Page 26

Indian Mountain Lake, Pennsylvania

M ichael Kohberger doesn’t want to make the call he’s about to. But he has no choice. His own son is a threat to the family.

None of it has worked. Not the boxing. Not the diet. Not the trips to the gun range or the move away from Jeremy Saba, Bryan’s childhood friend who has gotten into heroin, too. Not even a stint in rehab.

Bryan can’t stop using.

Which means he can’t stop stealing.

Now he’s taken Melissa’s cell phone and sold it. At a mall kiosk for two hundred dollars. Half what it’s worth.

Actions have consequences. Children, whatever their age, need to understand that.

So he closes his eyes briefly, then dials 911.

The police arrive, read Bryan his rights, and cuff him. The kid is civil. Barely looks at his dad. He knows who called the cops and why.

There’s a time to be calm, to talk to the police politely. Bryan knows that because he’s only sixteen, there’s a good chance this will be expunged from his record if he behaves.

He’ll go—again—to rehab.

Outwardly he’ll be the good, polite son everyone wants.

But inside?

Alone in the basement, Bryan lets his true feelings out on Tapatalk and SoundCloud, writing, recording, and posting an original rap song made for other sufferers of visual snow, a neurological condition that is the visual equivalent of TV static.

The rage, the loneliness, just pours out of him. The words are layered over a beat that is equally staccato and furious. A track no one in his family is likely to hear.

But this is the real him.

Always the same thing that disrupts my life.

Wonder when I’ll change, I guess when the time is right.

Procrastinating my derange to change would be a fight.

So I’m pacifist, like I’m afraid to get a bloody fist.

Look at this, my mind is pissed, and I keep running.

Why is this when I hit it always leaves them stunning?

I stuck in the future, but I’m never lookin’ at the fuckin’ present.

Keep it up, act like you’re all that.

Leave your loved one’s cryin’ like some seagulls.

You are not my equal, you are evil, but I’m

[unintelligible—people? Evil? Devil?]

And now I’m goin’ regal.

Don’t fuck with us.

Hope you learned your lesson.