The Black Box

Don’t get me wrong, I loved my first wife, Martha. But she passed—bless her heart. My second wife, Fanny Mae? I’d never say I loved her more than Martha, but maybe I did. And it wasn’t just the double D’s, whatever people thought. Or the thirty-five year age difference, her thirty and me sixty-five. No, I needed her—for my son. After Martha died, my boy and I struggled to communicate. But he was a man now, just turned thirty himself. All this sounds harsh, and crude, but nobody can judge me harder then my own self.

Anyway, he’d say something was bad, meaning good. I knew that one, but rent free, when he was thinking hard? What about, no cap truth, stan the Mets, or I’m dead when he was laughing out loud? And what’s with all the text letters: IMO, BRB, and IDK? I couldn’t keep up. I needed an interpreter.

Fanny Mae coached me on all the new-fangled gizmos the Gen Zs were up too. She said I should ‘connect with the younger generation’ (which she could as a Gen Z herself). My boy, Jake, apparently, struggled with finding himself. Part of me couldn’t figure out how he couldn’t find himself in our basement, one large room, but this is what I needed Fanny Mae for. To explain things.

“Why’s he so standoffish?” I asked. “All I did was tell him to take out the garbage.

“It’s the generation. Covid.”

This didn't make sense to me. “Jake was huddled up on his computer shoot- em-ups before covid,” I said.

“Trust me. Covid messed up the whole generation.” She stretched out the word ‘whole’ into two syllables talking through her Hollywood teeth (thirty grand, easy).

And now we arrive at the real challenge—the big kahuna. Sex. She wanted it all the time, and I… well, I’m sixty-five. I could still rally the troops (with a little help from my friends), like in the Reagan years, but some of the soldiers were AWOL. I didn’t want to (couldn’t, if I’m honest) make love ALL THE TIME.

“Again?” I’d said. “It’s Sunday. The Lord’s rest day.”

“Don’t you love me, Eddie?”

One day I was nosing around the basement while Jake was at the unemployment office. On his computer, a chill went up the back of my neck. I clicked. The screen came alive: a jittery video of three young men shoving an old man into a black box, the size of a casket cut in half. He fought, flailing, but they overpowered him. They forced him in, bending him in half, pressing the lid down as he screamed. They chained it.

I asked Fanny Mae about it.

“It’s Covid,” she said. “He’s repressed. Needs an outlet for his… male survival instincts.”

“Outlet? You go the condo at Sunset Beach. Doesn’t he unwind there?”

“He does.” She grabbed her keys. “I’m off to Dr. Longiotti. Should I do just the bags, or a full touchup? What do you think?” She stretched the skin under her eyes in the hall mirror.

“What do you mean, ‘male survival instincts’?”

“Some guys are aggressive. More… virile. Didn’t you feel it when you were younger? But I gotta go, Sweetie.”

I opened my mouth, but she slammed the front door.

One thing to do; talk to Jake. I felt the bass boom through the floor. He was downstairs.

“Jake, my man! I saw a guy shoved into a box on your computer. What’s that about?”

He turned the music down, leaned forward, shook his head, fists clenched. “What is it… NOW?”

“Well, if you don’t want to talk—”

“WHAT DO YOU WANT?”

“Son. I’m concerned.”

He leaned back, hands behind his head, took a long breath, sighed, and spoke in a singsong monotone. “It’s a game, Dad. An actor goes in a box. Players find him before he starves or dies of thirst.”

“Dies?”

“Like geocaching. A treasure hunt.”

“A treasure hunt for people who might die?”

“Don’t be stupid, Dad. They’re ACTORS. Don’t you know anything?”

“It looked pretty real,” I muttered. “I mean—”

Boom. The music was back on.

***

“They hate us,” Carlos said.

I shook my head. “They’re our children. Why would they hate us?” Every Wednesday, the guys and I met at Flo’s Diner. Carlos is an empty nester, just like Issa and John Boy. We raised our kids together. Egg dripped down Carlos’s chin onto his goatee, so I wiped it off with my napkin.

John Boy sprawled across the booth, all muscle and flash, red glasses to match his loafers. “It’s the boomer thing, right?”

“You got it, nut bag,” Carlos said. “We’re all baby boomers and they resent us for destroying the world.”

Issa cocked his head. “No way. Not my Khalid.”

“Who you kidding?” John Boy said. “Didn’t your precious Khalid get caught sending photos of his—”

“I shouldn’t a told you guys about his texts. Now you’re using it against me.” Issa crossed his arms.

I grabbed Issa’s forearm. “Not one of us hasn’t had issues with our kids, Issa.”

Carlos glanced around, then leaned in, his voice low. “There’s something going on, I tell you. A mood, an edge when you talk to these Gen Zers. It’s a conspiracy, is what it is.” He leaned back and nodded, like there was nothing more to be said. “Finito.”

Everyone gaped at him.

“I caught Jake with a video shoving some guy in a box; TikTok, whatever that is.” I said.

“No way,” said John Boy.

“Not just a joke, but serious. Blood. Screaming. Said it was a game they’re playing— ‘Kill the Boomers’. You get points.

John Boy’s eyes widened. “No freakin’ way.”

“Views, influencers, ad revenue. It’s a new world, buddy boy,” Issa said.

Everyone went quiet, chewing on their eggs and gulping coffee.

“‘Kill the Boomers’. Is that what he called it?” Carlos asked, through a mouthful of eggs.

“Yeah.”

“My kid mentioned that game. Same name.”

“Mine too,” John Boy said.

“Holy buckaroo,” I said. “That’s all of us.”

The table went silent.

Carlos leaned in. “I know one thing.”

I narrowed my eyes. “What?”

“We watch each other’s backs. Or this new generation will take us out. I’m not dying for global warming.”

“Or overpopulation,” Issa said.

“Or ‘cause they can’t get a job,” John Boy added. “Even if it’s not their fault.”

***

Fanny Mae was in the kitchen cradling our little Bichon like a baby. The dog burrowed into her fluffy pillow chest, jostled by Fanny Mae’s sobs, tears running mascara down her face. “It’s scary, and just… not right,” she whimpered, while tightening her grip on the squirming dog. “Jakey says he’s losing points from the competition. Ad revenue is down.”

Behind her, the news was running about a murder. Both of us stared at the TV as a camera cut to the alley behind Lee Mong’s Restaurant, an ambulance flashing red and blue. The reporter leaned into the mic. “The body has now been identified as John Stanley Morgan.” This one hit home. John Boy.

Behind the reporter, I could see the body bag as they zipped it up. One thing I couldn’t miss: John Boy’s red shoes—his trademark loafers. An officer shoved them back in the bag. Only one guy had shoes like that.

Detective Kamiński stepped to the mic, his face the color of raw ham, red and pudgy.

“Random violence Detective?” the reporter asked, tossing her hair.

“Not random, Candy. We’ve had multiple deaths with the same pattern. This is not, and I repeat, not, cause for panic. We’re asking the public to report any violent behavior against our aging population, sometimes characterized, as, and I quote, ‘Baby Boomers’.”

“Why boomers Detective?”

“I shouldn’t say.”

“Oh… won’t you say? Please me,” Candy purred.

“The group calls themselves, ‘Kill the Boomers,“ the detective mumbled, his face flushed red.

“Speak into the mic, Detective,” someone yelled from the crowd.

“Kill the boomers. Maybe a cult.”

Candy shoved the mic in his face. “How do you know? Some kind of message?”

The detective coughed and fidgeted.

A woman off camera yelled, “They carve ‘BABY BOOMER DIE’ into their chest, don’t they? Don’t lie! I saw it myself in the dumpster!”

The camera moved to the crowd. Echos of Night of the Living Dead as old people crowded closer.

A gray-haired man in a fedora and pencil mustache pushed forward. “It’s the mark of the devil is what it is! The devil!”

“You tell ‘em Oscar!” someone yelled.

The camera jerked back. “Is that true?” Candy pressed. “Multiple bodies? All older? Mutilation?”

“I can’t confirm.”

My mouth went dry. Kill the Boomers? I remembered the black box from Jake’s video, the swords sliding in, screams, blood dripping out.

But Jake’s videos were actors,” I said to Fanny Mae. “The police are on it.”

“Actors, right. Now he’s got competition. More sites, fewer clicks to go around, less ad revenue. He needs to hurry it up.”

***

That night, a sound outside the house woke me. A car door slammed. Then another. I went to the window. A figure stood near the mailbox, hooded, still, smoking a cigarette. He stared up and we locked eyes, then he squealed off.

The next morning, Fanny was cheerful. Pancakes, syrup, humming some song I didn’t know. Jake sat at the table, tapping his phone, smiling.

“What’s the good news?” I asked.

Fanny Mae said, “It’s Friday. Beach day.”

Jake said, “Guess I get to sleep in.”

Fanny Mae laughed. “You always sleep in, Jakey”

I smiled, or tried to. But the hair on my arms wouldn’t go down.

***

I woke in our bedroom in pitch darkness, a bag was covering my head. Heavy hands yanked my arms behind me and zip-tied my wrists. “Fanny?” I croaked. “Are you ok?” Silence. I was shoved into a van, thrown hard against metal. The engine started and we pulled away, the tires crunching on gravel. Two voices men’s murmured ahead. My chest tightened.

I was slammed into a steel folding chair, the hood ripped away. The two young men loomed, their heads covered with black ski masks, bloodshot eyes. The smaller ones eyes looked dead, like shark eyes. Behind them both was the black box like from Jake’s video.

The man with shark eyes, ripped duct tape off my mouth. As he did his hood came free. He was a gaunt twenty something, his cheeks sucked in. He giggled nervously.

“What have you done with my wife?!” My voice cracked.

The shark-eyed man laughed, a harsh, rattling sound. “Can you believe it? His wife?”

The other man hissed. “I can. But he’ll know what’s up soon enough.”

I shuddered to think what ‘soon enough’ meant. But I did know, instantly the man’s voice. “Jake?”

Behind Jake, another voice. “Let’s get him in the box, Jakie Honey.”

Fanny Mae.

She leaned in, the old perfume filling my head—Jasmin des Anges, my honeymoon gift. “Sorry, Eddie. Should’ve picked a better wife.” She ran a painted nail down my cheek, a gesture I used to think was tender. “You just can’t give your money to, what is it, Baby?”

“The Nature Conservancy,” Jake said, his voice flat.

She waved her finger in my face. “No nature conservation for you.”

“Fanny Mae, I—”

Jake put his hands around her, nuzzling her neck.

Somewhere, I had missed something. “You don’t have to do this.”

“The thing is, Eddie baby, I hate freaking pickleball,“ she said.

I struggled, muscles screaming, heart hammering. They pressed me into the box. Doubled over, I felt the cold wood on my back, my knees screaming. I realized, half-sick, that the sour smelling gouges in the wood beside me were fingernail-deep, stained dark with old blood.

I waited in agony on my knees, scrunched over, couldn't move. Fannie Mae, Jake, and Shark Eyes must have left. Hours inched by in the dead silence. I’d sleep, but how could I? The box pressed in.

It must have been after midnight, a light came on. Jake was outside the box.

“Dad, this isn’t how it was supposed to go.” Jake’s voice cracked, softer than I’d heard in years. “After Mom... I tried to talk to you. But you were having a tough time yourself, and I didn’t want to bother you. I wish I had. It’s just you were easy pickings. Bye Dad.”

The light went out, and I heard the squealing of a metal warehouse door sliding shut. I lay scrunched up in the pitch dark, like my kid had buried me alive. But I didn't know the half of how bad it could get.

Much later the light came back on. Shark Eyes giggled outside the box. He cracked open the lid just enough to slip something in, then closed the lid and chained it back. Whatever it was, MOVED. I felt a slivering by my thigh, a scratching up my side, a sniffing muzzle at the back of my neck.

Right in my face a rat’s head popped. I couldn't see him, only smell his sewer breath, warm, and wet. I then heard him nibbled on the gummy blood stuck to the side of the box. I felt warm urine soaking my pants, pooling beneath me, the stink of uric acid.

I lay there a long time as the rat chipped away with his teeth. It gave me time to think. It’s true Jake had reached a place where he barely looked at me, had a language I didn’t understand. I remember after his mom died, he’d watch old videos of her while he lay on the couch. I’d stand in the hallway and think: I should go in, I should try. And then I wouldn’t. I guess I was going to die with that guilt.

I woke with light coming through the holes. The blood was nearly all scraped off the wall, little teeth marks in rows.

It must have been morning. I felt a tickle where my shirt had pulled out of my pants, on the bare skin. I imagined a whisker brushing my lower back, sniffing, hungry.

And then a light back on, a giggle, steel clinking by my side, another rattling at my rear. I closed my eyes.

I heard a yell, a screech. There was crashing in the warehouse. Yelling. Suddenly, the box tipped violently, and the swords yanked free. The lid cranked open, and massive hands lifted me like a rag doll and set me down gently.

John Boy’s broad face appeared. Behind him, Issa held Fanny.

“I’m sorry, Eddie,” John Boy said. “You thinking me dead.”

The detective stepped forward, face flushed. The officer next to him said, “We’ll be taking Fanny.”

Outside, the morning air smelled of asphalt, exhaust, and adrenaline. Fanny Mae? Forget it. But Jake? You don’t give up on family, no matter how far gone. At least, I couldn’t.