The Post that Killed
A short story.
There would be no deliveries. Tommy sits on the stoop with anticipation. He thought presents came in the mail randomly. Tommy was just a little boy. His mom knew there would be no deliveries, and she’s drunk. She is just a woman and she is always drunk.
If she posts it, somebody might see and kill somebody or themselves, perhaps both. Her father’s lost it again. She wants to post on the everything app “If you think you’re Jesus and reading this, the answer is: yes, you are.” She posts this and deletes it immediately. Tommy stands up and surveys the corner. She posts this again and screams. She posts a lot of things and deletes them many times. She pretends to be dead on her social media for attention, which is a paradox, replying from the other side.
She is inside, like she always is. Looking at her phone, all she does; she drinks and looks at her phone. Tommy sits on the stoop, and he is so excited but he is always queasy and leaning sideways. Presents were never had and there certainly would be no deliveries of presents. She drinks more gin at the kitchen table as Tommy refills his fists with Koolaid squeeze drinks, plastic tubes with Koolaid in them. Tommy is just a little boy and he is a nervous child, so far. He’s always upset to his stomach, which his mother lines with cereal and macaroni, 2% milk. They sometimes buy festive cheeses. This mother who stays inside is called Ruth and her Tommy tells strangers on the street this. They live in Brooklyn in a neighborhood with many houses that all look the same inside out. It is a safe neighborhood but many people walk by and most of those are strangers, though some are daily visits. Tommy receives his guests daily with glee, stammering in his speech but aware, is not a fool not from the block. He’s from the neighborhood, though his mother really only knew the bodega guy, one lady at the grocery and the liquor store guy, who didn’t speak English, but they knew each other existed. This was all in Brooklyn. Sam hadn’t been back for a month. They live on the top floor and a family of eleven lives beneath them. It is just Ruth and Tommy, a woman and her child.
Sam works in Canada.
Tommy meets many people and they all know his mother is named Ruth.
“Ruth, that’s my mom’s name.” Ruth has no idea. She’d scream if she knew. Tommy has his ways and secrets but he is just a little lost boy on the stoop.
“I’m lost, but I can find the way.” He tells the mailman this.
“Got a package for ya,” the mailman jokes. The mailman knows that Tommy waits for deliveries that will never come.
“Is it addressed top Ruth Phearson? P-H-E-—”
The mailman interrupts, doesn’t have time for this. Some people on the next street look at him. He looks back. “I’m tryin’ see something.” Tommy has no idea what that means. He pets the pitbull mix that stops by frequently for pats and hugs, lap time with Tommy.
The phone rings and Ruth answers yes. Yes yes, she understands. Lithium, he had stopped taking the lithium. Ruth took lithium and drank copious amounts of alcohol, so much that she always had a cold and what felt to be a low-grade fever even if she were a perfect 98.6.
She feels off, she feels sick. Dad’s lost it again, she sighs. Can she come down to Mississippi to help?
Her phone vibrates against her face. The everything app is tapping her. Tommy has decided to pretend he has been abducted, and so he walks to the local park. It has a view of downtown Manhattan and Tommy loves this view, feels like he’s a significant person working on important things, though he is only a child who cannot read. Tommy has pretended to be abducted before—twice, a long time ago. He does this for attention. He wants his mother to understand that he is ready for the street, is from the streets. There’s Ruth’s kid, they say to each other as they pass.
Somebody has given Ruth some attention and she puts her mother on speaker phone, who is yelling hysterically in the psych ward at a hospital in Amory, Mississippi. The everything app tells her that somebody has reposted her post.
“YAHWEH HEHUSHUA MOSSHICACH I AM THE LORD,” somebody has said. They say this and it’s stacked atop Ruth’s original post: “If you think you’re Jesus and reading this, the answer is: yes, you are.” They’ve made the repost an ad and millions see this interaction.
A man in Texas murders his mama.
A woman in Florida goes missing.
Ruth is arrested for terrorism. Sam flies home. She’s let go with a warning.