Man That You Fear (Marilyn Manson)

Part 1: The Daughter

  I watched, terrified as Heather Robertson spun her body slowly around in a circle, one arm out in front of her, an ugly old sack on her head to blind her of her surroundings. I never liked her, and she never liked me, but that wasn't why I was terrified. I was terrified because today was the day of The Stoning, as this date had held every year since long before my parents even were thought of. This day had always scared me because of what it held, something I had learned at a very young age. I'm now nine.
  I decided that this year I wouldn't be scared. I was older and more mature now, I wasn't a little child anymore. There was nothing for me to be scared of, it would just give the other children a reason to laugh at me, and most likely poke me on Heather's command. All of the laughing and poking bothered me, but I could still come home to Daddy who would always comfort me and tell me that I was different, I didn't need the world's approval. He was the best person I'd ever known.
  And still, I was scared to death. My legs shook nearly violently and I felt like throwing up into the dust. I had to stand back inside the house a bit so that I wouldn't fall out. Our old, rusty trailer house was like all of the others in our community. My mom and I stood in the doorway, the sliding glass door pushed open. If I swayed to close to the edge, I would fall flat on my face, into the dirt, and then there would be yet another reason for Heather to bully me. I hated her and the others. But I forgot about my hate towards them now and watched her spin in the middle of our houses.
  A bit of dust rose from her feet and swirled around her. She finally stopped turning and she pointed to the house that she'd stopped on. She pulled the bag off of her head and saw with delight where she had stopped. The small grin formed on her pretty but harsh face, and that's when I realized...we were the ones today. It was us.
  I turned on my heel, my long and stringy hair flying around me, and ran into the room where I could no longer see the outside. It was still a bit dark in here, blankets covering the windows so that only certain rays of sunlight made its way underneath them and into the room, along with the dim light through the sliding door. I ran to Daddy.
  He lay there on the bed on his bare stomach, his long black hair flowing down his back in strands, his arms up around his face on the pillow. I would cry if I could, but that was one thing I could always conceal, my tears. I barely ever cried. I lifted my heavy hands and placed them on his soft arm, shaking back and forth to wake him. I heard Mama behind me and turned my head to see her, my hands still on Daddy's arm. Her face was a mixture of sadness and brokenness, her eyes sort of weary, but there didn't seem to be shock, and she maintained her usual face.
  I understood what she meant when she slowly nodded her head down once and I turned back to look at Daddy laying there as he always did, peaceful and gentle, now looking up at me awake, knowing it'd be the last time I'd seem him this way. I turned from him then and left the room, making my way into the living area. I glanced outside through the window that was open to see Heather with a group of other children who I knew talking to them, laughing, and playing with little rocks. Heather saw me and smiled a huge and smug smile, and the other children turned their heads to see me too. They all laughed while Heather just smiled and raised an eyebrow. I turned back to the hallway, holding back my horrible urge taking over my body to run back into the room, jump through the sliding door, run straight into Heather, and punch her in every possible place I could find. But I didn't.
  I made my way into my little room in the back of the trailer. It was a small room that I loved to be in. I didn't have much stuff other than my bed, dresser, mirror, and closet, but I liked it that way. I remember the day Daddy had taken my baby bed out and replaced it with the new one with a new mattress he had worked hard for to buy me. I would be sharing the room with another child soon. I would love the child, but I had been wondering lately if it would make Daddy love me less. I realized with a pain in my chest that he wouldn't even know the new baby.
  I opened my sliding closet door. The loud noise of the slide was familiar to me and the smooth, fake wood that made it was smooth on my fingertips. Daddy used to tell me all the time, "Evangeline, be carefully when you slide this door. It's old and barely hanging on and it could break easily." As I got older, I became more careful with it, but today I just slammed it open quickly. It rattled in its hinges.
  I glared into my closet for a moment and then put my hands in to push back a pile of old clothes I didn't wear anymore that covered the closet floor. Underneath was the hat and boots I wore every year for The Stoning like we were supposed to do. I left my spaghetti strap dress on, then I put my high, lace-up boots on my feet, tying them securely. Finally, I brushed my thin brown hair out and placed the pilgrim-ish tall hat on top of my head and stared at myself in the mirror for a moment.
  When I was done staring, I left the room and went back into the hallway. I could see the end of the trailer to where Mama and Daddy's room was at the other end with the sliding door, their own bedroom door now shut. I stretched my hand to the side, still looking at their door, and my fingers found knob to the other door to the outside. I let my eyes fall from my parent's door where I could hear the shower water running now, and back up again to where my hand was resting on the doorknob. I turned the rusty bronze knob and opened the door. It was a brown and splintery old thing, cheap, having replaced the last door that had been built onto this trailer before my family had lived here.
  I walked into the sunlight and glared, my eyes unadjusted to the new light. I closed the door behind me and walked down the old wooden steps, also splintery. I glanced at Heather and her friends and turned to my left where a chair hung from a rope from the roof of the trailer next to my outside door. It looked like a huge woven basket and I loved it a lot. Mama said that when I was just born, Daddy would hold me in his arms, sit in that very chair, and spin me around, laughing. Mama would sit on the steps and watch or take pictures of us. I always have had memories of sitting in this chair with Daddy as I grew up. We liked to watch the dust blow around us as the sun set. I loved him so much I could barely stand it.
  I crawled up into the chair and waited. The back of it was facing the center of the houses around us and I rested my body up against the back, looking through the 'holes' that made the basket. I remember asking Daddy when I was little why there were those holes in our chair as I stuck my fingers through them. When I asked that, he laughed and explained that it was like a basket. I never really understood it, but little kids never understand things like that really...I never gave it any more thought either, not until now when a hundred memories of him filled my head. I smiled just barely as I finally understood the 'holes'.
  I sat there for what seemed like forever, thinking about him, remembering memories. I thought of the time when I was in second grade, not many years before, when Heather had decided to get the others to gang up on me. They teased me throughout the day, each one pulling my hair as I passed. Finally, when Heather had pulled my hair one too many times that day, I hit her hard in the face, causing her to bleed. The teacher had called Daddy, telling him to come get me, and when he got there, she explained to him that I had punched Heather simply because she had teased me. He didn't say a word. He just took me my the hand, staring at the teacher with those dark eyes of his, and led me out of the school and to our home.
  When we got there, he took me into his and Mama's room and set me on the bed. He crouched down on his knees and put his arms underneath my shoulders, holding me that way. His eyes looked sad and I had never know why until now: because someone had hurt his little girl.
  "Listen to me," he said quietly. "You didn't do anything wrong, Evangeline. You did the right thing. You stood up for yourself and you proved to everyone that you are not the weak little girl that they make you out to be. Someday you'll show them better than anything they could ever think of you. You'll show them that you're special and you're different, and they won't understand, but you will, and I will, and so will your Mama. We love you. And we don't want you to get hurt either. That's why I'm proud of you for standing up for yourself, that's something that no one does anymore. I love you, baby," he said and kissed me on the forehead. I hugged him around his neck, my fingers getting tangled in his long hair. I breathed in the sweet smell of him, something that no one else had. It was special because it smelled like him. Everything he owned did too. And that's one thing I would never forget.
  Then I thought of the time that I had almost drowned. It had been only the two of us swimming, somewhere I don't even remember, in a clear river. Mama had stayed home. I remember Daddy vividly, his swimming shorts and his bare chest and tattooed arms. And his smile. He always smiled when he was around me and Mama, and he always laughed his nice laugh that always made me feel like everything was okay. He didn't smile or laugh around other people though. He was a shy person in reality.
  We had been swimming and he had gone to get something out of our picnic basket, or something like that. I never remembered what exactly had happened, but he had only been gone a minute before I was swept under the water into the deep part. I started to sink and could not bring myself up out of the water again. I felt the air and life start to leave my body, and I was growing weaker, less and less able to move my arms back and forth. My eyes closed right when I felt an arm wrap around my stomach and pull me upward into the open, out of the water. Daddy's other arm wrapped around me and he pulled me towards him, running to the 'shore' as we called it. He laid me out flat on my back and pressed his two hands to my chest, pushing down. I sucked in as much air as I could and his face filled with relief and shock. He pulled me close, up into his strong arms, and held me tight to his chest, his large hand on my head. I remember that he cried a small bit as he rocked me back and forth, muttering thanks and burying his face in my hair as I stared blankly ahead.
  I glanced up, bringing myself back to real life, away from the memories, and saw the black balloons tied to the railing of the steps and in a few holes in my chair. Everyone had decorated the houses with these and other things representing The Stoning. I hated them so much and had the want-to to just reach up and pop them all...though I had nothing to pop them with. I hated the decorations so much.
  And so did Daddy. In fact, he hated the whole idea of The Stoning. I had gotten up in the middle of the night three years before now to get a drink of water from the tap in my little bathroom, and heard my parent's quiet talking in their bedroom. I didn't usually do things like that, but I went silently to their door and listened closely.
  "It's not right," I heard Daddy say. "And it shouldn't be supported so heavily by the people every year, or supported at all. I wish we could rebel, but we just...can't. It's just not right that everyone does it, they make their own children and husbands and wives participate in it and it's just cruel. I hate it. I promise you though, I don't care what happens to me afterwards, but I will not do that to you or Evangeline, ever." He finished breathlessly and I heard a shift in their sheets. I could picture Daddy holding Mama with his strong arms, and I knew that that was exactly what he was doing.
  Mama didn't say anything back to him, but she barely ever did. She was the quiet type that took things in and listened rather than speak her mind. She had a mind of course, and a brilliant one, and she nearly always agreed with Daddy, but she preferred to remain silent about it. I liked that about her for some reason. It made her smile stand out more because that was her way of communication other than her eyes.
  Then Daddy said even quieter, "But you both have to." I knew automatically that he meant that if he was ever possibly chosen for The Stoning, that we would have to participate and throw the stones at him too. That had been one of the few times that I had cried, hearing him say this in a whisper, and I walked silently back to my room, crawling up into my bed and letting the tears fall without making a noise. I understood what he had meant easily, and I knew that if he said it, I must obey him no matter what, but it didn't make me want to, and it didn't make it any easier.
  I had told him the next night as we sat in the woven chair watching the sunset, me curled up into his chest, whispering into his ear, "I hate it too, Daddy." He looked at me with his beautiful dark eyes and saw that they were filled with sadness and grief. That his little six-year-old daughter could understand something so cruel already, but know what she had to do no matter what.
  He leaned his head over and whispered into my ear, "We can't tell anybody though." I looked up at him and said, "I know." He gave me a small and sad smile and said gently as he pulled me close, "I know. You're my smart girl, Evangeline." I then laid my head on his chest and listened to his steady heartbeat.
  So I knew Daddy hated The Stoning a lot. But I had never told anybody else, I never broke my promises, especially if they were made to him. Only Daddy, Mama, and I knew about his hate for The Stoning, and we both felt the same as he did. We would never tell him otherwise. And we would never tell anyone else. If so, we'd probably all be Stoned or something.
  I heard the familiar clicking noise of my door and the scrape of the bottom of the old thing on the rotting wood of the steps. I looked up to see Daddy walk out pulling Mama behind him by the hand. They rarely held hands unless something important was happening like this. They always held hands on The Stoning day. Always as the music started, he would take her hand gently and lead the way. I realized that the music had been playing in the background that whole time now at the trailer next to us. The people who lived next to us always played the music with their strange instruments, playing the song of The Stoning. I hated the song almost as much as I hate The Stoning itself.
  When I saw Daddy, he didn't look as he always did daily, only a bit like he did every year on this day. Except today, more decorations were added to his body. The person who was to be Stoned was always dressed up before hand. He was wearing the strange clothes he wore every year along with a hat that matched mine, but his makeup was done even stranger than always, his eyes and lips standing out far more than usual. His long hair was tied back and he wore a sort of collar around his neck that was the same length, color, and texture of his real hair that steamed down over his shoulders. Mama wore a pretty dress as always, an old plain one that was stretched seeing as she was pregnant, and a ring of wire around her head that looked as if it were a halo. I didn't like how the people were dressed up before they were Stoned. Even though everyone dressed up for this day.
  I saw that Daddy's lips were moving and I stared in shock. He was singing words along to the song of The Stoning, which no one dared sing before if they were to be Stoned. The people in the crowd though always sang and danced along. No one would stop him, but the higher up people of our community would be furious that he was doing this, singing along with them. It was a type of rebellion that was not supposed to be permitted. Well, there really was no rule saying that you couldn't sing it, but it was defiance, and Daddy was showing that he was did not agree with The Stoning, that in fact he hated it, and that he could prove them all wrong. As he told me I would do after school that day years back.
  I wanted to smile now at the fact that he was singing along to The Stoning song. I loved my Daddy so much and I respected what he believed. I knew he had told me the right thing when he'd said I was different and special and that I would show the world that very thing. And that they would never even understand that. He would not get to do that anymore, but I would, and he was helping me see that.
  The people began to crowd around our trailer in a way and Daddy walked down the stairs for the last time. He reached up and took Mama's hand, helped her down the steps though not looking at her, but at the crowd around him with a look I couldn't describe. I jumped out of my basket chair and Daddy looked at me. His shoulders seemed to be sagging and his eyes were filled with pain. He nodded his head forward a bit, telling me to walk alongside him and I realized that Mama and I would be coming right back to this spot, to our house in probably in an hour without him...that he'd never walk up those steps or be inside our house or sit with me in the basket chair ever again.
  We walked in the middle of the crowd of people, in the parade of people. They danced and sang along to The Stoning song, and Daddy had stopped singing. I loved his voice though. It always comforted me when he was either singing or talking. When he talked, it had a very small rasp to it, but it was soft and intelligent sounding, just like his mind was. When he sang, it was perfect, a beautiful sound that no one else had, and I loved it. He sang a lot when he was inside the house with us or sitting in the basket chair with me. I wanted to hear his voice singing again, but I didn't want it to be The Stoning song along with everyone else, and in a way, I wanted it to just be with him and Mama and me walking silently.
  We passed the old bus that sat in the dirt, stuck there forever, a bit from our house. Black balloons were tied to the windows and mirrors on the front. The people playing instruments walked ahead of us, making their horrid noises. The people right behind us shouted their own songs and chants, pointing their fingers harshly up and down at Daddy in front of them. Mrs. Warner was pushed in her wheelchair behind us at the back of the parade as she was every year. And Heather wore a sort of mask or hat thing on her head in the shape of a horse that she held with a hand as she danced around.
  We rose over a hill of dirt in what seemed like a cloud of dirt. I had just realized how big our small community really seemed now that we were all in a parade together, all shouting at Daddy and singing about him and The Stoning, him, 'The Condemned Man'. I remained quiet, but there was nothing for me to say anyway. I felt myself getting heavier and my heart beating faster in fear of what was about to happen. It hadn't even really sunk in yet...Daddy was about to die.
  I looked up at him just in time to see him stop and breath in a lot of air, and he fell sideways onto his right side, into the dust. His hat fell off and I could see his hair where it had been tied up in his hat. Mama's face turned full of worry and she sunk to her knees next to him, holding his head in her hands. He began to softly sing The Stoning song with the parade, who had stopped to crowd around him. Heather's father stepped forward with a look of anger on his face and I too got onto my knees next to him, lightly shaking his should and arm.
  His face seemed to form anger, or at least his mouth did as he bared his teeth while singing. He put his hand underneath his side and began to push himself up. Mama got to her feet and started to help him by pulling him up with her own hand. I grabbed his other arm and pulled too, as much as I could do, which probably wasn't much.
  He stood, his teeth still bared in a way, singing the song. Finally, he stopped singing and let the others sing the song without him. He reached his hand down to mine and I placed mine in his. It was warm and strong as it had always been, and the feeling of it calmed me in a way. I felt a small bit of relief and I felt very good to feel it. I would never forget the feeling of it, and I tried to savor it as much as I possibly could now. Since I would never get to hold his hand again.
  We trudged through the dirt and I looked over to see the wooden crosses made from thin branches. They rested on the graves of the people who were Stoned every year, their own little graveyard. I simply couldn't believe that the man's hand that I was holding now, that he would be there too in a matter of short hours.
  I looked up at Daddy, staring at his face, my mouth hanging open, my eyebrows narrowed and my eyes filled with sadness. I could barely stand the thought any more, I wanted to run from it all and to escape, I wanted Daddy to stay with me and Mama forever...and I would have to help the others stone him, I had no choice. I'd have to throw rocks and stones at him.
  I returned my gaze to the ground, my mouth still open. We were getting closer and closer every step, closer to the spot where he would die and I would watch and help. I felt him squeeze my hand gently and that's when tears finally flowed from my eyes. They ran down my dirty cheeks leaving long streaks where they washed the dust away. I couldn't think about anything else anymore except Daddy...the image of his face filled my mind, the face I'd memorized long ago. I didn't care if any of the children or Heather saw me crying, I didn't care that I was showing weakness...I was weak now, and I had every reason to be.
  We approached the two giant walls that Daddy would stand in, in the corner of it as the community would stone him. I started to feel heavier as I approached them and I stared at the ground, the image of Daddy still the only thing in my vision. I squeezed his hand tighter than before and I felt him do the same back again, this time holding on. He was probably doing the same to Mama. I held on with everything I had, memorizing the texture and feeling and everything about it as he held it.
  We reached the place where the community would spread out and stand. We all stopped moving and stood there, listening to the music still being played by the instruments and the wind. Daddy let got of my hand and I looked up into his face, the tears still streaming. He looked down at me, not smiling but not frowning either, and lifted his hand that I had been holding to my face. With his thumb, he wiped the tears from my cheeks and gently ran his fingers under my chin. Then he turned to Mama and rested a hand on her stomach, on their baby inside. He finally lifted it up to her face and caressed her cheek.
  At last, he dropped his arms to his sides and made his way through the few people of the crowd who stood in front of him. He didn't look back at us, but moved forward silently. He no longer sang The Stoning song. He made his way in front of us, in between the crowd and the high walls and he turned back to us all. He took off his shirt and showed his bare chest and tattooed arms. My heart pounded looking into his fearless face as Mama took my hand and pulled me forward slowly to the front of the crowd. I hadn't realized that I'd stepped closer to her when Daddy had moved forward.
  There was a man dressed as a sort of colonel to the side of us. He held the red flag that Heather had held as she spun in the circle, pointing her finger at the new House of the Condemned, something that seemed like forever ago. I glanced over at her as she began to take the horse mask off of her head and stare at Daddy with a smirk. The colonel man finally extended his arm out in front of him and slowly dropped the red flag.
  Everyone at once bent down to their knees to take a stone or rock from the ground. Unable to feel my body anymore, I bent too and grabbed a heavy, brick-like rock that was larger than my own hand, and rose again with it close to my face. I stared at Daddy, not wanting to do it more than anything, my eyes feeling as if they were about to fill with tears again. I wanted to drop the rock and run to Daddy and never let him go...but I knew what he would say to me.
  "Be my girl, Evangeline. You can do it. Do it for me," he would say to me in his quiet voice, the people around us vanishing to where it was just the two of us left, him talking to me gently as we swung slowly back and forth in our basket chair. So I held the rock firmly in my hand, knowing that was what he would tell me.
  Mama had bent to get a rock about the same size and her face was panicked looking, full of fear and more than sadness, making her want to scream out and do the same as I had felt like doing. The world seemed to go in slow motion now, everyone bending themselves up again into standing position, about to begin throwing their rocks.
  Daddy looked at me for a second and then at Mama, and then he closed his eyes as his head was bowed. Then he stretched his arms out to his sides and slowly put his head back, welcoming The Stoning, something else no one ever did. And that's when everyone began...I raised my arm back behind me and forced it forward, not remembering the force going into my arm and the rock as it was pushed forward and shot into the air...
  And I threw it.