Le hated cleaning an iron skillet. But he paused when he noticed Squirrel return with an odd look on his face, as if he were completely stumped. An arrow of realization hit when Lee considered how long the kid had been on the streets. "Two knobs, Squirrel. Hot and cold, like a sink. Find a temperature you like and lift up the plunger on the spout's top." He sighed, ready to just throw the stupid thing in the trash and buy a nonstick.

The boy blushed and nodded, returning to the bathroom and finding the appropiate knobs. He turned the hot halfway around and turned the cold until it was the perfect temperature for him. Discarding the towel, he jumped into the shower and let the water cleanse his dirty skin. He used the soap to scrub of the more stubborn dirt and found the shampoo he needed to wash his hair with. It took him awhile, as a lot of the grime had caked into his hair. After it was finally clean, he put some conditioner in to loosen the tangles.
As he turned off the water and hopped out of the shower, he caught sight of his body in the mirror hanging on the wall. He saw the ugly bruises on his skin and the peeling skin where lying on the sidewalk had given him nasty burns. He looked at his face. It had been a long time since he had last seen it and he was shocked to see how much it had changed. It was no long the face of a innocent child, but that of a pubescent boy with a rough look about him. He dried his hair, and studied the colour. It was no longer brown and green with filth, but sandy-blonde and it was shoulder-length.
He dried off the rest of his slim body and wrapped the towel around his midrif again, seeking Lee to find out what he should wear.

Lee took the time to go back downstairs and gather up the bones. He used an old plastic bag, which he hoarded like a pack rat, in various cupboards, keeping them whenever he went to the store. Lying them out beside the sink smallest to largest, he had quite a few to put. When he was done stacking, he went into his bedroom to find some old clothes. They weren't necessarily out of style, but they were a few years old. Lee hadn't been so tall when he was sixteen or seventeen, but had grown very quickly a while after. Amongst other things, he found a plain white shirt and jeans whose legs were rather baggy, and some black and white tennis shoes he decided not to wear. Going back out, he tossed them into the second bedroom and went back into the kitchen, turning the oven on.

He glanced around when Squirrel reentered. "Some of my old clothes are in your room. They ought to do until we get into the city and stock up. Hope that sounds good."

Squirrel nodded and went straight to his new room. He pulled the shirt on over his head and got into the baggy jeans. He had to roll up the legs a bit and considered asking for a belt. As he made his way back up to the kitchen, he stopped in the doorway. He only now noticed what Lee was doing, and he stared in horror at the bleached bones all lined up in order.

Lee almost didn't hear the kid return. When he glanced around, he put his hands on his hips. "What are you looking like that for? We all have bones---the only difference is these are outside the body. Come here, here." He picked a small finger joint up. "They hold shape and structure, but they're not much more than sticks when you look at them simply enough. They feel a bit like wood when they're dry, and generally the same when they've been baked." The small ones didn't need more than thirty minutes in the oven. Then they'd be as brittle as a lump of spun sugar.

Swallowing nausea, Squirrel joined his side. He supposed he had to learn how to do it, seeing he had been volunteered to do it by Lee. He hitched up his baggy jeans and stared at the bones, trying to imagine them as just that. He kept thinking about the man they had come from, and how Lee had removed them from the man's body. He gulped again and shook his head slightly.
"When we get Julius..." he started, but couldn't find the words to describe what he wanted done. He wanted to see it done to the perverted man. He wanted to be the one to do it to him.

Lee slid out a flat baking sheet from on top of the cabinet and set it beside the bones. "When we get Julius, I'll do whatever you want me to do to him." Lee said quietly. "I'll secure his feet so you can get in a good shot or two if you want." He set several of the largest bones on the sheet. "Here, pick a couple of the large ones up, set them beside each other. Make sure you don't leave too much room, or it'll take a long time to finish drying them all."

Squirrel did as he was told, picking the surprisingly heavy bones up and placing them on the tray. All sorts of horrendous images floated through his mind, as he thought of things he could do to the only human being he hated. One thing is for sure, he wanted him to be alive and conscious for most of it. He wanted the man to suffer the way he made many children suffer. The way he made Squirrel and his good friend Skye suffer. As he set about the task Lee had instructed him to do, he again thought about his friend and his life on the streets. He decided he'd tell Lee a little about himself, not because he wanted to know about the man, but because he thought it would provide a little background.
"I was 6 when my parents left me here. I was scared. I didn't know what to do after the first day. I had waited for them to return, but they hadn't. I went to the police, thinking they could help me. That man, Julius, pretended he was going to help. He got me into his car and he drove me to an empty park. He took advantage of me. I got out and ran until I couldn't run anymore. I collapsed. I was so tired and scared..." He finished placing the bones on the tray and waited for further instruction.

Lee clenched his hands as Squirrel spoke, biting hard before sighing the feeling of burning anger away. Control of his emotions was a wonderful thing, but he couldn't take the injustice of a man in a powerful position using it for terrible things. As the tray filled, he went around the boy and slid them in the oven. Picking up a timer, he turned it to an hour, and showed it to Squirrel. "I can sympathize with that situation, kid." he said at last. "I stopped trusting people when I was fourteen, then I lost faith in humanity at seventeen." He paused, set the timer down, and went around to the living room. Sitting on the couch, he looked around. "It's good you can trust me enough to tell me what you must not have told many others."

Taking a thin box from beneath the couch, he opened it and took out the money stored. Then he paused. "I... had a friend once. A good friend named Jamie. He was m---" the word caught, and he puffed it out. "---taken advantage of by his father, several times. For a year he kept it to himself, then finally decided to tell me. He couldn't take it anymore. I tried to be there for him but... he'd made up his mind. When he was alone at home one day he cut his throat after writing out a note, mainly to me, because I was supposed to meet him that day. I... kept the note. Went to his funeral. His father... looked sympathetic. But I could tell. The way he stood, the tone of his voice, that look in his eye. He didn't care." Lee spoke through gritted teeth. "And I... couldn't let him live. A couple years later... I ambushed him while he was searching the alley for another kid, like he did every weekend, since I'd followed him for a few weeks before. I cracked him over the head and brought him here. He was my first kill, at nineteen years old." He chuckled. "Then I never really looked back."

Squirrel listened to Lee's story quietly as he followed him into the living room. He curled up in the corner again, a strange habit he had picked up. "I had a friend too. I told you about him. But he was more than a friend..." He glanced over to the window, staring out to the world beyond. "After that happened... Skye found me. He was the only kind person I had met... He taught me everything. He taught me to steal and beg to survive. He told me never to resort to selling my body..." Squirrel turned his head and was now watching Lee. "You remind me a bit of him." They had both been around the same age. Skye was intelligent and cared for Squirrel. He taught him everything and cared for him like a father. "I have something else to tell you..." Squirrel didn't know why he wanted to tell Lee his secret. It was something that he had pretended never happened. It was something that he never thought about.
"My parents never loved me. They neglected me since I was a baby. They loved my sister. They never wanted me. My mother... was forced to have me by someone she never loved. They blamed me for existing. I... Pretended they loved me... Skye... Skye kept telling me I had to remember how they treated me. He told me if I lived in a fantasy world I'd be hurt again... He was right..." Squirrel went quiet now, resting his head on his arms. He didn't know why he wanted to tell Lee about it. He supposed he longed for affection and companionship, even though he knew Lee probably couldn't even care less. "I'm glad you have the guts to do what you do. You got to avenge your friend. I'm sure he's happy in Heaven. I hope they let him punish his father for what he did to him."
Squirrel didn't really understand how Heaven and Hell worked. What he had learnt, he had heard Skye talk about. Even though he was madly addicted to cocaine, stole and lived on the harsh streets, Skye was highly religious. He even took Squirrel to church on Sundays.
"My real name, the one my parents named me, was Marcus."

As silence rang down and fell, Lee stood. "Well, Marcus. I think I prefer Squirrel." He nodded. "Maybe someday we'll find your parents. Keep them in mind. They may well still be around." Pocketing the bills he'd grabbed from their small box, he went around the couch. He'd like to believe Jamie was in a place of eternal rest, happiness, and good things. But his parents had instilled a fear of death in him at a young age. The lessons had stuck, but now Lee didn't fear death. He tried to believe Jamie was happy in paradise. Sometimes he almost believed it. He cleared his throat. "Come here." He said, and ducked down to the pantry. Pulling out a steel thing, he set it on the table. "This is a grinder. Used for various large items, easy to grind them into a powder if they're brittle or soft enough. I use it for the bones, hook it to a trash bin to gather the dust. I used to wear gloves until I decided to burn my finger and palm prints off with lye."

He stared at his hands. The fingers and palms were smooth and free of lines or tracks. It had taken a while, but the painful scabs had fallen off, leaving his skin without discerning marks and therefore erasing any fear of being found by fingerprints.

Squirrel looked at the grinder and wondered what burning your own fingerprints off would feel like. Skye had taught him about finger prints. That you had to be very careful, because if found at the scene of the crime, they would lead the police right to you. Squirrel stared down at his own hands. He had never noticed the swirling lines that were unique to only him before.
"Can they get fingerprints off dust?" he asked, unsure about what Lee was talking about. "What do you do with the leftovers after?" He wondered what he had done with the flesh of the man. Lee didn't seem like the type to eat it.

Lee nodded. "You can leave fingerprints almost anywhere. On a solid or sticky surface, especially. Your skin is oily no matter what, and when you touch something, it leaves the outline of your prints on the surface of what you touched, though it's easy to wipe away. However, you might miss some, and that's a chance I didn't want to take. You ought to wear gloves if you handle trash bags, unless later you'd want me to help with your... fingerprint problem." He rubbed his fingers together and looked at the timer. Half an hour had passed. "After the first hour, set the timer for another." Lee added. "When it's done afterward, put them on the table and put the smaller bones in. They'll take about an hour. The smallest take half that, though it's best to start grinding them as soon as you can handle them. You got that?"

Nodding again, his mind was elsewhere. He was still thinking of what he wanted to do Julius. He was getting excited, and he had no idea why. He had never wanted to hurt anyone in his life. Even the suggestion of hurting his parents disgusted him. He understood why they abused him, and he was thankful they left him. At least he knew they didn't want him. If they really were kind, like how his imagination made them, he wouldn't ever be able to forgive them. "When are we going to get... Him?" he asked, coming closer to Lee. He sat next to him and leant slightly against him, hoping the man didn't mind. "I know how I can get him to come here. I don't mind doing it one last time."
After Skye had passed away, Squirrel had started to do favors for strangers. He was always useless at begging or robbing people. It was just the easiest way to make a few dollars. A lot of the time he didn't even go the whole way with them, they usually were satisfied with touching or other things.

Lee glanced Squirrel's way when he was used as a post. But he didn't bother shrugging the kid off. "Best not to lure him right here. I don't like the concept of someone possibly seeing the man come here before he's discovered to be gone. One more time, just get him into an alley, I'll be waiting at the back. I'll be able to knock him out and put him in the toolbox, and no one can be any wiser." He thought about it. The prospect of luring someone as sick as Julius with the thought of some degrading act, then dashing that hope and teaching him one hell of a lesson, one he'd never walk away from. "He won't touch another kid after this evening, I can promise you that." He clenched his hand, then released it, as if strangling a tiny, invisible Julius.

Squirrel smiled, no idea why he was so happy. He snuggled into Lee's arm and closed his eyes. He had never felt so contented in his life. Maybe living with the murderer was going to be a good thing after all. Remembering the items he had brought here from last night, he got up and went to his room. He found the photo of his little sister, the small amount of money and the gold locket on the floor beside his bed. He picked these up and brought them back to where Lee was sitting. He handed the crinkled 5 dollar note and 3 gold coins to Lee. "I know it's not much, but I don't need it anymore." He then opened the locket, revealing a picture of a beautiful woman. He smiled down at her, noting that there was a space on the other side for another picture. He measured the size of the locket against the size of his sister's face in the photo. It was a perfect fit.
"Lee, is it ok if you help me do this? I want the picture of my baby sister in here next to this picture." He showed him the locket. Even though Skye had told Squirrel that the locket belonged to his mother, he had never explained who the lady was inside. She looked too young to be Skye's mother. He also showed Lee the photo he was holding. It was a crinkled, faded family portrait. The faces of his parents had been scribbled over, but the baby girl they held proudly in their arms was clear as day. Squirrel had no idea why he had kept the picture. Sometimes he had pretended that the baby they were holding was him, even though he knew it was his baby sister. The child they wanted. He wasn't in the portrait, he never was in any photos that they took. He loved his sister more than anything in the world. She would be 7 now. Squirrel wondered what she would be like.

Lee pushed back the money, but took the locket and picture. "I don't need that." He said, noting the money. "I'm well set. But I can do this for you." Standing, Lee went to a drawer beside the refrigerator and pulled a small pair of scissors out. He couldn't blame Squirrel for scribbling out the two adults. They were, after all, the ones that had left him at a bus stop in a random city. Carefully cutting around the child's image, he pulled it free and slid it into the locket, right across from the woman. Who was she...? He'd never seen her around the city, and every face he saw was burned into his mind. "Here it is." He said, closing the locket and handing it back to Squirrel. "Maybe someday we'll find your parents. Even if it's not to teach them a lesson, but to ask them why they left you alone."

Squirrel nodded, picking up the money. He promised himself to go to Skye's grave sometime and plant the money in his friend's grave. He didn't need it and Lee didn't want it. Squirrel didn't want it either, as it was gained by means that he wished he never had to do. He took the locket from Lee and put it around his neck. It felt nice having the metal sitting next to his heart.
"I know why they left me. It's ok Lee. I know you are mad at them, but I'm not," he said, resting a hand on Lee's arm in a reassuring manner. "As long as my little sister was treated well, I don't care about how they treated me."

Lee shook his head, and crossed his arms. "I can't accept that, Squirrel." He said simply. "If they can abandon one child, what's to say they won't do the very same thing to your sister? Maybe one day they become angry, decide to go on a 'trip', and leave her behind. I'd rather not think like that, but it's the truth, Squirrel." He shook his head, gathering up his hair and tying it back into a ponytail.

"I'd never wish a child to go through that." He added. Without another word he put the scissors away, and went to pull the bottle of sedatives from the cabinet. In the back sat a box, which he pulled, and opened. Rows of cheap syringes lined the black interior. All he needed to do was mix the powder inside the caplets with a precise measure of water, and the resulting injection would put his target out in a few moments.

Sighing, Squirrel curled up on the couch. He saw the remote and turned on the tv. He had never watched tv in his life, except through windows of shops. Being in control of what to watch was weird. He flicked through the channels until he found a strange cartoon. The animals were talking and pulling tricks on each other. One joke made him laugh. He fell on the floor, clutching his sides and laughing hysterically. Now he understood why rich people watched television.

He used a glass to measure. Running a bit of water in it, he studied it for a moment. Clean and free of floating filth. Setting it on the table, he sat and pulled the cap off a syringe, pressing the plunger down all the way. Filling it halfway with water, Lee drank the rest and put it back into the glass. Fishing a caplet out of the bottle, Lee pulled both sides until it came apart, swirling it around.

Squirrel's reaction to whatever he'd seen pulled Lee's gaze up from what he was doing. "The hell...?" Looking over the back of the couch, he saw the show. Looney Toons. "Kid, I've got the entire set taped." He called, inspecting the water at the bottom of the glass. The powder was entirely dissolved, and the water now looked a little clouded. "If you want to see that show on your own time you can go ahead!" Pulling the liquid into the syringe's chamber, he capped the needle again and made it a point to wash the glass especially well. If he let it set, the kid might pick it up and use it unintentionally.

Still in stitches, Squirrel didn't quite hear what Lee had said. He sat up, breathing heavily and continued to watch the show. He laughed all the way through it, until it finished. He picked himself up and went to where Lee was, glancing at the oven. It was nearly done. "So when this is done, I take it out or?" he had totally forgotten what Lee had told him.

Lee had set the timer again because Squirrel seemed quite busy. His syringe was more than ready, and sitting on the counter while Lee inspected his hands. The pale scarring had faded a couple times in the past, while another douse of lye had completely and utterly eradicated what was left of his prints. "Yes, take them out when they're done." Lee said at last. "Then place the smaller bones on. You can go ahead and pile them here and there, since there are quite a few. They go in for an hour, and while they're getting done, it's best to focus on grinding the largest to make room for the next batch. The smallest bones, the ones found in the hands, feet, and along the backbone, take an hour. When you have a skull, it's best to crush it up well and put them in with the middle sections." Lee studied the boy. "You understood that?"

Squirrel shook his head, feeling dumb. "It's ok, I'll just ask for you to show me." He never was good at following instructions. He saw the syringe and gulped slightly. "Are we going soon?" He looked at the time, seeing it was nearing dinnertime. He felt excited and nervous all at once.

Lee nodded. "It's okay, kid. My memory's precise, so I feel certain things are easy to recall." He stood, scooping up the syringe and pocketing it. "We'll be going soon, yes. The bone thing takes a while, so they're best left for later. That, and since you're around now, I can clean the bones while you grind them. It'll make things easier, I'd say."

He went around to the kitchen window and looked outside. "Still a bit too bright. We'll go around town for a while, find you more clothes, and get a better bed for that room. I know it's probably full of dust." He rolled his eyes. It'd been quite a while since he'd even opened the door to that room, let alone dusted in there. He went to the oven as the timer rang loud, turning it off and taking the bones out using a towel. "Air can dry the smallest ones while we're gone, they ought not be so bad when we get back." Going to the other side of the kitchen, Lee scooped up a set of keys. "You ready to go? I could do with a new lock for the back door, after all."