Not a Bad Boy

"And now Michelle Leonard will play a selection from Mozart," the conductor announced as a beautiful woman stood and approached the solitary microphone stage center.

"This should be good," someone behind him stated.

"I heard she's magnificent," his date whispered into his ear as the conductor slipped away from his microphone, allowing all eyes to settle upon Ms. Leonard. As she bowed to the appreciative crowd, Nathaniel Howe began to squirm in his chair.

Mozart. The child prodigy he was compared to growing up. Howe's medium was not the piano, the harpsichord, the violin, or the flute. His was the guitar. He composed his first song at four, gave his first concert at eight, and by 10, was touring worldwide.

He loved music; it was his only friend. But his parents, two people that used his talent to their benefit, poisoned him. Whenever he had moments of doubt, they would berate him, telling him that Mozart was self-assure, he never second thought his own talents.

They stole his childhood, robbed him from experiencing bruised elbows, scraped knees, fistfights, and catching fireflies in the summer with friends. He had no friends, except for those his parents allowed in the house. And then, those were other talented young musicians.

He grew to resent Mozart and all his music. As he grew older, he associated the works of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart with the pain and abuse that his parents heaped on him. Mozart was their favorite composer, and would play his works while they talked, dined, or entertained guests that the home Howe's music had purchased.

"Are you feeling okay?" his date asked. Lori Wellington was a legal assistant at his brother's law firm, a stunningly tall, dark haired beauty he had a crush on ever since she walked into his brother's office one day while they met to go to lunch. She made an instant impression on Howe, causing him to loose all ability to speak for a moment as he looked into her almond shaped chocolate brown eyes.

"Yes," was his curt answer as he pulled his knees to his chest and tried to make the pain go away.

"Nate, honey, are you sure?" she whispered into his ear before kissing him gently on his cheek and reached for his hand. He quickly took it away.

"Don't touch me," he angrily said as he stood and began to walk away. She was stunned, not sure of what to do. Wellington sat, her mouth open wide, her eyes round as saucers.

He quickly moved down the row and into the aisle. He marched up the darken walkway; he need to be as far away from Lori as possible when the voices came. And he knew they would come. They always did when he heard Mozart.

Howe flung open the auditorium doors and rushed to an exit as his fingers fumbled in his pocket. A smoke, a cigarette would calm him, he thought to himself as he left the hall and stepped into the alley. He placed the last Marlboro to his lips and flicked his Zippo to life.

"Can I have a light from that?" an unfamiliar male voice asked. He looked around and saw a face. The man looked out of place for such a high brow affair; clothes and face shabby.

"Thanks," the man said as he exhaled a long trail of smoke from his lungs. "I needed that," he added as Howe heard another pair of feet come from behind.

"They're coming for you," the voice said in his head. That familiar voice, the one that sounded like his parents both cursing and condoling him simultaneously. "I told you that some day they would find out that you are a fraud and a nutcase, one that needs to be locked up."

"Not now," he whispered to himself as a second man came into sight. This one was filthier than the first. Howe reached back into his pocket and found a second metallic object, one that gave him such comfort when the voices came.

"Hate to do this to you, friend," the first man said as he flicked his cigarette to the ground. "But hand over your wallet." His words were met with a jab to his back. A third man had snuck up and now held a blade to his back.

"See, if you were such the man everyone had expected, you would not be in this situation," the voice said, taunting him. "Now what are you going to do?" the voice said with dripping sarcasm.

"I don't have much money," Howe began, but was cut off with the back of a hand across his mouth.

"See, mom was right," the voice said. "You are no good."

"Just give us the money," the cigarette man demanded. Howe nodded and slowly began to pull his hand from his pocket, showing that he was going to oblige with the demands.

"You are that worm mom always called you," the voice said, repeating it over and over again.

"No I'm not," Howe screamed, causing his robbers to flinch. He felt the blade enter his back, but there was no pain from that. The voices and the music enraged him.

He pulled out his knife and began to swing at flesh, striking at anyone and everyone. In his rage, Howe had no idea of what and at whom he was striking. All he could see and hear where his parents, taunting and ridiculing.

"Mommy, daddy, I am not a bad boy," he said as his blade struck the skin of his would be assailants. "I am not a bad boy; I am not a bad boy."

"My God, Nate, what happened to you?" Lori asked as she came out of the side door and saw Nathaniel Howe standing over the lifeless bodies of three men. He had a knife in his hand; he had a glazed look on his face.

"I am not a bad boy," he breathlessly whispered.