I’ve never liked my cousin Jerry. When I was very young, my father died in an accident, and my mother was hard pressed to provide for us and raise me. We ended up moving into the same apartment complex as her sister. Whenever she had to work long hours, which was very frequent, my aunt and uncle would watch me, so I ended up spending much of my time in their apartment, along with their son, my cousin Jerry.
To say Jerry was a strange kid would be an understatement. He never spoke much, and most of the time he was around he would just stare at me with a wry smile. The only times he would interact with me is when he had something to show me, which would run the gamut from a spider whose legs he had plucked off to pornographic sites he discovered. I got nervous when he had something to show me, because I knew it would probably be disturbing and inappropriate, but being a kid, morbid curiosity would always get the better of me.
He wasn’t much better at the school we went to, and he would often get in trouble. Most of the kids knew to avoid him, especially from the grades below, many of whom he had terrorized on the playground. My aunt and uncle tried to punish and correct him, but to no real avail. Yell at him, take his things away, ground him, everything just seemed to run off him like water. He never cried, or showed really any other emotion than hints of pleasure and satisfaction whenever he would engage in one of his devious endeavors. Otherwise, he might as well have been a walking corpse.
Around the time I was 14, my mother had a major breakthrough in her career and started making much more money while having considerably more free time. Because of this, we ended up moving out of the city the apartment complex was in, a couple hours south.
After that I rarely saw Jerry, and I sort of forgot about him. However, I continued being close with my uncle, Arnold, and would frequently call him. He was the only real father figure I had growing up, and he and my aunt had taken great care of me when my mom and I were struggling.
Eventually I wound up becoming a locksmith and moving back into the city, where I’ve been for quite some time. About two months ago, my aunt sadly passed. By this point, my uncle had numerous health issues, and was bound to a wheelchair. Without my aunt to help take care, my uncle was going to have to move into a care facility.
Well, he would’ve, if Jerry hadn’t volunteered to take him in. When I first heard that, I was surprised. Last I had heard of Jerry, he had moved away straight out of high school and had minimal contact with my aunt and uncle. Even at my aunt’s funeral, all he did was sit in the back and leave promptly when it was over.
Apparently, he was working as a garage repairman about thirty minutes west of the city, and had managed to make a decent amount of money in various investments. He had gotten a small two-story house, and was willing to let Uncle Arnold move in with him.
I helped Arnold pack up his things, and offered to drive him out to Jerry’s, which he accepted. During the ride, he admitted that he knew Jerry was not a normal kid and that he could never really connect with him. He said he tried his best to raise up Jerry right but nothing ever quite clicked, and by the time Jerry moved out, they barely spoke to one another. He said he was hopeful that maybe Jerry had changed out in the world and that they could have a fresh start and build a new bond.
When we got to Jerry’s, I wheeled Arnold to the door. Jerry came out, with that same blank yet simultaneously intense look I remembered. The inside of his house was dim and bare from what I could see. He asked me to unload everything onto the lawn and said he would take care of it from there. I offered to help carry stuff in, but he was oddly insistent that he could get everything inside himself. He then said he was going to get Arnold set inside, and told him to say goodbye to me. After we had hugged, I watched Jerry wheel him to the basement door, where I could see a crude plywood ramp was built leading down the stairs.
After I had unloaded everything and left, I couldn’t shake a strange feeling that something was off. I knew it was going to be awkward no matter what, but the way Jerry seemed to be in a rush to get me to leave and not even inviting me in the house was more than just weird. I figured Jerry had something to hide, though what exactly that was I had few guesses.
When things really started to seem worrying, though, is when neither me or my mom could even get ahold of Arnold. His cell service was abruptly terminated, and if you called Jerry to ask to talk to Arnold, he would say Arnold was busy or didn’t feel like talking, and that’s if Jerry even answered at all. This was completely unlike Arnold. Even in his older age, he was almost always available to talk and was quite warm and understanding. It made no sense that abruptly he would cut off the rest of his family and isolate himself like that.
It didn’t take long for me to suspect Jerry was up to something sinister. I figured everything added up to some form of elder abuse. For him to suddenly offer to care for his dad whom he had practically no relationship with, and for Arnold to stop talking to my mom and I was too big of a coincidence, especially given his cruel tendencies growing up.
Talking with my mom, she had her concerns too, but thought there wasn’t much we could do about it. That didn’t sit right with me. All I had were suspicions, but I was convinced there was foul play.
Thinking it would be useless to go to police with unfounded claims, I took matters into my own hands. In my free time I began tracking Jerry, driving by his house and following him. I learned what days and times he left his house for work, to get groceries, and so on, building a schedule of when he was gone. I resolved that I was going to break in and check on Arnold. I knew it would be illegal and there could be some pretty serious repercussions if I was caught, but I just had to see that my uncle was okay. If he wasn’t, then I could get him out of there and we could figure things out from there.
So, about a month ago, I drove to Jerry’s house, and watched him leave for work. I quickly got going on his lock, having brought my own kit. I admittedly was nervous; there was the chance that either Jerry would come back earlier than expected, or a neighbor would see me picking his lock and call it in. Luckily, though, it didn’t take long for me to get the door unlocked, and I speedily slipped inside.
The house was cold and dark. From what I can tell, all the blinds were drawn. There was no decorations to speak of. No pictures, no artwork, no plants, nothing. Not even furniture, except for a few barebones items like a table and chair. It was honestly unsettling; who could live like this?
I walked towards the basement door, which hung slightly ajar. I flipped the light switch and began walking down the steps. It seemed like he had removed the plywood covering, which further confirmed in my head that foul play was going on. Why would he remove the ramp to where he was keeping Arnold?
After a few steps down, though, I was hit with a horrid stench. It was as if I had walked into a cloud of putrid miasma. I stopped for a second, nearly gagging. Then I was hit with a sense of urgency, knowing something now had to be terribly wrong.
I sped down the rest of the stairs, springing into the basement. It looked unfinished, with bare concrete and exposed pipes and all. The smell had gotten worse. There were all sorts of shelves and tools scattered about. There was one dull lightbulb above me, barely illuminating the rest of the room. “Arnold?” I yelled. No reply.
I noticed a table at the far end of the basement, and crept over to it. There was something large and heavy on it, and a pit of fear grew in my stomach. I edged closer and closer, until I realized it was a man, motionless.
I sprinted over to the side of the table, and as my eyes adjusted, I saw it was Arnold. I gasped in horror. He was utterly disfigured, covered in cuts and burns. His arms were amputated at the elbows. There were bits of metal and glass protruding from his chest and torso.
Backing away, I bumped into a shelf, toppling it over and falling with it. It was filled with all kinds of knives and scalpels and saws, which clattered on the ground in a loud cacophony. It was a miracle I didn’t get cut.
Looking up, I could see jars of fluid filled with various bits of flesh. Most of them seemed to be amorphous hunks of skin and muscle, but I thought I could make out an ear.
I got to my feet, my head spinning. I needed to contact the police immediately. I took another look at Arnold, and that’s when I noticed he was breathing, ever so slightly. He was still alive.
Whatever momentary relief that came with that realization was fleeting, as I understood that in some capacity he was aware of the agony being inflicted upon him. At that point, I don’t know if he was in some kind of shock or coma. I can only hope he was.
“I’m going to get you help Arnold!” I yelled, and turned around to make for the stairs. I nearly ran into the barrel of a pistol, pointed square at my head. Stunned, I threw my arms up and started backing away slowly.
“Could never keep your eyes away,” Jerry said. I was too scared to reply, my lips quivering. His lips curled into his signature grin.
“Really didn’t think I knew you would come?” he asked. “Never thought I didn’t notice your car, parked across the street every week, trailing me all over the neighborhood?”
He stared intently. “Jerry…” I sputtered. “L-let’s ju-“
“Let’s just take it easy,” he said in a cruel, mocking tone. “I’m not going to kill you right now. I wanted you to see this. Just like I always have. I took a risk, a big one. This project… I snagged the opportunity as it came, and it’s really payed off. Of course you could’ve tried to report something to the police, but somehow I had a feeling you would come yourself. Lucky I managed to keep him alive this long too, but what can I say, I’m an artist. Well, whaddya think?”
I said nothing, my throat dry and tight. I was drenched in sweat, my heart beating against my ribcage. I couldn’t think of what to do; I couldn’t think at all. He walked over to the wall, where a few gallons of gasoline laid, gun still leveled at me. He kneeled, down, unscrewing the caps, and began to pour them along the floor.
“Go”, he said. “Go call the police. You saw what I wanted you to see.”
I began shuffling towards the stairs as he continued to douse the basement in gasoline. As he emptied a can, he suddenly flung it at me, causing me to break into a panicked sprint for the stairs.
As soon as my foot hit the first step, there was a deafening bang, and I fell into the staircase. It felt like someone had hit the back of my calf with a bat. Adrenaline flooded my body, and I scrambled up the staircase as best as I could. Every time I tried to stand, I would fall again, so I flung myself forward basically on all fours.
I threw myself onto the main floor, and with all the strength and speed I could muster, made for the front door, which was wide open. I launched myself out of the house and onto his front lawn, sprawling out on my stomach. I quickly flipped around, pushing myself back, and withdrew my cell phone to call 911. I screamed for help repeatedly as my fingers fumbled over the screen. I kept my eyes glued on the house, expecting him to burst out any moment to finish the job. But he never did.
The next couple of hours are a jumbled mess of chaos in my memory. There were neighbors and police rushing to me. Jerry’s house went up in flames, with firefighters battling the inferno. I was pulled into an ambulance and rushed to a hospital.
The recovery process- physically and mentally- has been rough. I’ve had to explain multiple times my recounting of events, reliving the terror I felt while also admitting my break-in. My mother is a wreck, maybe even worse off than me. The procedures, legal and all, are still in proceedings.
While investigators could not be sure, they concluded it was likely both Arnold and Jerry perished in the fire. They could not find a trace of the bodies, but there was no evidence they found that Jerry had attempted an escape. Even if he had tried, they thought it likely that the blaze might’ve caught him right after he lit it, especially if he had gotten gasoline on his person.
I was willing to accept that. Whatever was so fucked up in his mind, it wasn’t an unreasonable leap that he burned himself with his “project”. I had no idea what twisted Jerry’s psyche into someone who was capable of this depravity, and honestly, I didn’t care, as long as he was dead too.
But he isn’t. You see, last night, I had a package delivered to my doorstep in the middle of the night. I found it in the morning, on my way to the grocery store.
The package was strange, just a box covered in paper, with my name written on it. A fear took hold of me as I slowly tore through it. My heart dropped when I saw the contents.
It had a polaroid of Jerry, standing in the field behind his burnt house. He was flashing that same smile. Below the picture, was a dozen or so tapes, completely unlabeled.
I have no idea what’s on those tapes. I’m sending them in to the police station. I don’t know if they are videos of he did to Arnold, or of him tracking me after, or what. I’m too scared to check for myself. I don’t know what the detectives will make of it.
All I know is that Jerry is still out in the world, and he knows where I live.