Just Like Mishima

Crime Fiction by Steven McFann

He stares at the options I laid on the kitchen table. They glisten against the flickering kitchen light he hasn’t bothered to fix. I tell him to choose the one that cuts the quickest.

He thinks I’m kidding. I make it clear that I’m not.

Because he crossed a line this time. I never expected my two-time loser brother Leonard to stay a good boy very long. I knew he’d land a third strike, and there was no way I could prevent it. But hiding his dirty laundry in my house, thinking I wouldn’t find it before the cops did, that was a new low for him.

Because I know he doesn’t have it in him to do the time he’s facing. I ask him what he’s already given up to the cops about me.

He insists he hasn’t told them anything, though I already know for a fact they’ve tried. I can’t bet my freedom on his weak willpower in the hopes that for once in his life, he’ll do the right thing and won’t sing to the cops.

How dare he put me in that situation? I ask him that. How dare he? After everything I’ve done for him. That’s why there’s no return. He has to do it.

He asks why I can’t. I tell him his hand needs to be the only one involved, otherwise they’ll snoop around and find my trail. It has to look willing.

He picks the Japanese knife. He says it reminds him of the author Yukio Mishima. Leonard showed me Mishima when I was younger and he was obsessively studying karate, the last time he had ambition for anything that wasn’t criminal. He knocked the manga out of my hand, thrust a ragged library copy of Confessions of a Mask in my face, and said “this is real Japanese culture!”

I smile and I tell him he’s right. It’s just like Mishima. Only, Mishima was lucky. He had someone to finish the job when the pain was too overwhelming for him to continue. I won’t lend him that privilege.

I ask if he wants to order a last pizza before he does it. He shakes his head. He won’t even take a drink. He wants to do it bone sober. Besides, he says, if he loses control of his bowels with a full stomach, the smell is gonna be worse for me.

I lead him to the room. I’m surprised when the cold, flat part of the blade hits my throat. He still knows a few moves from his dojo days.

I have my gun on me, but I make no effort to stop him. I tell him he’s free to do it. I can tell he won’t. Someone like me turning up dead, it tends to attract the worst kind of attention, and all eyes will be on him. I warn him that after my friends are through with him, he’ll have wished he’d have gone out on own terms instead of being at the mercy of merciless men.

Hell, I say. Maybe they’d even come for his new girlfriend with the kid on the way.

He laughs and lowers the blade. He sits on the bed, his hand shaking like a rattler tail. He asks me to guide him. I shake my head. The best I’ll do is read him the same story mom used to read to us. I have every word of it memorized. I start telling the story. He looks at me as if hoping this final moment between us will soften my heart and grant him another chance.

I turn my back to him to press the point. There’s no way out.

Halfway through the story, he takes the plunge. I hear him grunt. I peek over and see it. I expected it to be nasty, but the sight of Leonard opening his own stomach up is beyond even what I’ve seen. I leave when the story is over. I don’t want to hear the inevitable pleas of a man changing his mind when it’s too late, and I don’t wanna risk my hair getting all over the place just to comfort him. I just close the door and sit in the living room.

I check my watch until it’s midnight. I look out the window. A long beam of light from a helicopter scans the city streets and I hear the wail of a distant siren. I push the door open and I see Leonard slumped over, the knife laying in the mess he made, the glassy eyes of my older brother staring right at his bloody reflection in the blade.

I cross myself and tell him I’ll pay for a funeral mom would be proud of.

The two-way radio in my car is exploding by the time I get there, and my phone has a few missed calls. I answer.

“This is Detective Sergeant Towne.”

A 187 at a motel on Figueroa. I’m needed. I say I’ll be there. I pull the rubber gloves off. I grab my duty gun and badge from my glove compartment, and decide to take a detour to make it seem like I was nowhere near Leonard’s place. I wonder what new terrors the night will bring me as I leave all bad feelings towards my brother behind with his corpse.

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Bio: Steven McFann is a writer living in Los Angeles. His work has previously appeared in Empyrean Literary Magazine, Saddlebag Dispatches, with non-fiction articles published on the entertainment news website ScreenRant. He also maintains a history Substack titled “Fool’s Gold.” 

Cover photo by: Pexels/Alireza Heidarpour

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