NOS4A2(53)

I just did, she thought. I had a nice little chat with the last kid Charlie Manx kidnapped. He’s some kind of cold vampire now, and he’s in Christmasland, and he wants something to eat.

“I think the talking is done,” she said, and took Lou’s hand when he offered it. “Maybe I’ll just paint instead.”





Sugarcreek, Pennsylvania


EARLY IN THE SUMMER OF 2001, THE NEWS REACHED BING PARTRIDGE that Charlie Manx was bad sick. Bing was fifty-three by then and had not put his gasmask on in five years.

Bing found out from an article on AOL, which he accessed using the big black Dell computer he had received from NorChemPharm for thirty years of service. He looked at AOL every day for news out of Colorado about Mr. Manx, but there had been nothing for ages until this: Charles Talent Manx III, age unknown, convicted murderer, suspect in dozens of child abductions, had been moved to the hospital wing of FCI Englewood when it proved impossible to wake him up.

Manx was examined by prominent Denver neurosurgeon Marc Sopher, who described his condition as one for the medical books.

“The patient appears to suffer from adult progeria or a rare form of Werner syndrome,” Sopher said. “In the simplest terms, he has begun to age very rapidly. A month is more like a year for him. A year is close to a decade. And this guy was no spring chicken to begin with.”

The doctor said there was no way to tell if Manx’s condition could partially explain the aberrant behavior that led to his brutal slaying of PFC Thomas Priest in 1996. He also declined to describe Charlie Manx’s current state as a coma.

“He doesn’t meet the strict definition [of coma]. His brain function is high—as if he’s dreaming. He just can’t wake up anymore. His body is too tired. He doesn’t have any gas left in the tank.”



Bing had often thought of writing Mr. Manx, to tell him he was still faithful, still loved him, would always love him, would be there to serve him until the day he died. But while Bing was maybe not the shiniest bulb on the Christmas tree—ha, ha—he was smart enough to know that Mr. Manx would be furious with him for writing, and correct to be. A letter from Bing would for sure lead to men in suits knocking on the door, men in sunglasses with guns in armpit holsters. Hello, Mr. Partridge, would you mind answering a few questions? How would you feel about us planting a shovel in your basement, digging around for a bit? So he had never written, and now it was too late, and the thought made him feel sick.

Mr. Manx had passed a message to Bing once, although by what means Bing didn’t know. A package had been dropped on the doorstep with no return address on it, two days after Mr. Manx was sentenced to life in Englewood. Inside were a pair of license plates—NOS4A2/KANSAS—and a little card on ivory laid stock, with a Christmas angel stamped into the front.

Bing had the license plates in the root cellar, where all the rest of his life with Charlie Manx was buried: the empty stolen tanks of sevoflurane, his daddy’s .45, and the remains of the women, the mothers that Bing had brought home with him after many a mission of salvation with Mr. Manx . . . nine missions in all.

Brad McCauley had been the ninth child they had saved for Christmasland, and his mother, Cynthia, the last whore Bing had dealt with in the quiet room downstairs. In a way she had been saved as well, before she died: Bing had taught her about love.

Bing and Mr. Manx had planned to save one more child in the summer of 1997, and that time Bing would go all the way to Christmasland with Mr. Manx, to live where no one grew old and unhappiness was against the law, where he could ride all the rides and drink all the cocoa and open Christmas gifts every morning. When he thought about the cosmic unfairness of it—of Mr. Manx being ripped away right before he could swing wide the gates of Christmasland to Bing at last—he felt smashed inside, as if hope were a vase that had been dropped from a height, crunch.

The worst of it, though, was not losing Mr. Manx or losing Christmasland. It was losing love. It was losing the mommies.

His last, Mrs. McCauley, had been the best. They had long talks in the basement together, Mrs. McCauley naked and tanned and fit, clasped against Bing’s side. She was forty but stringy with muscle that she had built up coaching girls’ volleyball. Her skin radiated heat and health. She stroked the graying hair on Bing’s chest and told him she loved him better than her mother or father, better than Jesus, better than her own son, better than kittens, better than sunshine. It felt good to hear her say it: “I love you, Bing Partridge. I love you so much it’s burning me. I’m all kindling inside. It’s burning me alive.” Her breath had been sweet with the smell of the gingerbread smoke; she was so fit, and so healthy, he had to dose her with his flavored sevoflurane mix once every three hours. She loved him so much she cut her own wrists when he told her they couldn’t live together. They made love one last time while she bled out—while she bled all over him.

“Does it hurt?” he asked.

“Oh, Bing, Bing, you silly thing,” she said. “I’ve been burning with love for days. A couple little cuts like these, they don’t hurt at all.”

She was so pretty—had such perfect mommy tits—he couldn’t bear to pour the lye on her until she began to smell. Even with flies in her hair, she was pretty; extra pretty, really. The bluebottles glittered like gems.

Bing had visited the Graveyard of What Might Be with Mr. Manx and knew that if Cynthia McCauley had been left to her own devices, she would’ve killed her son in a steroid-fueled rage. But down in his quiet room, Bing had taught her kindness and love and how to suck cock, so at least she ended her life on a good note.