my brain’s just fucked.
Or maybe I’m terrified that I might be wrong about him
and I’m just making things up in my head— that there’s
nothing under those shirtsleeves at all, and he just likes the
look of covered forearms.
It’s a fashion statement.
He’s more like Linda6
than I am.
End of story.
I worry Herr Silverman will laugh at me when I ask about
his covered forearms.
6 Linda is my mother. I call her Linda because it annoys her. She says it “de‑moms” her.
But she de‑mommed herself when she rented an apartment in Manhattan and left me all
alone in South Jersey to fend for myself most weeks and increasingly more weekends.
She says she needs to be in New York because of her fashion‑ designing career, but I’m
pretty sure it’s so she can screw her French boyfriend, Jean‑ Luc, and keep the hell away
from her fucked‑up son. She checked out of my life right after the bad shit with Asher
went down, maybe because it was too intense for her to handle. I don’t know.
10
He’ll make me feel stupid for wondering— hoping— all
this time.
That he’ll call me a freak.
That he’ll think I’m a pervert for thinking about it so much.
That he’ll pull an ugly, disgusted face that’ll make me feel
like he and I could never ever be similar at all, and I’m there‑
fore delusional.
That would kill me, I think.
Do my spirit in for good.
It really would.
And so I’ve come to worry that my not asking is simply
the product of my boundless cowardice.
As I sit there alone at the breakfast table wondering if
Linda will remember today’s significance, knowing deep
down that she’s simply not going to call— I decide to instead
wonder if the Nazi officer who carried my P‑38 in WWII
ever dreamed his sidearm would end up as modern art, across
the Atlantic Ocean, in New Jersey, seventy‑ some years later,
loaded and ready to kill the closest modern‑ day equivalent of
a Nazi that we have at my high school.
The German who originally owned the P‑ 38— what was
his name?
Was he one of the nice Germans Herr Silverman tells us
about? The ones who didn’t hate Jews or gays or blacks or
anyone really but just had the misfortune of being born in
Germany during a really fucked time.
Was he anything like me?
Four
I have this signature really long dirty‑ blond hair that hangs
over my eyes and past my shoulders. I’ve been growing it for
years, ever since the government came after my dad and he
fled the country.
7
7 You won’t believe this, but my father was actually a minor rock star back in the early
1990s. His stage name was Jack Walker, which were his two favorite drinks: Jack
Daniel’s, Johnnie Walker. How clever! Do you know him? No?How shocking! You
might remember his band, Tether Me Slowly, or the “East Coast’s answer to grunge,”
according to Rolling Stone,once upon a time. You’ve definitely heard his one big hit,
“Underwater Vatican,” because they play it all the goddamn time on classic‑rock
radio. He toured with the Jesus Lizard, Pearl Jam, Nirvana, and others as an opening
act. Signed a HUGE record deal, had a creative block, became an alcoholic, married
my mom, made a crap sophomore album, developed a drug habit (or should I say
developed anotherdrug habit because— as we learned in health class— alcohol is a
drug), was too much of a wuss to OD or off himself like a proper rock star, had me,
quit making music, lived off what he made from basically one lucky song and selling
his rock ’n’ roll paraphernalia on eBay (including the smashed and signed Kurt
Cobain guitar that used to hang over my bed), became a has‑ been one‑ hit‑ wonder joke
who never even touched a guitar anymore, grew bloated and perpetually red‑ skinned
and unrecognizable, accused Linda of having affairs, began to disappear for days at a
time, clandestinely started overnight gambling in Atlantic City, stopped paying taxes,
woke his fifteen‑ year‑ old son in the middle of the goddamn night to give me his
father’s WWII souvenirs and knock me out with his roses‑ and‑ mustard‑ gas
12
And my long locks piss Linda off something awful, espe‑
cially since she’s into contemporary fashion. She says I look
like a “ grunge‑ rock stoner”
8
and back when she was still
around caring about me, Linda actually made me submit to a
drug test— pissing into a cup— which I passed.9
I didn’t get Linda a good‑ bye present, and I start to feel
guilty about that, so I cut off all my hair with the scissors in
the kitchen— the ones we usually use to cut food.
I cut it all down to the scalp in a wild orgy of arms and
hands and silver blades.
Then I mash all of my hair into a big ball and wrap it in
pink paper.
I’m laughing the whole time.
I cut out a little square of pink paper and write on the
back.
Kurt Vonnegut breath, told me to be a good man, told me to take care of Linda, was
rumored to have fled by banana fucking cargo boat to some Venezuelan jungle just
before the Feds could nab him, and hasn’t been heard from since. Every time I hear
“Underwater Vatican” now, I want to tear down the walls, and not just because every
penny from every royalty check goes to the U.S. government and not me. Linda was
pissed about the money she owed the government, all the lawyer shenanigans, losing
the big house, the cars, but other than that, she was pretty much like “good fucking
riddance” and then her parents died and she inherited enough money to start her
NYC designing business and keep me here in South Jersey. My father— whose real
name was Ralph Peacock— had Linda sign a prenuptial agreement, I’m certain of
that, because no one would have put up with his faded‑ rock‑ star shit for so long. But
the joke was this: In the end, she got absolutely nothing out of the deal. He was pretty
much a bastard. And shitty mom though she may be, Linda still turns heads. She’s
beautiful— just what you’d think an ex‑model would look like in her late thirties.
8 Aka my dad, circa 1991.
9 Like father, unlike son.
13
Dear Delilah,
Here you go.
You got your wish.
Congratulations!
Love, Samson
I fold the square in half and tape it to the gift, which looks
quite odd— almost like I tried to wrap a pocket of air.
Then I stick the present in the refrigerator, which seems
hilarious.
Linda will be looking for a chilled bottle of Riesling to
calm her jangled nerves after getting the news about her son
ridding the world of Asher Beal and Leonard Peacock too.
She’ll find the pink wrap job.
Linda will wonder about my allusion to Samson and Delilahwhen she reads the card, because that was the title of my
father’s failed sophomore record, but will get the joke just as
soon as she opens her present.
I imagine her clutching her chest, faking the tears, play‑
ing the victim, and being all dramatic.
Jean‑ Luc will really have his professionally manicured
French hands full.
No sex for him maybe, or maybe not.
Maybe their affair will blossom without me around to psy‑
chologically anchor poor Linda to reality and maternal duties.
Maybe once I’m gone, she’ll float away to France like a
shiny new silver little‑ kid birthday balloon.
14
She’ll probably even lose a dress size without me around
to trigger her “stress eating.”
Maybe Linda won’t return to our house ever again.
Maybe she and Jean‑ Luc will go to the fashion capital of
the world, the City of Light, auw- hauh- hauw!, and screw like
bunnies happily ever after.
She’ll sell everything, and the new homeowners will find
my hair in the refrigerator and be like What the . . . ?
My hair’ll just end up in the trash and that will be that.
Gone.
Forgotten.
RI P, hair.
Or maybe they’ll donate my locks to one of those wig‑
making places that help out kids with cancer. Like my hair
would get a second shot at life with a little innocent‑ hearted
bald chemo girl maybe.
I’d like that.
I really would.
My hair deserves it.
So I’m really hoping for that cancer‑ kid‑ helping outcome
if Linda goes to France without coming home first, or maybe
even Linda will donate my hair.
Anything’s possible, I guess.
I stare at the mirror over the kitchen sink.
10
10 Linda needs mirrors more than she needs oxygen, so there are mirrors in every
goddamn room of our house.
15
The no‑hair guy staring back at me looks so strange now.
He’s like a different person with all uneven patches on his
scalp.
He looks thinner.
I can see his cheekbones sticking out where his blond cur‑
tains used to hang.
How long has this guy been hiding under my hair?
I don’t like him.
“I’m going to kill you later today,” I say to that guy in the
mirror, and he just smiles back at me like he can’t wait.
“Promise?” I hear someone say, which freaks me out,
because my lips didn’t move.
I mean— it wasn’t me who said, “Promise?”
It’s like there’s a voice trapped inside the glass.
So I stop looking in the mirror.
Just for good measure, I smash that mirror with a coffee
mug, because I don’t want the mirror me to speak ever again.
Shards rain down into the sink and then a million little
mes look up like so many tiny minnows.
Five
I’m already late for school, but I need to stop at my next‑ door‑
neighbor Walt’s
11
so that I can give him his present.
Today, I knock once and let myself into Walt’s house
because he has to walk slowly with one of those gray‑ piped
four‑ footed walkers that has dirty tennis balls attached to
11 I met Walt during a blizzard, just after we moved into the new house. I remember
Linda asking me to shovel the driveway, even though it was still snowing, because she
had to go out to meet another fake designer or some bulimic model or whomever. I
think she was trying to “cure” me by assigning manly tasks because of what happened
with Asher and me, even though she refused to believe me when I tried to tell her
what happened because she’s a selfish, oblivious bitch. And on that snow day, shoveling
was an impossible task, because just as soon as I got one shovel width done, new snow
had already covered the cleared driveway once more. It took me hours, and I was
exhausted by the time Linda said, “Good enough.” I was just about to go inside when
she asked me to make sure our neighbor was okay. “He’s an old man. Ask him if he
needs his driveway shoveled or anything else,” Linda said, which was strange because
she’s not usually considerate— or even aware— of anyone but herself. Again, I think
she was trying to “cure” me without addressing what happened. When I didn’t move,
Linda said, “Go, Leo. Be a good neighbor. We want to make the right sort of
impression. Especially after all that’s happened.” So I walked through a few feet of
snow as Linda pulled out of the driveway. I had planned on just going inside our new
home once she had driven away, but she idled in the street, watching me through the
falling snow. Just as soon as I rang the doorbell, she drove away. When no one
17
protect his hardwood floors. It’s difficult for him to get
around, especially with bad lungs, so he just gave me a key
and said, “Come in whenever you feel like it. And come
often!”
He’s been smoking since he was twelve, and I’ve been
helping him buy his Pall Mall Reds on the Internet to save
money. The first time, I found this phenomenal deal: two
hundred cigarettes for nineteen dollars, and he proclaimed
me a hero right then and there. He doesn’t even have a
answered I thought I was in luck, but then I heard yelling inside and what sounded
like gunshots. It shook me right out of the quiet winter scene I was in and got my
heart going even more than it already was. I waited for a second, thinking I might be
hearing things, but then I heard more gunshots, so I pulled out my cell phone and
called the police. Three cop cars arrived a few minutes later with their sirens blaring
and their lights flashing. They had this bullhorn and they used it to tell me to step
away from the house. So I did. One of the cops went up to the door with his gun
drawn and knocked really hard. No one answered. So he trudged through the snow
toward the back of the house. He looked in all the windows. A minute or so later, the
front door opened and an old man stood there leaning on a walker. “What the hell is
going on?” he said. “Sir, there was a report of gunshots. Are you okay?” the police
officer said. “I’m just watching a Bogart movie, for Christ’s sake.” The cops looked at
me like they were pissed and then we all went inside to sort out the facts. Once the
cops were satisfied that it was all just a misunderstanding, they left. “What were you
even doing at my front door?” the old man said to me. “My mom wanted to know if
you needed your driveway shoveled. That’s how this all started. I’m sorry I called the
police. But the gunshots sounded real.” The old man smiled proudly and said, “That’s
my new surround‑ sound system. They’re redoing the sound on most of the old films,
and I can’t hear so good, so I turn it up. You ever watch good old Humphrey Bogart in
action?” “No,” I said. He opened his eyes so wide and said, “Jesus Christ, you have no
idea what you’re missing! Get your uneducated ass in my living room and we’ll start
with The Treasure of the Sierra Madre.” And that’s how Linda passed me off to the
next‑ door neighbor when I needed a father figure— when I first started getting fucked
in the head. Watching old movies with Walt seemed like a strange thing to do on a
snow day, but it beat shoveling, so I followed him into his living room, declined the
cigarette he offered me, heard Bogart say, “Will you stake a fellow American to a
meal?” and just sort of settled in for what would turn out to be hours and days and
weeks of black‑ and‑ white movies.
18
computer in his home, let alone the Internet. So it was like I
performed a miracle, getting cigarettes that cheap delivered
to his doorstep, because he was paying a hell of a lot more at
the local convenience store. I’ve been bringing over my laptop—
our Internet signal reaches his living room— and we’ve been
searching for the best deals every week. He’s always trying to
give me half of what he saves, but I never take his money.
12
It’s funny because he’s rich,
13
but always keen on finding a
bargain. Maybe that’s why he’s rich. I don’t know.
A “helper” comes and takes care of him most days, but not
until nine thirty AM, so it’s always just Walt and me before school.
“Walt?” I say as I walk through the smoky hallway,
under the crystal chandelier, toward the smoky living room
where he usually sleeps surrounded by overflowing ashtrays
and empty bottles. “Walt?”
I find him in his La‑Z‑Boy, smoking a Pall Mall Red, eyes
bloodshot from drinking scotch last night.
His robe isn’t shut, so I can see his naked, hairless chest.
It’s the pinkish‑ red sunset color of conch‑ shell innards.
12 Maybe you think I’m an asshole, making smoking more affordable for an old man
with shot lungs? I’m not a big fan of smoking, for the record, even though I’m about to
commit suicide. Irony? But Walt pretty much has old‑ time movies, cigarettes, scotch,
and me. Cigarettes are 25 percent of his life. So I don’t judge him for smoking. Why
should he want to extend his life longer? He started before they even knew it was bad
for you, so maybe his addiction isn’t really his fault anyway. Maybe if I were born
eighty‑ some years ago, I’d be addicted to cigarettes too.
13 Seventy‑ inch flat‑ screen TV; Oriental rugs; garage‑ kept brand‑ new Mercedes‑Benz,
which he never even drives; professionally landscaped yard; in‑ground sprinkler
system; original Norman Rockwell painting in the hallway— you get the picture.
19
He looks at me with his best black‑ and‑ white movie‑ star
face
14
and says, “You despise me, don’t you?”
It’s a line from Casablanca, which we’ve watched together
a million times.
Standing next to his chair with my backpack between my
feet, I answer with Rick’s follow‑up line in the film, saying,
“If I gave you any thought I probably would.”
Then I follow it with a line from The Big Sleep, saying,
“My, my, my. Such a lot of guns around town and so few
brains,” which feels pretty cool and authentic considering I
have the Nazi P‑38 in my backpack.
Walt counters with a line from Key Largo, saying, “You
were right. When your head says one thing and your whole
life says another, your head always loses.”
I smile even bigger because whenever we trade Bogart‑
related quotes, our conversations seem to make a weird sort of
sense that is unpredictable and almost poetic.
I go with a Bogart quote I looked up on the Internet,
“There never seems to be any trouble brewing around a bar
until a woman puts that high heel over the brass rail. Don’t
ask me why, but somehow women at bars seem to create trou‑
ble among men.”
He goes back to the Casablancawell and says, “Where
were you last night?”
14 If you took away all his wrinkles and rogue white hair, he’d look like a seasoned
George Clooney.
20
So I finish the quote, playing Rick and say, “That’s so long
ago, I don’t remember.”
He says, “Will I see you tonight?”
It sort of freaks me out, because no one will ever see me
again after today, so the question seems weighty. I remind
myself that he couldn’t possibly know my plan; he’s just play‑
ing the dumb Bogart game we always play. He’s clueless.
I become Rick again and finish the quote: “I never make
plans that far ahead.”
Walt smiles, blows smoke at the ceiling, and says, “Louis,
I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”
I sit down on his couch and end the game the way we
always do by saying, “Here’s looking at you, kid.”
“Why aren’t you in school learning?” Walt says as the flame
from his Zippo lights up his face and another cigarette sparks to
life. But he doesn’t really care. I skip school all the time just to
watch old Bogart films with him. He loves it when I skip school.
He starts coughing and you can hear the terrible tobacco
phlegm rattling.
A two‑ pack‑a‑day sixty‑ year‑ habit smoker’s cough.
Foul.
I just stare at Walt for a long time, waiting for him to
wipe his hand on his robe and catch his breath.
I wish he were healthier, but it’s hard to imagine him
without a cigarette in his hand. Like I bet even in his high
school yearbook pictures he was smoking. That’s just who he
is. Like Bogart too.
21
Man, I’m going to miss Walt so much. Watching old
smoky Bogart movies with him is one of the few things I’ll
truly miss. It was always the highlight of my week.
Walt says, “You okay, Leonard? You don’t look well.”
I shake off the weirdness, wipe my eyes with my sleeve,
and say, “Yeah, I’m fine.”
He says, “You got all your hair tucked up into that fedora
along with the tops of your ears?”
15
I nod.
I don’t want to tell him I cut off all my hair, for some rea‑
son, maybe because Walt’s one of my best friends— he really
cares about me, I swear to god— and he’d know something
was wrong if he saw my fucked‑up haircut. He’d get upset,
and I want to exit on a good note— I want this to be a happy
good‑ bye, something he can remember and actually feel good
about after I’m gone.
“Bought you a present,” I say, and then pull the turtle‑
looking wrap job from the top of my backpack.
He says, “It’s not my birthday, you know.”
I hope he guesses that it’s mine— or that he might figure
it out, deduce it, so I wait a second as he fingers the present
and tries to mentally guess what the hell it might be.
He looks so happy to get a present.
I kind of promise myself that I won’t kill Asher Beal, nor
15 He’s talking about my Bogart hat, which is too big and even covers my eyebrows.
It’s kind of ridiculous.
22
will I off myself, if only Walt just says “happy birthday” to me
one time, as silly and trivial as that seems.
He doesn’t, and that makes me sad, even though I proba‑
bly never even told him when my birthday was and I know
he would definitely say “happy birthday” if I had.
But I really want him to say “happy birthday” to me with‑
out any prompting, and when he doesn’t, I get to feeling hol‑
low as a dry‑ docked boat or something.
“Why do I get pink paper? Do you think I’m a faggot?” he
says, and then starts laughing really hard and coughing again.
I say, “It’s the twenty‑ first century. Don’t be such a homo‑
phobe,” but I’m not really mad at him.
Walt’s so old that you can’t hold his bigotry against him,
because for almost all his life it was okay for him to say “fag‑
got” among friends, and then suddenly it wasn’t.
He also says things like niggerand kikeand Polackand
chinkand light in the loafersand sand niggerand slantand
spadeand spookand camel jockeyand smokesand porch monkeyand just about a trillion other awful slurs.
I hate bigotry, but I also love Walt.
It’s like Herr Silverman teaches us about the Nazis.
Maybe Walt was just unlucky being born at a time when
everyone was prejudiced against homosexuals and minorities,
and that’s just the way it was for his generation. I don’t know.
I’m starting to get sad about all that, so I change the sub‑
ject by pointing at his present and saying, “Well, aren’t you
going to open it?”
23
He nods once like a little kid and then tears into the pink
paper with his yellow shaky fingers. Halfway in he says, “I
think I know what this is!”
When he has the Bogart hat unwrapped, he says, “Hot dig‑
itty dog!” all corny and nestles the hat down on his white hair.
It’s a perfect fit, just like I knew it would be, because I
measured his head once when he was passed out, drunk.
He composes his face, gets all black‑ and‑ white‑ movie‑
star‑ looking, and says, “I’ve got a job to do too. Where I’m
going you can’t follow. What I’ve got to do, you can’t be any
part of. Leonard, I’m no good at being noble but it doesn’t
take much to see that the problems of three little people don’t
amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world. Someday you’ll
understand that.”
I smile because he switched my name in for Ilsa’s. He does
that sometimes when doing lines from Casablanca.
16
He smiles back real nice and says, “Wow. My very own
Bogart hat. I love it!”
16 Maybe you’re wondering why a teenager in 2011 likes watching Bogart films with
an old man? Good question. At first, it was just something to do, somewhere to be
where I felt wanted, because Walt’s pretty lonely. But I really grew to get, understand,
and love Bogart Hollywood land. Walt says the movies were for men who came home
from World War II disoriented, trying to make sense of the new postwar world, trying
to relearn how to be men in a new domesticated life with women. There were no
women around during the fighting overseas, just men supporting men, which is the
reason for the Lauren Bacall– type femme fatales. During the war, men forgot how to
interact with and trust women. And I like the fact that Walt takes me to a place none
of my classmates even know exists. I admire Bogart because he does what’s right
regardless of consequences— even when the consequences are stacked high against
him— unlike just about everyone else in my life.
24
And then I just start lying and can’t stop myself no matter
how hard I try.
I don’t know why I do it.
Maybe to keep myself from crying, because I can feel the
tears coming on strong— like there’s a thunderstorm in my
skull that’s about to break.
So I tell him I got the hat off the Internet on a site that
auctions old movie props. All proceeds go toward curing
smoker’s cough and throat cancer, which killed good old
unkillable Humphrey Bogart. I say the hat Walt’s wearing
right at this very moment was the same hat Humphrey Bog‑
art wore while playing Sam Spade in The Maltese Falcon.
His eyes open really wide, and then Walt gets this sad
look on his face, like he knows I’m lying when I don’t have
to— like he loves the hat even if it’s nota movie prop, even if I
found it on the street or something, and I know that too, that
I don’t have to make shit up because what we have as friends
is real and true already— but I just keep telling mistruths and
he doesn’t want to call me on it; he doesn’t want to make me
feel shameful and fuck up the good moment that is happening.
That sad look on his face just makes me say things like
“really” and “I swear to god” like I do sometimes when I am
lying.
I say, “It’s really really Bogart’s hat, I swear to god. Really.
Just don’t tell my mom about this because I had to spend some
serious money— like upwards of twenty‑ five grand I debited
from her Visa card, which all goes to cancer research, all of
25
it— and I had to get the hat just so that we might have a little
piece of Bogie history, just so we might at least have that for‑
ever. Right?”
I feel so awful, because the truth is that I bought the hat at
the thrift store for four dollars and fifty cents.
Walt’s eyes look all glazey and distant, like I shot him
with the P‑38.
“So do you like it?” I ask. “Do you like owning Bogie’s
hat? Does wearing it make you feel tough and capable of sav‑
ing the day?”
Walt smiles real sad, makes his Bogie face, and says,
“What have you ever given me besides money? You ever given
me any of your confidence, any of the truth? Haven’t you
tried to buy my loyalty with money and nothing else?”
I recognize the quote. It’s from The Maltese Falcon. So I
finish it by saying, “What else is there I can buy you with?”
We look at each other in our Bogart hats and it’s like we’re
communicating, even though we’re completely silent.
I’m trying to let him know what I’m about to do.
I’m hoping he can save me, even though I realize he can’t.
His Bogie hat is gray with a black band and really looks
like Sam Spade’s. It was a lucky thrift store find. It really was.
Like Walt was destined to have this very hat.
I remember this other weirdly appropriate quote from
The Maltese Falconand so I say, “I haven’t lived a good life.
I’ve been bad. Worse than you could know.”
But Walt doesn’t play along this time. He gets real twitchy
26
and nervous and then he starts asking me why I gave him the
hat at this particular juncture—“Why today?”— and—“Why
do you look so sad all of a sudden?”— and—“What’s wrong?”
Then he starts asking me to take off my hat, asking if I
cut my hair, and when I don’t answer he asks me if I’ve talked
to my mother today— if she’s been around lately.
I say, “I really have to go to school now. You’re a fantastic
neighbor, Walt. Really. Almost like a father to me. No need to
worry.”
I’m fighting the big‑ time tears again, so I turn my back on
him and walk out through the smoky hallway, under the
crystal chandelier, out of Walt’s life forever.
The whole time he yells, “Leonard. Leonard, wait! Let’s
talk. I’m really worried about you. What’s going on? Why
don’t you stay awhile? Please. Take a day off. We can watch a
Bogie movie. Things will seem better. Bogart always—”
I open the front door and pause long enough to hear him
coughing and hacking as he tries to chase me, using his sad
drugstore tennis‑ ball walker.
He could die today, I think, he really could.
And then I just stride out of his house knowing that it
was the perfect way to say good‑ bye to Walt. My storming out
right at that very moment was like the emotional climax of
an old‑ school Bogart film. In my mind, I could even hear the
stringed instruments building to a dramatic crescendo.
“ Good‑ bye, Walt,” I say as I stride toward my high school.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s
imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is
coincidental.
Copyright © 2013 by Matthew Quick
All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and
electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher is unlawful piracy and
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First Edition: August 2013
Library of Congress Cataloging‑in‑Publication Data
Quick, Matthew, 1973–
Forgive me, Leonard Peacock / by Matthew Quick. — First edition.
pages cm
Summary: A day in the life of a suicidal teen boy saying good‑bye to the four people who matter most to him.
ISBN 978‑0‑316‑22133‑7
[1. Suicide—Fiction.] I. Title.
PZ7.Q3185Fo 2013
[Fic]—dc23
2012031410
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
RRD‑C
Book design by Tracy Shaw
Printed in the United States of America
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