Aaron Jeffrey Kincaid had only met one true psychopath in his life.
As a teenager, Aaron had spent four months in a state-run group home for adolescents in southern Mississippi. The state didn’t call them orphanages anymore. Of course not. Much too negative-sounding. Instead, it was a “group home.” As if calling a place like that a “home” would turn it into one. As if anything could do that.
Of course, the idea was still the same-children who’d lost their parents and were no longer cute and cuddly little babies whom couples might actually want to adopt get to live together until “they’re old enough to move out and become a burden on society.” At least that’s how the staff at the group home used to put it when they thought the children were out of earshot.
It was their idea of a joke.
So that’s where Aaron Jeffrey Kincaid met the psychopath-during his stay at the Oak Island Group Home in La Cruxis, Mississippi.
Sevren was a gray, cold pool with deep currents. On his first day there, he ran into Lucas, an ape-like high school senior nearly six years older than him, in the hallway. Lucas bullied all the other kids and they all hated him, but none of them dared cross him.
The two students stood staring at each other, neither moving. Neither flinching.
“Out of my way,” said Lucas, glaring at the newcomer.
Sevren just eyed him. Expressionless. Impassive. Unmoving.
“I said, step aside,” growled Lucas, moving closer.
He pushed Sevren against the wall and smacked him hard in the gut. As Sevren gasped for breath, Lucas leaned close. “I heard about your mama, little boy. What she did for a living. She deserved to get cut.”
And then, something happened. Something snapped in the wiry little boy who had just arrived. As quick as an asp he grabbed the older boy’s throat and squeezed. Lucas beat on Sevren with his massive fists, but it had no effect. It took five other kids to pull Sevren off, and Lucas spent the next four months in the hospital trying to learn how to swallow again.
Of course, the other kids were glad Lucas was out of the picture. So when the administration asked about the fight, they just told them Sevren was acting in self-defense, which was mostly true. And instead of being sent to juvenile prison he was allowed to stay at the home.
Sevren became a coiled serpent, always watching, always evaluating, always calculating. But what impressed Aaron the most wasn’t his roommate’s physical strength but his ability to manipulate people, to control them. In fact, he was almost as good at it as Aaron Jeffrey Kincaid was.
Almost as good, in fact, as Father.
But of course, that’s not what makes a person a psychopath, just having the ability to manipulate others. If it were, someone might actually consider Aaron Jeffrey Kincaid a psychopath. But no, persuasion, admirable though it is, isn’t enough. To be a psychopath you need to lack empathy. You need to have a complete disregard for what other people are feeling or experiencing.
Even now, Kincaid remembered watching CNN when Gary Ridgeway, the Green River Killer, was captured back in 2001 after a nineteen-year killing spree in the northwest. After he was finally convicted of killing forty-eight women (and claimed to have killed forty-one more), the investigators asked him what made him different from other people, and he summed it all up in three simple words: “That caring thing.”
Psychopaths lack that caring thing. They act on impulse, don’t feel guilt, don’t respond emotionally the way the rest of the world does, and have an insatiable need for power and control. Some don’t feel fear. Some can’t find sexual fulfillment unless their partner is in pain, or dying, or dead. Usually it’s the agony of others that brings psychopaths the most pleasure.
So that was Sevren. No conscience. No guilt. No fears. No regrets.
They say psychopaths begin exhibiting signs of their pathology at age fifteen.
Sevren was an early bloomer.
One day after school, Aaron had snuck behind the group home’s south wing to grab a smoke out of sight of the host family’s window. It was April in Mississippi. Hot and steamy. Humidity you could taste.
Just after lighting up, he heard sounds in the nearby woods. Screeches. High-pitched, primal, something other than human.
The noises were coming from a clearing up ahead. Aaron knew the place. The teens would meet there sometimes late at night to drink or smoke pot around a bonfire.
He heard the sound again. What was that?
And then, laughter. Quiet and calm. And a cold voice oozing through the trees. “You like that, don’t you?”
Aaron saw a flicker of movement in the meadow and stepped quietly onto the path.
Another cry, this time sharper. Definitely not human. Some kind of animal.
What was going on?
He had to see.
But then the screech was cut off abruptly, swallowed by a burst of strange, moist, gurgling sounds. “There, now. That’s better,” said the voice.
Aaron edged forward and peered through the underbrush. He was close enough now to see a figure kneeling, working at something with his hands, humming. Whatever he had on the ground in front of him lay hidden from view.
Aaron took another step closer. Who was that? Only his back was visible.
Maybe it was the movement, visible out of the corner of his eye, or the soft sound of footsteps on the forest floor, but the figure stopped what he was doing. Froze. So did Aaron.
Time crashed to a halt. To Aaron the moment smelled like spring rain and flowers and earth and blood, and then the person in the meadow turned his head slowly and rose in one smooth, serpentine motion. Aaron recognized him right away.
“Hello, Aaron.” Sevren was holding a pocketknife smeared with dark blood. More blood dripped from his hands and forearms down onto the leafy forest floor.
Aaron let his eyes follow the descent of the drops of blood. And that’s when he saw what his roommate had done to the cat. Somehow the poor creature was still alive. It flopped what was left of its head back and forth feebly, finally facing Aaron. Tried to look at him. Had no eyes left to do it.
“What are you doing, Sevren?”
“A little experiment.” Sevren cocked his head slightly and shook out his fingers, splattering warm blood onto the young leaves. “You won’t tell, will you?”
For a moment, just a moment, Aaron thought of running. Somewhere deep beneath the gurgles of the dying cat he could hear the sounds of the jungle and the screams and pleading prayers of the dying children. And the babies crying in the dark.
Somewhere beneath the sounds.
The dream called to him. He thought of running from Sevren, from this meadow, from everything, escaping like he had when he was ten, running and running and running forever, but this time he stood still. Something kept him there, drew his eyes toward the gruesome scene.
Sevren’s voice turned dark. “If you tell, Aaron, I might have to explain what happened to Jessica. What really happened.”
The words slammed into him like a fist in his stomach, taking all the air out of his reply.
“What?” Aaron searched Sevren’s eyes. He couldn’t possibly know.
“Jes-si-ca.” Sevren said the word slowly, deliberately, savoring every letter. “What really happened to her.” Sevren grinned and drew the pocketknife across his wrist, not to cut the skin, only to demonstrate that he knew what Aaron Jeffrey Kincaid was certain no one could possibly know.
Sevren continued. “I saw your scar, there on your wrist, last week when you were changing clothes, and I remembered what happened to Jessica Rembrandt last month. It wasn’t too hard to piece together. At first I thought maybe you’d planned to die with her, and then at the last minute you chickened out and couldn’t go through with it. But.. . that’s not what happened, is it?” He paused, but not for long. It wasn’t really a question. “You talked her into it, didn’t you?” During the last few words, his voice, his posture, his tone had shifted from cool judgment to warm admiration. “You convinced her to do it.”
When Aaron didn’t reply, Sevren nodded. Shook some blood off his fingertips. “Yes. I thought so.”
Aaron couldn’t think of anything to say. He didn’t know if it was rage or fear or disgust that swarmed over his soul. “I loved her,” he said at last.
Sevren nodded. “Yes,” he said simply. “I know.” A pause. Then, he continued. “So I won’t tell if you won’t tell. We’ll have two little secrets between us: the girl and the cat.” He placed a bloody finger to his lips to signify their pact of silence. “Shh.”
Aaron scratched absently at the fresh scar on his wrist. He nodded. “I won’t tell.”
Sevren looked down at the writhing cat whose paws he’d tied down to four stakes. Then, he looked back at Aaron. “Cross your heart and hope to die?”
Aaron nodded.
Sevren pulled a yellow ribbon out of his pocket and turned back to the cat. Then he glanced back at Aaron. “You can stay if you want. It’s just now getting to the good part.”
And Aaron had stayed. Until it was over. And then a little longer even.
Long enough to listen to Sevren tell him about his mother.