Shadows Fall

The Hatman

"Do you know the worst thing about women? The very reason that you have to stay away from them? Has anyone ever told you that before?" the tall seventeen year old boy interrogated the smaller boy. "Have they? Have they ever told you the cruelest thing about women, and why you gotta be real careful with them?" The smaller boy lowered his eyes and shook his head. These types of questions always embarrassed him.

"Good!" the older boy answered with relish. The two of them were standing in the yard of a large farmhouse, so old that it was said to have been used as a hospital for Confederate soldiers during the Civil war. They were standing directly under the mock shade of a rusted old basketball goals rim, and the direct August sunlight that burned down upon them carried a heat index of something like one hundred and twenty. Despite a six year age difference, the two looked very much alike, which was not surprising since they were brothers. Both had sandy blonde hair that was always cow licked, clear blue eyes, and both were underweight for their age. They were altogether completely unremarkable boys when it came to looks, you could see a boy like them on every page of magazines like "Grits" or "Boys Life." Their only distinguishing features at the moment was that the younger boy was burning a deep shade of red that had nothing to do with the sun, and the older boy was grinning the grin of a man about to graciously impart some spectacularly esoteric piece of wisdom on a lesser clearly undeserving vassal, but does anyway out of the immense size of the his own great heart. The older boy paused for a moment dramatically:

"The worst thing about women," he began majestically, "Is that where you and me, in-other-words men, while we have a sex organ," (at the actual enunciation of the dreaded word the young boys blush turned nearly altogether purple) "While we just are equipped with a sex organ, women ARE a sex organ! That's right, they are. Do you know what I mean by that?" The older boy bent down and placed his hands on his younger brothers shoulders, who immediately pulled away.

"I can see that you don't." He continued, "That's... okay. I don't feel like giving a anatomy lecture today. Just trust me when I say that I know what I am talking about. That's why God wants you to be so careful around women. What you have hanging between your legs is very special, God gave it to you to make babies with, so that we could pass our seed on and create more people to glorify His Name. And that is the ONLY reason he gave it to us." The older brother stood up and started shaking his head, as if he was severely disappointed. "But lotsa people think it is for other things," he said, "Things that have nothing to do with making babies like... well...." He took a deep breath, as if considering how to approach a very vile subject, "Some of your friends may start talking about how they like to ... touch themselves.. .and how it feels. Have you..."

"Please!" The eleven year old boy wailed, he thought he must have been having something like an asthma attack , even though he had never had one before, his chest was all tight and he could not breathe right, panic was setting in. "Please!" he choked out again.

"Hey it's ok!" The older brother said, suddenly aware of the younger boys discomfort. "It's okay. I know that you are a good kid. I know you don't do nothing like that and don't have anything to do with anybody who does. We don't have to talk about it no more. Just promise me you will be careful around women okay? It's never too early to start. Even little girls can get you into trouble. They start young sometimes. It's not that I don't want you to not ever have anything to do with a woman! You are gonna have to get married one day, you better to prove to God that you are not queer, because queers burn in the Bad Place you know, no on the contrary, God put women here for a reason. He took that rib out of Adam for a reason, not only to have babies, but to give men companionship: but only one woman for one man you here? And never never never anything physical until your wedding night. People who have premarital sex burn in the Bad Place too, you know. You know that right?"