Meet the Richards

2.2 || Diner Doorbell

I gave in frustratedly to Zheng's pleas. It wasn't like Jonah was going anywhere soon. I had to drop the girls off at school anyway so I thought why not see Zheng at the diner. I parked the car and entered the diner, the doorbell ringing above me but also ringing in my head, my ears. An alarm. Something was wrong. Zheng sat in the same booth we had talked before in.

"Hey Dirk," Zheng said, "you want me to get you a -"

"It's Mr Richards to you," I corrected, sitting down with a certain temper. "We are not friends, okay? I am here to comfort you in your moment of grief. Don't ever tell me to leave my son."

"Then why did you leave him?" As the question left his mouth, I uttered nothing. I didn't know what to say. "People have such strange ways of expressing anger. They say one thing, and they do the other. Like you. Your anger and resentment comes from the accident. The accident was created by your drunken stupor. And you still don't know when to give up your alcoholic tendencies."

I slammed the table with my fist. "How the fuck do you know that?"

He shook some sugar in his late day coffee.

"Alright, I'm going to be truthful now," he said. He leaned in and spoke at a quieter voice than usual. "Your son is going to go through a gruesome transformation that ends with death. First, his arms will crumble until he no longer feels them - no pain because the bones and nerves and joints and muscles will be discombobulated. Second, he will want to eat and eat and eat until his belly becomes so fat - his gut will feel like it will explode, his skeleton will be hidden under a new layer of fat that will latch around the original image of your son. Third, once he is a living blob with deceased arms, his teeth will fall out one by one and once that last tooth is on the floor or in your hands, he will die. Little Jonah. On the floor. And this will happen to the rest of your family unless you take it into your own hands and kill one of your own to save the rest. I'm doing this because you killed a member of my family. Now you got to kill a family member or live with the fact that you let your entire family die."

I looked around when he was finished. No one was sitting close enough to listen to us. The kid was a psychopath. Plain and simple. And maybe it was my fault. Whatever he was spouting was untrue and it was just a coincidence that he knew about Jonah's arms. I shook my head as I got up and left the diner.

"I suggest you choose wisely, Dirk," he proclaimed as the doorbell rang on my way out.

The following morning, only I woke to the screams of Ovi. Irene had stayed at the hospital with Jonah overnight. I had told her about Zheng's insane rants and warned the kids from ever meeting with him again. I felt a bit sluggish because I drank yesterday night since I hadn't drank in the morning. I wasn't sure I was going to drink this morning as well. I opened the door to their bedroom. Elena was helping Ovi get to me. Her arms weren't moving.