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“‘Serpent!’ screamed the Pigeon. ‘I’m not a serpent!’ said Alice indignantly. ‘Let me alone!’”

-Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

The redhead’s smile was dazzling, and looking at it impacted straight down to his soul.

It was innocent and teasing and completely charming.

It seemed to promise something exquisite and pure.

Something which would make the person on the receiving end of that smile complete.

Something which would just wash everything clean and make everything alright forever. Something that offered life.

Something… which apparently had to do with coffee.

Oz sat on the tree limb, looking out at the decaying billboard which featured the image in question.

A redheaded woman in an elegant blue housedress was serving something called ‘Lieber Coffee’ to some unseen individual.

The red cup sat on an outstretched tray in the woman’s elegant hands, like some sacred Holy Grail, offered to an unseen man by an angel.

She was looking at him like he was the most amazing person she’d ever known. Like he was… extraordinary.

Oz had never actually heard of the defunct brand, and the tagline under the image simply provided the words “At the end…” and the rest of this cryptic message was long gone.

The ad appeared to be from the midcentury, its colors now sun-faded and stained.

Just how it came to be here and how it had survived this long was anyone’s guess, but Oz spent a great part of his days staring at it.

Not because it had extraordinary artistic merit, just because he found it relaxing for some reason, and it was one of the only things visible from the tree.

Everywhere else he looked, there were only mountains of trash.

Oz’s aunt and uncle owned the local dump, and the cramped ramshackle trailer which served as their home was positioned right in the middle of it.

Oz hated it. It was like drowning. Drowning in a sea of other people’s trash and mistakes.

The sights and smells were overwhelmingly awful.

He escaped the home whenever he had the opportunity, climbing the property’s only tree and looking in the one direction which wasn’t just a pile of garbage.

That tree was Oz’s window on the world. The one place where he could feel safe and alone.

But the day was drawing to a close, which meant that Oz would have to return to reality and abandon his imaginary world.

Not that Oz really had much of an imagination, but even 25% of one was better than 100% reality. Anything was better than reality, really.

Oz was the only ten year old in the world already trying to get a full-time job so he’d have enough money to move out, while simultaneously researching “Is it possible to put yourself up for adoption?” at the library.

He dropped his book to the ground and started climbing down from his perch. It took a few minutes, but then his feet were once again planted on the soft, vaguely damp soil, which was peppered with bits and pieces of a thousand different types of trash.

He tried to keep the area around the tree relatively clear of debris, but the ground itself contained the garbage.

It ran too deep in it. The litter was always right below the surface, no matter how much you raked or how hard you tried to hide it.

A month ago, he’d spent three full days carefully trying to remove all traces of trash.

And it had looked so clean and orderly when he was done.

But the garbage had returned within a week.

Uncovered by the wind and rain, the shame once more exposed.

It was impossible to get rid of it and Oz was getting to the point that he was sick of even trying to.

It might be clean at the moment, but it wouldn’t be for long. You could tell. His aunt was right about that.

Filth would out itself in the end.

Oz took an almost clinical fascination with the idea, because it confirmed what he already knew to be true: things which looked clean were always dirty.

As such, he had long ago self-diagnosed himself as a serial killer, still in his formative years.

He was well-acquainted with the warning signs, watching for them in himself the way other boys might await a holiday or a meteorologist might observe the weather .

He didn’t recall an abnormal amount of bedwetting as a child, but he wasn’t really sure how one defined a “normal” amount of something so horrible.

He didn’t start fires, as a rule, but he wasn’t afraid of them either, which was probably a bad sign.

And he saw no point in hurting small animals.

So, as of yet, he hadn’t reached the stage of exhibiting the three biggest warning signs of burgeoning serial killers.

Still, he was a loner and he did feel a disconnect between himself and other people.

He wasn’t on the same page as they were, he’d always seen that.

And he had violent thoughts sometimes, which he hid from people.

He could feel it, even if there was no evidence of it yet. Which meant, honestly, it didn’t really matter if he was showing the classic serial killer telltales or not. He would eventually . There was no doubt.

One day, Oz’s life was destined to be featured on one of those crime shows, talking about what a quiet, odd boy he was, and how the warning signs had all arrived later in life than they normally did, but were ignored, just the same.

He’d gone so far as to think about the exact photos they’d use for the program, probably something where he looked haunted, gaunt, and angry.

He didn’t think those photos actually existed, but they’d probably be taken once he completed his metamorphosis into a madman.

It was inevitable.

Oz was a serial killer, even if he never actually killed anyone. He could feel it. And everyone told him so. Repeatedly.

It kept him up at nights. It was yet one more reason why he preferred to be alone.

He brushed off his book, one of the Hardy Boys mysteries, which he’d bought for 10 cents at the library’s book sale.

Generally, Oz would have vastly preferred to buy the book new and wrapped in sterile plastic, but his aunt and uncle weren’t really readers, so there was no way they would have given him money for that.

Oz liked mysteries. There was an order to them which he appreciated.

There was good and there was evil, and evil could be defeated if you just followed the clues.

And there were always clues to solve any seemingly impossible mystery life threw at you.

Everything made sense, if you looked at it long enough.

Everything had a place and nothing was messy.

And Oz liked the Hardy Boys especially. He liked the idea of having someone to solve mysteries with.

Someone you could trust. Because Oz couldn’t even imagine such a thing.

Oz wasn’t really a people person and he didn’t have any friends.

He’d never had any friends and he was utterly okay with that.

He honestly didn’t want any. People were silly and dirty and irritating.

But he liked reading about the Hardy Boys and imagining having a partner and a friend.

Someone who didn’t irritate and disgust him.

One day, some very noble men and women would probably need to stop Oz, once he truly lost his mind and started doing bad things. They’d need to work together to do it.

He had nothing but respect for them. Hopefully, they’d manage to do it before he killed too many people. It wasn’t that Oz wanted to hurt people, at all, but he predicted that he one day would. That was how these things went.

Trash couldn’t hide for long.

He switched off his small radio, and James Taylor instantly stopped singing about fire and rain.

Oz had hung the radio from a red reflector nailed to the tree, which was there to keep the trucks from crashing into the tree at night, but this area of the dump hadn’t really been used in years.

Which was why Oz liked hanging out here.

His uncle’s dump had existed since the 1930s, providing local communities the perfect place to discard the things they didn’t want anymore. The things which were too disgusting or too dangerous to keep around.

Like Oz himself.

His uncle made ends meet by occasionally allowing people to dump toxic chemicals here. Or charging the criminal element a fee to turn a blind eye to the fact they were using his land to dispose of… problems. Bloody, dismembered problems.

Oz had little doubt there were dozens of people buried forever in the mounds of garbage which circled the site. Slowly decomposing in the filth. Gradually being eaten away by the rats and the mangy seagulls which were forever moving around in the horror.

Living at the dump was an absolute nightmare. One which Oz couldn’t wake from, no matter how hard he tried.

Oz made his way down the path and ran smack into one of the principle reasons why living here was so horrible: his cousin.

The older boy towered over him, cigarette dangling from his lip. The boy stood up, pushing his friends out of the way. “Hey there, Creepy.” He advanced on him, face contorting with sudden rage. “Been meaning to have a talk with you…”

“Kick his ass, Hooch!” The skinny girl standing next to his cousin encouraged.

His cousin always went by “Hooch.” It was one of those nicknames which caught on because his cousin kept trying to make it a thing.

Probably because his given name was “Meryl.” The other kids in the neighborhood quickly realized that if they ever wanted to survive past high school, they’d better start embracing the nickname he’d chosen for himself.

Personally, Oz thought it sounded stupid.

He saw no sense in going by anything other than your actual name.

“I don’t want to fight.” Oz told him, backing away.

Hooch pushed him. “Did I ask what you wanted?”

Oz stumbled backwards.