The Last Victim_ A True-Life Journey Into the Mind of the Serial Killer - Jason Moss [20]
“Okay, guys,” she ordered us, “have a seat. I’ll be right back. I need to get something real quick. Try to familiarize yourself with the frog.” She pointed to the green lump in the middle of the pan. “I left a sheet there for you to see where you’ll find all the major organs and structures.”
“This is neat,” my mother said excitedly, and nudged me.
I now got my first look at the frog. It was lying on its back, belly up, on this waxy substance. The smell was even stronger and more putrid than when we first entered the room. The legs of the poor little creature were pinned into the wax with long needles. There was no way this frog was going to move, even if it was alive. Somehow this reassured me.
Miss Pernatozzi walked back in and told us about the procedures we were going to be following.
“First, we’ll make an incision here,” she said, pointing to a spot on the frog. I was trying to hold my breath so I didn’t have to inhale that terrible smell.
“Then,” my teacher continued, “we’ll be pulling this out from there . . .”
I could feel my stomach tighten as she described what we were to do. I felt like I had something in my eyes. Maybe dirt or something. I don’t know, but things were a little blurry.
“Okay, Jason,” she said, “are you ready to make the first cut?” I looked at my mother pleadingly. She could tell I was a little apprehensive.
Since I didn’t move, my mother suggested that perhaps the teacher could show us how to get started.
“All right,” Miss Pernatozzi agreed.
She picked up the scalpel and began making an incision along the length of the frog’s stomach. My mother was looking intently at what she was doing. I felt like a warm blanket had been thrown over me. I was beginning to feel very hot. And I was doing everything I could to look anywhere but at this frog that was in the process of being disemboweled.
“Jason,” my mother said, “watch what she’s doing right now. You’ll be doing this in a minute, so pay attention.”
I looked back down again and saw Miss Pernatozzi peeling the flesh of the frog’s stomach back and pinning it against the wax. I couldn’t take it anymore.
“Jason?” my mother asked. “Jason . . . are you okay?”
I began to see a white fuzz all around, like the screen of a television that has no signal coming through. Everything around me seemed to be shaking violently.
The next thing I knew, I was on the floor. I could hear echoes of my mother’s voice, calling my name. “Jaaason . . . Jaason.” I opened my eyes and found myself on the floor in my mother’s lap. I’d fainted and fallen off the chair.
I was covered in sweat, and very scared and confused. I could hear Miss Pernatozzi in the background say, “I guess I’ll start putting these things away.”
I felt so embarrassed. So ashamed. They went through all this effort for me and I didn’t even have the stomach to go through with it. Since that time, I’ve always been repulsed by the least sight of blood. So much for a career in medicine.
Although I won the Presidential Academic Fitness Award at age eleven, I was still viewed by my parents as being weak and vulnerable. Hence, I wasn’t permitted to view anything on television or in the movies that might upset my weak stomach. This especially rankled when a movie was released called Friday the 13th. I’d been told that it was about a guy who stalks others in the most horrifying way; ironically, he was named Jason! I reasoned that if I could face what I feared the most, a bogeyman-like monster trying to snatch and kill me, then perhaps I wouldn’t be so afraid all the time.
I begged my parents to let me see the movie but my mother adamantly refused. I found this hypocritical because she was constantly reading her true-crime books and giving me capsule descriptions.
My fears weren’t just based on fantasy. When I was little, my younger brother and I were waiting in one