I

His mother died giving birth to him and it was nearly impossible to forgive him for it, if that makes me something rotten then so be it. I wept dryly by her dying side, stunned, and as the doctors and nurses chided me out of my seat so as to attend to the paperwork for the mutant responsible for the death of the bloated woman lying in the plastic hospital bed in front of me. The doctors ushered her body away and brought me to the boy with ropy tumorous skin covering his mouth. They assured me that a procedure to remove the fleshy patch keeping his mouth shut could be exercised and they would just need me to sign off on it. I did and handed the cold and whimpering child with no mouth off to them, excusing myself to the bathroom. The primary physician seemed to regard me with some understanding pity but, how could he?

I stood in the bathroom, stomping my rubber soles against the solid tiles beneath my feet. The man looking back at me from the mirror seemed to be much smaller than I remembered. I'd been so red and boisterous and ready for the family life. Now the man there slumped his shoulders and his hair seemed to be greasy and gray. His eyes, that of a stabbed bull in the arena, looking up and accepting death, terrified and darting.

I briefly wondered what it would be like to kill myself. I could buy a gun, go home, paint the walls. This conclusion was wholly unreasonable, I know. This would leave the boy alone in the world. So, I was stuck. Adoption? Perhaps. Call it a grief induced confusion if you want, but I prefer to call it being taken away on a wave of extremes. High tide, low tide. Moving quickly between the proposition of acting as a good newly single father and being the bastard that ducks out when needed most. I was deeply sad. That is my only defense and that sucks.

After washing my face in the deep bowl of the hospital bathroom, I wandered back down the lime green hallway to press my face against the window of the nursery where my son lay. He rolled back and forth, twisting his small and inconsequential limbs in all directions with his eyes wide open in terror, nostrils flaring. He wished to belt out a scream like any other baby might and yet was refused even that. The muffles came from him small.

They cut him a new mouth and as he healed, it was almost easy to ignore the jagged look of his lips. The doctors assured me they would heal nicely with time and that I would hardly be able to even notice they'd ever been sealed shut.

I took my son home and within the week I buried my wife. The funeral was brief and small. The baby did manage to cry out with its newfound mouth on that day. So, did I. I'd cry into my pillow as the small boy lay on the bed next to me. He would look up at me with curious blue milky eyes and the world would fall away for a little while.

Time went by. Weeks.

One morning I awoke to my alarm and was stunned to find that my baby wasn't crying from his crib. I could hear him struggling in his haphazard blankets and I could tell he was attempting to muffle out a high-pitched babe scream. I darted to the crib, terrified that he was choking on something.

As I looked down into the crib, I saw him staring up at me with those pleading blue eyes. He had no mouth. It had sealed itself over again. His nostrils flared hysterically, and his soft feet kicked out below his twisting torso. I panicked.

I took my child up in my arms and rushed him to the kitchen, phone in hand, ready to dial 911. I could feel the boy thrashing in my arms and I almost dropped him but abandoned the phone instead. The cellphone shot from my hand and slid across the kitchen tiles. He was gagging and snot and vomit shot from his nose. The image of me holding the limp form of my dead baby in my outstretched hands shot through my mind and I decided that was not going to happen.

It was quick enough work. I grabbed a long butcher’s knife from the block on the counter and held him over the sink as I carved him a smile. Was I doing the right thing? The dam in his throat broke and the sink drain pooled with blood and vomit. I screamed. He screamed. I was terrified and sick to my stomach. I was immediately struck with how small I felt. Was this what being a parent was like? Surely no one else in the history of the world had ever had to perform such a macabre act on their infant.

Tears streamed down my face as I patted him on the spine, and he choked up in the sink.

Years passed.

He would come up to me in the morning, I would brush his hair neatly, straighten his shirt, cut him a new mouth for the day and send him on his merry way. I would be lying if I said that the thought of sending him off to school with runny red lips didn't eat me up most nights.

Beyond his poor eating habits and his strange mouth problem, he was a lovely child. I swear, I can't get that kid to eat anything. Sometimes after I make dinner, I find the contents of his plate in the trash. Although, he must be getting enough nutrition. He isn’t wasting away.

The first startling clue was when the dogs in the neighborhood started going missing. It wasn't the craziest thing in the world to be sure but seeing as we live in a rather upscale gated community, it was definitely odd to have a dog burglar on the prowl. Then the dogs' mutilated corpses would be found in undeveloped portions of the community or in sewer drains. Each of them had massive hunks of flesh taken from their bodies as though they'd been dined on.

Speculation of wild coyotes or mountain lions ran rife through the neighborhood and I was sure to keep a closer eye on my boy so that he wouldn't be munched up by some wily beast.

I purchased him a puppy for his fifth birthday and he said something to me that chilled me to the bone:

"Thank you, daddy, I've been so hungry!"

I thought this was a strange quip and nothing more initially, but I sleep with the dog in my bed these days as sometimes I can see my son giving the poor thing a sideways glance with a twinkle in his eye.

I'm beginning to wonder whether or not he was born without a mouth for a reason.

II

I'm starting to think I might have come across as a little melodramatic. I hope I was. Maybe. I don't know. Every night, his mouth seals itself shut and every morning, I have to use a razor to cut it open. Other than that, he's almost an entirely normal, sweet, wonderful, great, adorable kid. Almost.

It is obvious to me that most kids love candy or ice cream and have a difficult time eating their vegetables. My son loves small animals. Not in the way that most children love small animals, mind you. He- he eats them. I've come to accept that now. I am sure that I have. I think. I found him kneeling over the body of a possum. Do not ask me how, but my son figured out a way to withdraw the poor thing's solid tiny heart from the jagged spot in the possum's chest. I looked over the dead animal and then back at my son. He stared at his shoes, sniffling.

"Are you sad it's dead?" I asked him.

Maintaining eye contact with the ground, he shook his head.

"Hey."

Still, he looked down, rubbing the tip of his shoe into the grass.

I reached out and grabbed his chin with my forefinger and thumb, pulling his watery face up to meet mine. "It'll be alright, buddy." I said, hoping that saying it aloud would somehow make me feel better about it.

I'm honestly terrified of the boy, but I cannot let him see that. I don't want him to think that his father thinks he's a monster. I also don't want him to think about taking a nibble off me.

I dug a less than perfect grave in the backyard after wiping the red grime from my son's mouth and chucked the possum in, pinching it by its fur so that I wouldn't have to touch any of the bloody mess. I made my son brush his teeth and floss. Then I put him to bed and settled in on the couch with Captain Trips lounging on my lap. Oh, sorry. Captain Trips is the puppy. He is fine. He is a good boy. I scrolled through google on my tablet while rubbing Captain's soft ear absentmindedly. Gruesome images passed my eyes as I looked over picture after picture of disfigured children with medical issues. I've been looking up similar conditions in children, wondering whether or not there was a possible solution to his issue.

Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

There are plenty of children born with disabilities and sealed orifices. Did you know that some people are born without anuses? Doctors are left with no other options in these cases but to cut the skin covering the sphincter. That's horrifying no matter how you slice it. I- I didn't mean that to come out like that. You know what I mean. It's terrible. I apologize to anyone that may have been born without an anus who read that.

Anyway, yes, plenty of children are born that way. I've yet to find any children who's orifices seal up overnight, every night. I've also yet to see any cases of children like that who have an insatiable hunger for small game.

So, here's what I'm thinking, and don't laugh at me, please. I think there must be a paranormal reason behind all of this. There must be something going on here beyond human understanding.

I was pulled from my thought as I felt a pair of eyes on me. It was my son. He was rubbing the corners of his eyes. His mouth has partially sealed shut so that his mouth was little more than a pinhole. After some motioning, I realized he was thirsty and so we went to the kitchen and I poured him a small glass of water, pushing a straw into his mouth. He slurped it down and I kissed him on the head, ushering him off to bed with a pat on the shoulder. At least that was something I never had to worry about. He'd never been a bed wetter.

Captain was asleep on the couch when I returned, sighing heavy as I sat next to him.

I resolved to think on it some more in the morning and lifted Captain off the couch, taking him to my bed and tucking him under the blanket so that his snout was well above the blanket. Even with my mind racing, I was able to sleep easily enough.

I was startled awake by a high-pitched yelp. In seconds, I was wide awake, flicking on the lamp sitting my bedside table. My stomach churned and I felt sick and cold all of the sudden. I have never ever been so fucking scared in my life. There was my son at the edge of the bed, eyes wide, as though he'd been caught with his hand in the cookie jar. It took a moment for me to realize it, but Captain's tail fell from my son's open mouth and the pup quickly shot over to my side of the bed, tucking his injured tail beneath him. My son had one of the large kitchen knives I usually kept in the wooden block near the sink in his hand. His mouth was open. He'd given himself a smile. His hand was not as trained as mine and so his teeth were exposed in a snarled and wriggly fashion. The knife clanged to the floor.

"Hey." I whispered to him.

"Hey." He whispered back.

"What were you doing there?"

"Nothing." He held back a quivering bloody bottom lip.

I scooted across the bed, throwing the covers off, and grabbing him on his small shoulders. "D-don't do that. Alright?" I was still whispering.

He cocked his head to the side. "What do you mean?"

"You scared me. Don't do that." I nervously chuckled.

He stayed quiet for a moment, looking absently around the room. Then his eyes shot up to mine. "You're scared of me?"

Even thinking of the way he said that now... It makes me uneasy.

I started hiding all the blades in the house and making sure my bedroom door was locked tight.

It was difficult to tell with his wonky lips, but I swear to you that when he asked if I was scared of him, he was grinning.

III

I took up hunting; I was hoping that perhaps raw fresh flesh could satiate my son's growing hunger. The small traps I started setting up around the property were simple enough but trudging through the woods and looking for larger game is way more difficult than I could have ever imagined. I can safely say this: hunting is not my forte.

Don't worry, I brought Captain with me. I don't think I could leave him at the house with the boy. He's just a pup so it's not like I could expect him to keep up with me on his own. Instead I'd deposited him in my backpack so that he could poke his snout out and enjoy the ride as I moved through the forest. I never did shoot anything though. I had the opportunity to once, but just as I was about to fire, Captain let out a whine and scared the young buck off. It darted into the brush and vanished completely, and I was left with nothing but a little puppy.

"Maybe I'll just give you to him then." I playfully said to the pooch. Of course, I wouldn't.

After giving up on that endeavor, I sat on a leafy embankment in the woods, drank from my canteen greedily and poured a bit into a plastic bowl for Captain. He's a good boy.

I knew I couldn't bring my son with me on this trip, so I'd gotten him a babysitter. Telling the young girl of his special condition was strange, I'll say that much. I didn't tell her everything. I simply told her that he had a difficult time eating so if he fussed, she shouldn't reprimand him. I also told her of his disfigurement. To this, she simply nodded and told me her price. I paid so that I could be left alone to go into the forest and hunt. But this had been a bust.

The traps too proved to catch nothing. This is something I'd expected. We do have the occasional varmint, but given my son's previous discrepancies, I'm fairly certain that small game tries to give our home a wide berth. Maybe that's just me attempting to rationalize it though. Who knows?

I never would have guessed the babysitter would die. I'm so sorry. She was a young fit girl, and I was certain that if my son had given her any problems, she could call me or she could overpower him. This was apparently not the case.

Upon returning home sometime in the afternoon, I was jamming out to some Pearl Jam with Captain lazily stretching in the passenger seat. I clicked the garage door open and pulled in, sighing and preparing to relieve the young girl of her duties. I reached out for the door leading into the kitchen with Captain underfoot and as soon as I pushed the door in, I was slapped in the face with the stench of something not quite right. I'd smelled it before. Metal like pennies in my nose. It was strong and permeated throughout the house.

I rushed through the kitchen, grabbing the threshold frame leading into the den to support my weight. There it was. There he was. He was crouched over the poor girl. She was possibly fifteen or sixteen. Too young for this. It took a long time for my eyes to comprehend what I was looking at. Long looping entrails torn to shreds. She looked up at the ceiling with a pale expression of fear plastered across her still face. Someone had finally died due to my incompetence. My son, upon realizing I was looking in at the mess he'd made, dropped her heart and it plopped to the floor soft and wet. His expression was one that probably matched my own. Wiping his hands and mouth down quickly, he looked at me while placing his hands behind his back.

I was horrified. I was broken. I knew he couldn't stop.

It takes a really long time to get blood up. Especially when the blood has been sitting on the wooden floor long enough to settle in and stain. I tried using a straight mixture of bleach and water, but after the initial wipe down, there was little more that I could do.

The world was a haze as I lugged the young girl's body into the bathtub and took the hacksaw to her limbs. When you attempt to cut into muscle with little experience, it sometimes pulls away in thick strings; that's something I never thought I would know. I had no idea what I was doing, but the legs and arms came off well enough after snapping the bones. The head was a different matter altogether. I couldn't look at those eyes and so I shut them as I placed the saw against her throat. I removed the teeth and ground them into a fine powder. I still haven't figured out what I'm going to do with the body. Burn it? I'm unsure. I am now a criminal. My whole life was spiraling. Still I knew what came next. I bagged the pieces and put them in my shed. Maybe I should’ve called the police on myself.

After this was done and I washed the tub down, I fetched my son and bathed him, washing the red residue from his body. We were quiet. I think he knew I was upset with him. Which, I mean, I was. This isn't a part of the road for normal parents though. This wasn't something I should have to do. This isn't the sort of situation I was supposed to be in.

"I'm sorry." He mumbled.

"It's okay, buddy." I told him. I forced a bright disposition over my whole face and body. "Wanna' watch a movie?"

He perked up. "Yeah."

I put on Finding Nemo in the living room and we watched it together, laughing at the fun antics of the animated fish onscreen. When the DVD flipped back over to the main menu, he smacked me in the head with a pillow. I lifted him up by his ankles and swirled him over the couch, swinging him and dropping him onto the cushions in a fit of giggles. He put on his little plastic Batman mask and I sneaked through the dim house, playing the part of the newest escapee from the asylum. He would catch me, and we would be locked in mock mortal combat with one another. We would fall to the floor together in a barrage of laughter.

"I got you daddy!" He shrieked as I would lay on the floor with my tongue stuck out.

We played the board game Life until it was pitch black out. I'd long since turned my phone off as the phone calls from the girl's parents had made it impossible to use it anyway. I let him win and he laughed in self-satisfaction.

Then it was bedtime. I read him a chapter from Harry Potter and clicked his bedside table off, planting a firm kiss on his forehead. He rolled himself into a burrito and I could tell he was tuckered out.

I passed Captain snoozing on the couch and I moved to the garage, popping the trunk of my vehicle. There it was. I took the rifle I'd specifically purchased for hunting.

Before I could think my way out of it, I marched down the hall, checking the rifle and making sure the safety was off. I pushed in his cracked door, keeping the light off.

It takes a really long time to get blood up. Especially when you're cleaning it off sheets and bedding.

I don't know if I'm an evil man. I hope not.

Please forgive me.