Bill immediately lay down and let the chick nestle in his chest hair.
Of course, the chick imprinted on him and followed him around like a dog. “Chicken Girl” is what he and Bonnie named it, and Chicken Girl was the perfect pet for the perfect lives of this perfect couple in their perfect house.
Chicken Girl quickly grew and learned to go in and out of the house through the doggie door, and Chicken Girl would fly up to your hand and gently take a bite of meat when proffered, and, as Bill watched with rapt fascination, she would lay eggs inside the house on the kitchen counter. Chicken Girl would even let the real dog, Bonnie’s dog, Myrtle the spaniel, carry her around in its slobbery dog mouth. Yes, everyone and everything was smitten by Chicken Girl
And, finally, when Chicken Girl was old enough, Bill and Bonnie went back to the Chicken Lady for another egg—a rooster— which was similarly incubated and hatched by the perfect couple in their perfect house. Tellingly, the rooster never acquired a name, but he did do his duty, and soon Chicken Girl’s eggs were hatching with dozens of Chicken Girlettes, all of which she would lead around the house and yard, following Chicken Dad Bill. Yes, the rooster may have been the biological father, but he was treated as a nameless, spiritual zero, and this finally led to a confrontation.
The rooster spurred Bill.
And Bill tossed the rooster clear across the yard.
Shaken, the rooster steered clear of Bill after that, but he did fly at Bonnie whenever he had the opportunity, so the perfect couple gave this not-so-perfect rooster away to friends.
And life at the perfect house became perfect again.
Until Bill and Bonnie came back from a camping trip and found Chicken Girl gone.
Of course, there was the remote possibility that she’d just up and flown the coop, angry at Bill and Bonnie’s absence, but the profile said that either a possum or a ground squirrel was to blame, and both had lately been seen acting fat, full, and sassy in the immediate vicinity.
So Bill was out there waiting when the killer came back for another meal.
It was the possum, and it was making a beeline for the hen house, intent on easy pickings.
What it got for its trouble was the blade of Bill’s ax. By the time Bill was done, there were too many possum pieces to count.
And then, a few nights later the ground squirrel made its move, foolishly thinking that the turf was fair game since the possum had abandoned it.
Bill took a shotgun to the ground squirrel, liquefying it.
“Those’re the only things that I’ve ever killed… that I can think of,” said Bill Suff to me.
Think again, Bill and look at the photos of Tina Leal. With all sincere respect to the living person whom I never met, the corpse, as dressed up and posed, looks like a chicken. A costumed, cartoon chicken. No question. It’s “Big Bird”, it’s “Foghorn Leghorn”, it’s “Rhode Island Red” from Bill’s own drawings. Bill was big on drawing birds—the blue and purple clothes on Tina Leal match the colors in Bill’s drawings of blue jays. The long, thin, “bird” legs with the stripes all the way up, thanks to the socks. And Tina’s arms are inside the T-shirt because chickens don’t have arms, they have wings—Tina’s arms are placed inside the shirt so that they bulge up like a chicken’s breast and wings. Tina’s small, angular face with the tiny beak nose—did she look like a chicken to him in the first place, so that he knew he’d be obligated to complete her transformation?
Think I’m mad, or just worried that I can see things through Bill’s eyes?
But now even you know why the lightbulb is there, don’t you? Bill had seen Chicken Girl lay egg after egg, and it was always both miracle and mystery. How come the damn things don’t break? How can such a big thing grow inside that tiny chicken and then get squeezed out of that tiny hole?
Ain’t life grand.
We’ll never know for sure why Tina Leal got “the chicken treat-ment” any more than we know why any artist suddenly gets one image in his head instead of myriad others. The magic of the creative process is that you begin with infinite choices, and yet you are able to choose. The only difference between the non-artist and the artist is that the former can’t make a choice, doesn’t see one choice because too many of them run together into a vision whiteout.
The day Tina Leal died, Bill Suff had his beloved but tragically lost Chicken Girl on his mind—in his killing kit the “egg” and the chicken clothes were waiting for their moment—and so what he inflicted on Tina was the one thing he had to do above all others.
Oh, and the “egg”—the lightbulb—it didn’t break.
Damnedest thing.
15
“I Shouldn’t Exist But I Do”
The Letters of Bill Suff
Brian,
This is the ‘Near Death Episode’ paper I wrote just after my arrest. You’ll probably need some explanations as to certain names or incidents mentioned in the paper. So, I’ll do that here. I’ve told you about Dijianet’s death, my Aunt Judy’s death and Cathy Sharp’s death. Earl’s death, you can probably learn more from Mom or Don than you can from me. But one thing they don’t know about, is something that happened before Dad died. Cheryl and I were at the hospital and he was supposed to be in a coma. Cheryl was about seven or eight months pregnant then; she was standing beside me and I was holding his left hand. Granted, his eyes were shut, but I believe that I still was able to reach him on some conscious, or subconscious, level. Tears were in my eyes and I was telling him that he couldn’t die before the baby was born (we didn’t know the sex beforehand). Asking him to please hold on until after Cheryl gave birth, I felt him definitely squeeze my hand in reply. From that squeeze, I got the message that he would see the baby, regardless. And yes, I believe that happened… that he did see Bridgette when she was born.
Now as to other things and names mentioned:
A Bugler in the Air Force:
When I was assigned to the hospital at Carswell AFB in Fort Worth, my commander found out from my records that I played the bugle (trumpet). I was given a choice: Have ‘Grounds Duty’ or ‘Funeral Detail.’ Grounds Duty consisted of one week every three months of mowing the grass or trimming the shrubs on the hospital grounds. In retrospect, Grounds Duty would have been an easier duty. Most of the enlisted personnel only served on Funeral Detaiclass="underline" once every ten to fifteen funerals. Because there were only three buglers, I caught every third funeral and every third week I caught either the weeklong reveille or evening taps. Needless to say, between that and my regular ward medical duties, I didn’t have a lot of free time to spend with Teryl.
As to ‘Nita Severson and her ex-husband:
I worked as a typist for Nita for about two months after working for the Schartons and before going to work for John’s Service Center. One day, when I got to her home for work, she told me to forget work that day and to drive her over to her ex-husband’s home to talk to his widow. She asked if I would accompany her to the funeral. I guess it was because she considered me such a good friend. Bonnie came with me and Nita was little upset because she wasn’t really invited.
As to Jesse Brown:
Jesse Brown was the supervisor of the Supply Services warehouse when I went to work for the county. When he died, we almost shut down the warehouse for the afternoon so we could go to his funeral. Bonnie was not present for that one.