Abducted Chapter Twenty: Batgirl, Batman, and Robin.
In which Brendan, Tabby, and Jeff find new hobbies.
Chapter Twenty: Batgirl, Batman, and Robin
If the kid says, “I am Batman,” one more time, I’m gonna leave him on the side of the road. I wouldn’t really, it’s just, goddamn it, how many times can you say that without getting tired of it? In the rearview mirror, Brenny’s head to toe in a fine black Versace suit, black socks, tie, gloves, and shoes. Over his head is a breathable nylon mask with eyelets for him to see and over his eyes is black grease paint. Only thing that gives him away are the glasses and his small stature. Not that he needs them, but attached to his hip is the pair of escrima Halcyon’s been training him with. He’s a kid so you can’t help but let him have his fun.
“I am Batman,” he says, trying to make his voice gruff.
I roll my eyes.
Not that Jeff and I aren’t armed too, what we’re doing may be a good thing, but honestly still dangerous if the first few times were any indication. Last I checked, our philanthropic efforts at the camp where we found Brendan were mostly positive. A number of them had put the money to good use, buying new clothes and shoes, and food, and got jobs, and cleaned up. Some’d bought cars and traveled. Others still gave the money to even less fortunate people. Broke my heart to hear some had continued staying homeless, not that a mere 10,000 could cure it, I know this, but it was the only leg up I could think of at the time. A few rented hotel rooms bought expensive drugs and OD’d.
There are consequences I’ll face in the afterlife, I’m sure, but for now I need to keep a level head. For me, for Brenny, for Jeff, and for Bradford’s memory. If it weren’t for the fact that I’m sick to my stomach, it’d be easier.
“Swear to me!” Kid echoes from behind me as he seems to prefer Christian Bale’s Batman to any other.
Jeff and I exchange a look, snort, and continue on.
Far from being retired, Halcyon and Layla have bought a house in town and the old butler’s insisted on keeping busy by continuing to be my feeler. My Alfred, I guess. Even built himself a Batcave like space in his garage with multiple screens and powerful computers scanning the net for the information we need, all this next to a Duesenberg he can barely drive cause his eyesight’s so bad. Notwithstanding this, Halcyon’s been training Brendan there like a little Robin. Hal can still perform splits and backflips and butterfly-kicks and is teaching Brendan to do the same. I figured once things had settled and I’d tended to his needs for the rest of his life, he’d simply stop being my old butler. Disturbing to know mother and father still have influence over Hal, but he can’t stop, and I don’t want to force him to.
All this to say, Brendan is Hal’s little protégé. Focused and determined, I’ve found him in Hal’s gym with Jeff doing hours of pommels and rings and flips on beams like as if he was training for the Olympics. His strength far exceeds his thin appearance as he performs handstand push-ups, puts his little fists through wooden boards, and aims to inevitably learn to surmount men the size of Jeff or bigger. To impress me our new little man bench pressed 180 lbs. like as if it was nothing. No genetic change had come over him like Jeff and I, however when you feed and care for someone’s every need they’ll flourish like house orchids.
Doing a horse stance in the back of the van, Brenny attempts to balance over each bump. Mostly successful, the boy’s got a knack for concentrating like another little man I once knew. The exception being he’s never been on any psychotropics. Won’t do that to him either. Taking pit of his stomach breaths, Brendan takes a step forward, removes the escrima from their sheath and guards his left, right, and front with exhalant grunts. Pirouetting, he blocks his face and knees from attack, stops and puts his finger to his mouth and thinks like he’s forgotten what comes next.
Rather than performing the roll thrust and three leg sweeps like he’s supposed to he says, “I am Batman,” then his voice returning to normal, he says, “but we’re not really like Batman and Robin though are we? I mean, we’re giving money away and not fighting crime.”
Jeff and I are dressed much the same as Brendan with the exception we don’t have our masks on yet and were wearing black fedoras and we’re armed with two desert eagle 45’s. While our getups are convoluted, the point is obviously we don’t want people knowing our identities cause then they’d come right to the door and line up hat in hand. Along with Jeff’s learning he couldn’t just liquidate his wealth and give it away, there’s the problem of economic destruction. Were we to redistribute it evenly across the US, the amount of personal holdings would drive up the cost of nearly everything, drive down the value of labor, and create chaos in the world markets. So, no, the old adage that Bruce Wayne giving away all his money in one fell swoop wouldn’t cure all that ails Gotham. It would destroy it. Bruce Wayne only had about 10 billion. Imagine what would happen we’re we to capsize this already leaking titanic.
To Brenny, I say, “in a way we are though. Think about the implications of giving someone a small windfall. Generally, the poor can’t save money because of the immediacy of their needs. Whereas the wealthy can turn money into more money or just spend it on useless gifts. Giving someone a quarter of the average yearly income presents the sudden opportunity to do good for themselves that prevents them from otherwise committing crimes.”
Brenny says, “oh,” then, “I AM Batman!”
Today’s road-trip is a bit of a hike. Leaving Massachusetts in a black Mercedes sprinter with tinted bulletproof windows, we’re headed to a homeless encampment in NYC. Next to Brenny, on the floor of the van, are two 30-gallon garbage bags filled with about 10 million dollars. We’re to give each person 10,000 like the last time in the hopes they’ll help themselves. Not unprepared, we’ve already sent a few other feelers to the area to inspect its layout, secretively film the inhabitants, and tease out the general attitude of the place. Mostly tents and cardboard boxes with families and loners and prostitutes and addicts, there are very few agitators, criminals, sex offenders, and such, but we’re as ready as we’re ever going to be.
Dropping and doing 50 pushups, Brendan’s out of breath already. Can’t fight his asthma except with an albuterol inhaler, which he removes from his pocket, lifts his mask and huffs heartily four times, then puts away. Uncomfortably he shifts the suit aside to scratch himself down there, says, “I have to pee.”
Sigh.
If you’re asking yourself why we’re bringing him along the reasons are twofold. First is that Brenny’s become obsessed with the restroom shitter to the point he can’t sleep. We’d given him only one job to do aside from being an active normal kid, and it’s become an obsession. Lately he’s given to sitting inside the front-end restroom on a stool staring down each customer with suspicion and grimace. Following each with his peeled eyes, even those customers who actually needed to take a giant shit, he watches carefully until they uncomfortably shut the stall door against his gaze. Still on the wall opposite the mirrors, is the unremovable stain from the shitters’ finger that reads, “we need the low to remind us of our station. We need the high to have a goal never to be reached. Stay where you are -Q .” Perhaps Brenny doesn’t understand how ominous it looks, him sitting under that quote staring down patrons and customers. But it’s enough people will quiet their gastric anomalies, or merely go to the other restroom, manned by Luiz, or Yuri, or Jo-jo. It’s been weeks since they last struck and I’m given to think it was just a prank at this point, but still our little man sits there, the escrima at his hip, unencumbered by starers ready to jump the moment a patron can’t control their shit cannon.
Pulling over off 95 at a rest stop, Jeff walks Brenny to the lonely highway bathroom where they can pee. It’ll be a while. In the meantime I give my still-startling face a look over in the front facing camera of my phone. Like a dove, the unusual creaminess of my skin strikes my eyes and I turn away. I don’t even want to get used to it. Ever.
The second reason is, Brenny can’t be left alone. Other than his routine of work, training with Halcyon, and collecting rocks, he’s been doing something that while Jeff and I find disagreeable is honestly good-natured. His vigilantism goes beyond even our thinking as he patrols Grindr and other hookup apps posing as a lonely old man looking for a young boys’ comfort. Strangely, he gets the inverse effect of what you’d think. While there are those other actual old men looking for the same, Brenny blocks them, and ferrets out other young boys. After long conversations with these, he’ll reveal himself to be fifteen. Paradoxically, the others will do the same; revealing they are also an underage boy looking for dangerous hookups. This weirdly simple plan Brenny’s developed causes the other boys to confess to him their darkest desires, wherein its revealed their unsatisfying home lives are enough they use online hookups as a form of stress relief. Some of them aren’t even gay or even interested in older men. However, just the idea of messing with someone’s head or getting attention from an adult makes them feel wanted, needed, and desired.
“Originally, I wanted to catch older men in the act. Thing is I know them,” he’d explained, “That doesn’t stop them from doing what they’re doing- you’ve seen it on TV. The root cause of their problems is something the US healthcare system and prison system can’t handle or fix.” He says, “so I go to the source I understand better.”
Brendan’s otherworldly childhood experiences have matured him in ways these other boys can’t comprehend. In most cases they talk to him until they’ve burned out their desire for danger and dopamine highs. He refuses to exchange nudes, and instead sends his face as proof they can feel comfortable talking to him without penalization. Couldn’t believe it when I read these long winded conversations that when he got to the bottom of their distress revealed hundreds of young men in the area willing to put themselves in danger because they feel the world is ending soon. They catastrophize and give in to their inherently immature wants as a coping mechanism for climate change, the threat of WWIII, parental abuse, economic destruction, and the overwhelming feeling that there’s nothing they can do about it.
Our Brenny, with his brilliant if misguided attempts at saving the world has found himself at the hub of a network of young men who otherwise have no outlet for their needs. Even he’s set up a Discord called Hope Club to send them to where they can chat with the and others about this. A group of wayward and desperate teenagers who’d otherwise be out there getting brutalized for the fun of it.
In this Discord, he moderates their exchanges, and keeps their heads level about the dangers out there. Dangers of what he’s seen and what he’s done. Tells them the truth about what it’s like to find yourself tied up for three days in someone’s closet to only escape by the skin of your teeth. To have a stomach that painfully grumbles for a few drops of water only to have it be met with a glass of urine, that he’d accept out of desperation. This in turn has the effect of fending the others off from nefarious online activities. Even he’d played matchmaker putting together couples and thruples.
Jeff and I were utterly, heartbreakingly impressed with our boy’s tenderness and sweetness in the face of so many in need of emotional comfort.
Sigh… But.
It didn’t stop there. It’s kind of how we found out about all of it. A few weeks back, Jeff and I’d come home from dinner to a house party. Not the kind where teenagers run amuck doing keg stands and fall dead drunk on some unsuspecting neighbor’s lawn, but another kind I’ll never forget. When our Brenny, even after long conversation, or repeated counseling sessions, couldn’t convince these boys of their worth, as they were overweight, or malodorous, or believed to be unlikable, he’d set up a weekly meeting in which as he’d explained later, “I let them lose their virginity to me so that’s out of the way,” then, “you’d be surprised. Just being touched in a sexual way for the first time clears their heads.” He adds, “getting to have me is like a breath of fresh air cause I’m so adorable.”
He says, “runaway averted, school shooting averted, etc.”
Eye-rolling at him on the couch in his bathrobe after we’d sent the others home, neither Jeff nor I could be angry with him. It’s the most altruistic thing I’d ever heard in my life. Even better than throwing stacks of money away into crowds or paying off an old lady’s Walmart bill.
“I’m doing good for them by letting them have me, and of course, I’m still a teenage boy, and I need some comforts.” He adds, “and it’s not like you guys are going to help me.”
Still. Still after all of our efforts Brenny wants us to take advantage of him. Not only that but he believes it’s okay for us to do so. His own counseling sessions are marred by his avoidance of talking about sharp subjects like his parents and such. Still haven’t gotten to the bottom of everything even with all our feelers out there. Doesn’t help that Brenny’s dishonesty about where he’s really come from dampens our searches. Even had his blood sent off to be compared to any known matches. Nothing came back. An anomaly. Even missing child services says nothing about him and if no one wants our sweet, sweet, damaged boy, we’ll take him. Who’s gonna say no? Not that us taking him in was in question.
Inside the rest-stop bathroom Brenny and Jeff are taking their sweet assed time. Not that we’re on any sort of schedule but the drive there and back again will be tiring so it’s best to get a move on. I suspect the extended pee time has to do with Brenny’s burning urinations. Started last week and now he screams and squeals when he needs to piss. Cried the other day aside the toilet. The infections worked its way up into his kidneys causing severe backpain and fire breathing urine.
He’d let himself be used to save the others from what he called certain doom. After their group coital therapy, in the motionless clear-headed space where they all laid together, he gave them his philosophy. The night we’d found them all wrapped together in a pig pile on his floor, I’d listened next to the open door, stopping Jeff from entering. Over the ambient music and cries of exhalation, he’d said, “If you go too far down the rabbit hole of self-hatred and self-loathing, you’ll find yourself blaming your personal failures on things you can’t change rather than what you can change. That way you never have to take responsibility for any of your own shortcomings.”
Passing a joint between them, they listened with rapt attention to their king every so often asking him questions or prodding for further meaning. He’d said, “sorry about your small penises, and short statures, bad genetics, and all of that, but here’s the thing; you can’t change that.” There was a long dramatic pause, and he said, “But you can keep clean, lose weight, study hard, get a good job, and develop your personality with me and the others here, with the understanding that you can’t always have what you want out of life.”
Aside the door Jeff held me close as I wept silently in his bosom, and I could feel he felt the same. Our poor boy is so destroyed instead of helping himself he wants to save others. He IS Batman to these boys in a twisted way.
To all of them, he’d said, “I like you all just the way you are and want you to love yourselves. Bring me your fat, your skinny, tall, short, small dicked, stretch marked, abused, wounded, socially inept, slovenly, and your blue-hairs, and non-genders, and trans-boys, and gays, and I’ll make you all the happiest you’ve ever been. I’ll show you that you have value, and you’ll see that value in each other.”
It wouldn’t be so bad if he’d used protection, but he didn’t, thinking the closeness of the interaction would help all of them bond. Problem is they’ve all fallen in love with him. Others still are obsessed with him. Coming to our door with roses and gifts and confessions of desire, and hopelessness, they fall to their knees and plead utter devotion to him like a cult of personality.
“Love each other, as I have loved you,” he’d said.
Halcyon’s lessons encompass both the Bible and US history and with the dulcet plagiarized words he’d wooed them and got the clap. Thankfully he’s negative on everything else.
Our boy doesn’t understand the effect of what he’s doing to them. Or maybe he does. Either way, being suddenly told you’re right about everything is a shock to the system that reboots all other worldly and parental teachings. He’s charismatic beyond even Paul Atreides.
“No,” he’d said to them, “school isn’t to help you find yourself. It’s to create subordinate workers who won’t question their bosses,” he asked, “and who are the bosses?”
There were shouts of, the rich kids, and, the bullies.
Our little man says, “yes, yes, now you’re getting the picture,” he says, “and even the teachers and parents are so programmed and subservient they allow your bullying to continue, and sometimes bully you themselves, not because they don’t care, but because they know change is difficult and they don’t think they have the power to do it,” he asks, “who does?”
One shouted, “desperate groups of people banded together with a common goal.”
He’d said, “beautiful.”
Sitting on our sofa, staring down the satisfied Brenny, we didn’t know what to ask- say. Were we to blame, Jeff and I? Was I to blame? I feared I’d failed. Again. All other efforts, our charity, our philanthropy, could fail and I wouldn’t lose any sleep, but this.
Jeff’d asked, “where are you getting these ideas from?”
He’d said, “Halcyon, the library, and you guys,” a second later, he hesitantly said, “and Fight Club.”
Jeff and I, we looked to each other, then into our laps. Then as if the same thought occurred to us we laugh and look to each other and kiss and separate. Baffled, Brenny cringed back into the love seat, then his look of fear melts into disdain and anger as we continue to laugh.
I said, “honey, don’t be upset. Don’t be. I need to ask, you do understand that that book isn’t meant as a guidebook for revolution. It’s just a story- a good one I might add,” I say putting up a finger, then, “don’t go thinking I don’t like it. But Tyler isn’t someone you actually want to follow into the fray-.”
He interjected, “I’m not trying reach rock bottom, or blow up buildings,” this he says, giving me the side-eye, “I’m just trying to help them by getting to the root of their problem.”
I’d asked, “and what’s that?”
Brenny said, this time rolling his eyes at us, “they’re boys, that’s their problem.” Jeff and I confusedly shared a look, then look back to Brenny. He says, “everything about them is rigidly defined to the point if one of them flutters their hand the wrong way, or wears something frilly, or lisps, they’re ostracized and bullied into submitting to a social order.”
It was my turn to interject, I’d said, “it’s not that way anymore. Schools have anti-bullying campaigns. Gays are accepted now. The world is getting better little by little, dear-.”
I’d stopped cause Brenny was laughing now and looking into his lap.
He’d said, “tell that to my friends,” and pointed to his empty bedroom, “on the surface those campaigns of acceptance are a front to cover the school’s asses, but they don’t actually do anything about it. Suspensions, talking’s too, and discipline only stiffen the bully’s resolve to find other ways to bully. Online there is no justice, Tabby. None. In turn those bully’s find the respective opposite of what I’m doing; they find adults willing to shore up their belief in their right to be at the top of the food chain. In many ways, the public acceptance of minority strangeness, say legalization of gay marriage and trans rights are the catalyst that created spaces like the alt-right and new Nazi movements. And in any case the front of acceptance is merely to make us dance. Those boys that were here, they’ve been made to perform their strangeness like a stage play. There are no real safe spaces anymore as they’ve all been invaded by the heteronormative asking to have their hair done, or for us to do drag, or be their emotional tampons, sucking up what the world can’t fix.”
I’d stood up and paced the room. Our boy was too smart for his own good. And awfully correct. Jeff too had stood and paced the opposite direction. I thought about my beautiful brother and his conditioning, and Gabriel’s conditioning. The two star crossed lovers whose mornings would never meet. I’m stricken with the strangeness of how real Brenny’s brain is. Hasn’t even had a chance to be a child and already he’s championing armies of other young men to fight back against the social order through the influence of sex. Our boy’s got himself a little haram.
Brenny continued, “when a boy wakes up and realizes he’s gay he’s immediately deemed a creature of sexual nature only. In some ways it’s true in that our desires for other boys and men are hypermasculine. I aim to resolve the conflict within them by giving them what they want. The cutest boy telling them they’re loved, desirable, needed, wanted, beautiful and most of all tough, flexible, and can endure the worst of circumstances. Oh, how it must rankle the worst of bullies when one of my boys faces them head on with a smile and keeps on moving through a fist. Nothing can hurt them after they’ve had me, talked to me. I am their armor through the best and worst of times. My words dampen the taunts and teases and-.”
“Brenny!” It was the first time I’d ever yelled at him. I’d stopped pacing, taken a breath, said, “you’re not considering the negative impact of what you’re doing. It’s dangerous.” In that moment I’d never felt more like a parent. I’d said, “you’re making them fall in love with you. Worship you.”
He snorted again asked, “you think that’s the worst thing that can happen?” Without waiting for us to answer he stood, his chest puffed out, said, “the worst things that can happen to a boy have already happened to me.” Pointing to his chest he said, “I’m not even a kid anymore, there’s barely anything left of me. I’m already a whore, a cumdump, a used up receptacle, and if giving myself to a thousand boys to help them over the hurdle of high school is what it takes then that’s what I’ll do.”
Jeff and I stared long into his eyes expecting a tearful breakdown, but here’s the thing, it didn’t happen. He was stoic. Even the cuts and strikes of his own painful words couldn’t break him down. Perhaps he’s right, and he’s no longer a child. Punishing him wouldn’t do anything but reenforce his ideas, but we couldn’t let him go on like this.
And so, he’s there in the rest stop bathroom peeing fire while Jeff rubs his pained back and tells him he’ll be alright. We can’t police Brenny’s internet use or reading. Can’t make him check in with us at all hours of the day and night. Can’t have him update us on his thinking he’ll just there for hours staring at us blankly. All those things, like his army, would only reenforce his desire for destruction. Our boy’s a mess and I can’t put my finger on how to help. Even Halcyon, who’s been the closest thing to a father to Brandon and I’d ever had, is out of ideas.
What do you give to the boy who’s lost everything?
Standing on the edge of the wooded park and rest area a few families at picnic tables take breaks from long rides. Cracking the window, I light a cigarette, and take a few drags. Last time it took Brenny nearly a half hour to empty out. Quacking, clacking the families talk about soccer games and first dates and other such nonsense while I’m worried about my kid’s fiery pee hole and plans to dominate the world of throwaways. Couldn’t find a more fucked up family if you tried.