Semper Prixus (pt 11).

In the end it isn’t much – his dad hauls him up and there is a splash and the Shark meets the shark. And all seven of them watch it happen grimly, holding on to each other until it is done.

That’s for you, you son of bitch, Kyle’s dad says, spitting into the water.

The men are leaving, filing towards the locker room in a single line. Kyle starts to follow but his dad stops him. We don’t want you coming with us, he says.

What? Why not? Kyle shakes the cold water from his hair.

You know why, his dad says. Because me and my friends don’t want to be anywhere near a child molester.

Kyle recoils. Fuck you, he says, looking for some other way out.

Did you think this was going to change something? You did what you did, Kyle. His dad jams his hands into his pockets. What we did was an honor thing, and somebody like you’s never gonna get that.

Just shut up, Kyle says, trapped in here unless he wants to climb the fence and he’s consider it. You fucking used your own son, just go with your buddies and don’t ever think about me again.

I’m not going to, his dad says. And it’s more than that. Don’t come to the house no more. I’d never be able to leave Stevie alone with you and he’ll be old enough to know why before too long.

Dad, Kyle says. Please. Please.

His dad turns and starts to walk.

You never even asked me what happened, Kyle says. But his dad has reached the locker room and now Kyle is all alone on the patio, surrounded by black water that is still roils with the force of what goes on beneath it. Stevie will hear, just like all the kids will hear when they get older, and then it will be Kyle who is the Shark.

He hears a car start on the other side of the building, and then hears it leave, the tires crunching on the gravel road. Nobody asked him, Kyle thinks, nobody ever asked him, they just took the retarded boy’s word for it and tried to hang him from a streetlight.

He feels something behind him and turns, and sees that the shark is staring at him, half-submerged like a crocodile, and its mouth is half open like that as well, its teeth the brightest thing out tonight.

I didn’t mean to, Kyle tells it. You can kill me all you want but that’s all you’re getting.

The shark bobs and then slowly sinks; when its dorsal drops out of sight the black water instantly becomes as still as a mirror. Some version of these things undoubtedly happened here, but probably not the one Kyle thinks he saw. He doesn’t want to go inside so he ends up climbing the chain link fence after all, cutting his ankle as he hikes his leg over and bleeding all the way back to his sister’s house. But not to go inside, just to get his car. He starts to leave them a note, but doesn’t.