Page 71 of Assassin Anonymous

And miles later, I stop in the shadow of a grocery store that’s closed for the night to catch my breath, and remember that small box she placed under the tree, still in my pocket. I take it out and tear it open.

When I discover the positive pregnancy test inside, I fall to my knees and yell into the cold asphalt until my lungs feel scraped raw and there’s nothing left for my body to give.

—

“Mark!”

Ibrahim is leaning over the counter at the front of the bodega, the maroon kufi on his head artfully askew, looking at me like I’m not wearing pants. I check to make sure that I am. Still in my flannel pajamas. Paired with a leather jacket and heavy-duty boots, it would look out of place anywhere else, but I’m in the West Village, so it flies.

“You good, bro?” he asks.

“Yeah, man, sorry.”

“You been drinking?”

I run the fingers of my left hand through the webbing of my right hand, my knuckles cut up and aching from where I broke Lucas’s teeth. “A little, yeah.”

“Get some Gatorade and take a few Advil before bed,” he says.

I turn my attention back to the freezer case, and the colorful pints of ice cream. All the delicious stuff I never get to eat. Cookies and cream. Brownie batter. Cannoli. There’s a cannoli ice cream now? I’m out of the loop. Given my digestive circumstances, this isn’t an area where I need to be well-versed.

I check my phone. Four missed calls. Two from Sara. Two from a number I don’t recognize. The police will be looking for me. Doesn’t matter. Sara didn’t like to sleep in beds other than her own, and I told her my apartment had a roach problem, so we always stayed at her place. The cops have my first name, a fake last name, and the most dangerous organization in the world covering my tracks.

They won’t find me because I’m not a person.

It wasn’t them I was running from, anyway. It was the reality of who and what I am.

A monster, driven by blood and money and adrenaline.

I was fooling myself that I was worthy of her. I wasn’t made for human things. And realizing that, what is there left to do?

George Bailey, I suddenly understand, lacked commitment.

I won’t make the same mistake.

I open the freezer case and take out a pint of cannoli ice cream. Then cookie dough, and a cherry vanilla. I end up with six pints in total. I’ll chase them with my SIG Sauer P365. Then the only person who has to worry about the mess is whoever finds the body. I’ll do it in the bathtub. It’ll be easier to clean. That seems like the kind thing to do.

It’s almost funny, how easy it sounds.

But maybe that’s because oblivion has been a constant companion.

A Pale Horse, and his name that sat on him was Death…

As long as I’m doing this, I may as well go full tilt, so I head for the shelves in the middle of the store, hunting for mac and cheese, the kind that comes with gooey cheese lava in the shiny pack. I remember having that when I was a kid. The one foster mom I actually liked, who went and got herself a boyfriend who wanted a “real” kid so she eventually sent me back, she would make it for me. I must have been seven or eight because the lactose intolerance developed when I was nine.

This is what I want. My last meal.

I’m going to eat all of this and enjoy these final moments of my stupid, cursed life.

It takes me a little searching to find—this isn’t an item I generally go for—but then that perfect orange and yellow box leaps out at me, and when I grab it off the shelf, a little ball of fur peeks out from behind the gap and says, “Meow.”

I jump back, dropping all the food I’m clutching in my arms.

“Hey, you found him,” Ibrahim says from somewhere up front.

The cat is just past the stage of kitten but still not full-grown. A dull orange, his fur matted, he stands at the edge of the shelf and meows at me like an excited toddler. I give him a scratch behind his little ear and he flops forward off the shelf to the ground, then scrambles to his feet and rubs against my legs.

All that dangerous air built up inside me releases as I laugh. “You little dumbass,” I tell him. I lean down and he leaps up, clinging to my chest, digging his nails into my leather jacket. I press him into the crook of my neck and have to stop myself from squeezing him too hard, like I can absorb the affection into my skin. I bring him to the front. “Does he have a name?”

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