By: Jack Bristow

“Just because I kill for a living doesn’t mean I’m a subhuman mongrel with no feelings whatsoever. Even I have my limitations.”

How many times have I wanted to share that with my therapist, Dr. Kinzer. But, my cover’d be blown, and those remarks would have transcended the patient/doctor confidentiality agreement in the State of Delaware. So’s I tell Dr. Kinzer I paint houses for a living–an idiomatic expression for contract killing. In a sense, I am not lying to the portly little bastard.

Sure, I have clipped many people, but never innocents. If a guy wants to have his wife knocked off for insurance purposes, I tell him to go screw himself. If some lady wants me to snuff out her husband because he cheated on her–I tell her, ever so tactfully, I don’t render my services for such reasons. Instead, I go after the bonafide pondscum: The sexual predators, the corrupt police officers, those killers who slipped through the cracks of the justice system, without a conviction.

But it bothers me I cannot confide this in Dr. Kinzer, or any other mental health professional for that matter. If I were able to, perhaps we would finally be able to make some kind of massive breakthrough. Perhaps then I would be on the road to healing if only Dr. Kinzer understood the complexities of my job, the stresses and dedication it takes to rub out scumbags of all stripes.

Then sometimes there’s the worrying factor. When going out on a hit, I always panic. Generally speaking, I carry the contract out to a T, flawlessly and cleanly, but when I’m driving back home, having just disposed of the most recent scumbag, I start getting these obsessive compulsive-type thoughts racing through my head: What if I clipped the wrong person? What if, despite my best efforts, I left some evidence–perhaps a strand of hair, a thumbprint, or even the executing weapon at the scene of the crime?

Of course, those thoughts are always unfounded. But I am still plagued by them after every piece of work I do. And it’s a shame I cannot disclose any of this to Dr. Kinzer. But some of these little “quirks” of mine are most assuredly a chink in my armor.

For instance, call me an obsessive compulsive, call me a germ-freak, lob any penny-ante insult at me that you will, dear reader. But I like to fulfil a contract as tidily and humanely as possible: Not a lot of blood; not a lot of guts and innards dripping on the floor. Leave a good-looking corpse for the family. A deserialized 9 millimeter Beretta equipped with a suppressor is my preferred mode of execution. Just two behind the head — bang, bang — and my quarry goes tumbling to the ground, not knowing what happened.

Last week in Tampa, a wonderful collegiate woman asked me to rub off her boyfriend. We were dining at Marty’s Lobster House. She was dunking her lobster in tartar sauce with a gusto and relish rarely seen. I, on the other hand, was picking at my Cesar’s salad, lamenting to her the sordid taste of artificial Bacon- Bits.

“These artificial bacon bits taste like they’re not suitable for human consumption. And these croutons–give me a break. They’re so hard. I think I just chipped my tooth. Anyway, why did I fly all this way to see you, dear? Lorenzo said it was important.”

She didn’t mince words. “Noah Amato–I want you to whack my boyfriend Henry.”

“I see,” I said, grasping my second premolar. Goddamned croutons. “Sue, I trust that Lorenzo explained everything to you. I do not clip anyone over petty disputes. I’m a humanitarian, after all, and I solely kill for humanitarian purposes….”

Sue confided in me how Henry has been stalking her since their break-up. “At 2:30 AM every night, he drives in front of my house, blaring Bon Jovi’s “Edge of a Broken Heart.” “He wakes my neighbors. I can’t sleep, either. I underperform at work.”

“This is very concerning,” I said, through mumbled toothache speech. “The police won’t do anything?”

“Nothing. Even after I returned to the dormitory last night and discovered all the koi in the pond had been poisoned. Henry knows I love the koi in the atrium. However, the police said there wasn’t enough proof.”

I slammed my fist on the tabletop, attracting gazes from everyone dining at Marty’s Lobster House that fateful day. “Killing exotic Japanese fish and blaring Bon Jovi at 2:30 in the morning are crimes against humanity. Henry is a dead man.”

Sue smiled widely.

Late that night, sure as shoe polish, Henry was parked in the dormitory parking lot, blaring Bon Jovi’s “On The Edge of a Broken Heart,” flashing his high beams at Sue’s room. Clad in black from head-to-toe, I deftly crept up to the 2019 Prius Henry was parked in. He had the windows down, yet he could not hear my footfalls, due to the high volume and speaker capacity. Just then I pulled out the silenced Beretta, stuck it right beside Henry’s temple and fired.

BANG.

He crumpled horizontally on the passenger side of the Prius. I dutifully and nonchalantly walked over toward the passenger side window, which was also opened, and pumped a few more into his head for good measure. With my right gloved hand, I removed the wallet from his back denim jeans pocket and stole all the money — to make it look like a random robbery-gone-awry, lest the detectives suspect Sue’s involvement.

Two hours later I was flying coach–God Almighty, I detest coach!–on a flight back to Wilmington Airport. In a few days, Lorenzo would hand me five thousand dollars for taking care of Sue’s problem. I would lay low for a few weeks, keep a low profile, then ask Lorenzo if he had any more work for me. Rinse and repeat.

“This is the business I have chosen,” in the sage words of Hyman Roth. Of course, Doctor Kinzer knows absolutely none of this. He steadfastly believes I’m some neurotic humanitarian goofball who literally paints houses for a living, whose biggest concern is climbing the ladder to the roof safely. In reality, I’m some neurotic humanitarian who happens to be a contract killer — whose biggest concern is finally getting caught and sent away to Lewisburg for life.

But without being able to accurately and appropriately tell Doctor Kinzer the nature of my work, how am I ever to expect psychological improvement?

Perhaps it’s high-time I’d sought another vocation….

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Jack Bristow’s writing can be read in Huffpost, Saturday Evening Post, The Orange County Register, CalMatters, and elsewhere online. Bristow also plays Elvis Presley on the celebrity greeting website Cameo, and plays fictional mobster Jimmy Capece in Elias Perez’s webseries, “Mocos.”