As FRANK K. MAson grew up, snakes, spiders and animal bones became a regular fixture in his life. From time to time, Dessa would come by to share her other snakes, and Frank became obsessed with the variety of spiders he suddenly noticed around Manor Mill as well.
He also grew fascinated by the relationship of the living and the dead, particularly when he’d stumble upon old carcasses in the field. While Frank could not articulate or frame it himself, the concept of God emerged for him and drew him further inward, as he tried to make sense of creatures as diverse as a garter snake and a daddy long leg and so many mammals around him – deer and fox and cows – that just died and rotted in a pasture. He wondered how he would die and wondered why bones seemed to last so much longer. He liked their strength, too.
He also became fascinated with how snakes liked to wrap themselves around the large thigh and leg bones of the dead cows he had, more so – he thought – than they did other objects like a big stick, as if they seemed to know too that they were wrapping their body around something that had once breathed and walked the earth. He’d make small playgrounds of bones for them to slither around and watch them interact with all of the obstacles he’d set up. They were toys, of sorts.
Now, at present, he ripped down the advertisements of him, every one of them that he saw. He went into the barn and found that his bed had been recreated with straw, tired axes and rusty hatchets — none of which he had ever used. He stared at it like he was looking into a distorted life, someone he knew well but had never met, but not a person that was meant to be himself. He felt violated, robbed of something, his identity. He grabbed the first ax he could and raced downstairs.
He wondered now what else had been “adapted” to suit a tour of people who had nothing better to do on a Saturday evening (“You’ll never be so terrified!” the advertisement said) but to find out about this “freak” who had loved an animal so much he tried to become one.
In the woods, he was petrified to see that even his own hiding spot – a tiny oasis tucked in the woods where he could listen to the river and be alone – had been violated. Signs were posted about Frank’s obsession with snakes. That’s when he noticed fake rubber snakes all over the place, cheap replicas of the creatures he loved. He took his ax, heaved it high and cut one of the snakes in half. It bounced off the ground with the impact and landed upside down unceremoniously.
And then, Frank realized what he needed to do, to solve it. To put everything back in its place. To give him peace. To end this.
And with ax in hand, Frank raced up to the Mill, dug up his mask and put it on.
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