Preview: Mr. X

We called him Mr. X.

We always knew there was something different about Mr. X. He’d walk around the neighborhood everyday at 3pm, shirtless with weights wrapped around his ankles, treading along the tree-lined streets like the Terminator. He wore sunglasses and never smiled, and the time when we knocked on his door for the school fundraiser we saw he had no furniture. Just a punching bag and a weight rack. We hadn’t met anyone like that before. We were kids who hadn’t left our enclave and didn’t know that the world was full of all manner of types, on both sides of the law.

“What does Mr. X do for work?” AJ Pierce asked his mom one night at dinner.

“Mr. Who?” she asked, reaching across the table to add more string beans to the insufficient serving on his plate.

“Mr. X. who moved into the old gray bungalow on Spring Street.”

“First of all, don’t call him Mr. X.”

“Why not?”

“It’s rude.”

“Well what’s his real name?”

“It doesn’t matter. Just be polite.”

“What does he do for work?”

“Well, he’s...”

None of our parents could answer our questions about Mr. X.

But we knew he was a hitman.

We spent idle afternoons at the diner, slurping milkshakes, or in the woods, whittling branches down to nothing, speculating about Mr. X. We made up theories about his origin story. We drew comics about his daily life and likely targets.

“He’s definitely a hitman.”

“Definitely.”

“Someone that ripped?”

“No way he’s not out there, murdering people for a price.”

“He’s so intense.”

“Laser-focused.”

“Like a killing machine.”

If we were honest with ourselves, we would’ve admit one of us would hire him someday, and we knew it would be Wyatt.

Wyatt’s dad had violent tendencies. It was ironic because he was a cop, praised as a hero for keeping our community safe. But when Officer Wyatt got home, it was a different story.

After he kicked Wyatt down a flight of stairs, Wyatt decided he was going to hire Mr. X.

He walked to the gray bungalow on Spring Street and knocked on the front door.

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