Believing Lies

by Elizabeth, Anne

  He smiled.

  Henry grinned, thinking about that night, how the fear rose in Kyle’s eyes when he realized his best friend was dead. How crazy he went thinking it was him. He was even admitted into the psych ward because he started hallucinating.

  Good, Henry thought to himself, turning the next couple of pages. The smell of rotting was in his room, but it never bothered Henry. Ever since he was little, he never minded the smell of corpses. Of plants, animals, or humans.

  The next page spelled out Mark’s name. Henry had crossed the name off with so much pressure and anger, he ripped through three pages. Good thing he had spaced them out so much, otherwise it would’ve been ruined. Underneath the name Henry had written.

  Didn’t get the chance.

  He had everything planned out. The first time Mark got away because Henry let him. Letting him reconnect with Kyle was all part of his plan. At the hospital, he was going to replace Mark’s IV drip with mercury. The IV bag was in a sleeve, so nobody would have noticed the difference until it was too late. However, when Henry got there, he was already dead. He came home that night to write up a new plan.

  “Hold the door, please!” Henry yelled to the nurses up ahead. The nurses turned around to see him running at them. They all gave each other looks, and he smiled at them, holding up a brown paper bag.

  “My mom is the chief, and she just called me to say that she forgot dinner, so I brought some to her,” he explained, holding the edge of the door. “She told me to use this door because it’s past visiting hours, so the front is closed.”

  The nurses smiled at him and moved out of the way so he could pass through. As Henry walked away from them, he heard their whispers, saying he was a good son. He moved through the halls swiftly, quick on his feet. He walked down many hallways and took a bunch of turns to go where he needed to.

  Henry knew that Mark already had his autopsy, and the body was in the morgue. He found the door that he spent many hours at as a kid and walked inside. A doctor was standing in there, facing the metal boxes they kept the bodies in. Henry pulled out a rag that had chloroform on it. He walked behind the doctor as quietly as he could and gently placed the cloth over his mouth. A grunt came from the doctor, along with a bit of a struggle, but it wasn’t long before he was on the ground. Henry searched through the morgue, looking for the body he so badly desired. He opened many coolers to find different dead people until Mark Evans’s lifeless eyes stared back at him.

  Now to get him out. Henry knew that the cameras right outside the door were broken. And all the ones down the hall to the exit were off for the shift change. It was the new way to stop the alarms that were set off by motion detectors. He bagged him up like a doll before leaving. He didn’t want to run in case someone was nearby and saw him. He managed to escape the hospital without a single person seeing him.

  He walked past a fenced-in house where he felt a tug on the bag. He realized that part of the fence was sticking out and hooked itself to the bag. Henry pulled on it, ripping the side of the body bag. Mark’s arm fell out of the bag, dripping with blood. The fence must’ve gone through the skin as well. Henry quickly placed it back in the bag then held it from the side that was broken. He made it to his car and threw Mark into the back. Henry didn’t even bother putting him in the trunk. When he got home, he lugged the bag over his shoulder, hoping it would keep the body from falling out. When he got to the front door, the bag had ripped even more, showcasing half of Mark’s body. Henry grabbed Mark from the bag and threw the bag in the trash. The smell from Mark would spread throughout the house, but if Henry moved quickly enough, he would be fine. No one would notice, especially since it’s so late. Henry dragged Mark’s body into the house and down the stairs. When Henry was at the bottom of his stairs, tugging the dead body into his room, he heard a creek at the top of his stairs.

  “Dammit.” He breathed, using all his strength to pull Mark into his closet as fast as he could. He left the door open and ran up the stairs. He swung open the door to be greeted with an armed Kyle.

  “What? Kyle?” Henry asked, his eyes narrowing on the pistol in his hands. “Why do you have a gun?”

  Henry smirked, thinking of how he pulled off his greatest plan. His eyes moved to the jar placed by his bed. Seeing a tongue placed inside there made him grin with excitement. The tongue started to turn brown, so Henry had to figure out how to make it last longer. He didn’t need his room smelling any worse. His attention shifted back to the book. He flipped through the next couple of pages, landing on Luke’s name. His hand twitched for the pen to the side of him. He crossed the name off with a huge X. He wished he had the chance to grab the bullet from Luke’s chest, but he couldn’t because of Kyle. The pistol he killed him with would do as a souvenir for now.

  Henry walked down the street with a backpack filled with his greatest goodies. Making a couple of turns, he finally made it to Luke’s house. It was broad daylight, so there was no way in which he could sneak. So, he had to walk in. Luke was with Kyle, and Luke’s mom was out with her girlfriend. Henry had been tracking which days she was out.

  Henry pulled out a key he had swiped from Luke that day to unlock the door. He planned on putting it back if he made it back in time, so he was already wearing gloves to make sure his fingerprints weren’t anywhere in the house. The door clicked open, and Henry made his way inside.

  He kept his shoes on, pacing the floor. He climbed the stairs and made his way into Luke’s room. He placed his bag down on the ground and pulled out his items: Nick’s phone, a journal, and revolver. Henry placed Nick’s phone in the drawer by his desk, leaving it the tiniest bit open. He placed the journal under Luke’s mattress. Henry had to find a spot for the gun. He noticed a creaking in the floorboard below his feet, so he tore it open. Nothing was inside until Henry placed the revolver in there. He closed the board, clearing up his mess. He quickly left the house, leaving everything else as it was.

  Everything was in place.

  Henry had swiped Luke’s phone a couple of days later. Long enough to know Kyle wouldn’t be texting him, waiting for a response.

  Henry placed the bullet in the journal, under Luke’s name. He taped it and admired the bullet. His work was almost finished. His plan, which had taken years of development, was finally coming together. He stood up, closing his eyes to live through each kill. Each plan he made and him getting away with it.

  A knife was sitting on his desk, which he wrapped his fingers around, picking it up. Kyle came to mind, which made Henry fume. He took the knife and stabbed it into the desk, cutting the wood. Henry sat back down, flipping through the pages before landing on a name that made him so angry he could kill. Which he did. He circled Kyle’s name ten times. One for each time he wanted to run the knife through his body. Henry sighed, leaning back in his chair. He muttered something, only for his ears.

  “For Max.”

  “Dad!” Kyle’s voice screeched. “Something’s wrong with Max!” Henry and his dad were sitting inside the sunroom. Henry had gotten sunburnt and didn’t want to play outside any more, so his dad offered to play a card game. Kyle and Max were hanging by the pool, but they weren’t allowed to go swimming because Max was too young. Neither one of them wanted to go inside, though, so their dad let them relax on the chairs.

  “What’s wrong, Kyle?” he asked, standing up. He placed his cards down, walking away. It was hard to hear what Kyle was saying from where they sat. It was something like, “I was…swimming.” Henry had no idea what the middle part was, nor did he care. He reached over and started peeking at what cards his dad had. There was a loud yell that echoed through Henry’s ears.

  He never liked things that were too loud.

  Henry winced and scraped his chair back. He ran outside to see his father hunched over the side of the pool, reaching for something. Kyle stood behind him, shaking. His entire body looked like it was vibrating. Kyle turned to Henry with tears brimming in his eyes. Henry raced over to Kyle and his dad, his fee
t slapping against the burning concrete. His dad grabbed ahold of what looked like an ankle. He pulled on it, and a body came with it. He placed the body onto the cement and started pressing against his chest. Henry noticed that the face was all blue and it belonged to his little brother Max.

  Kyle jumped onto his dad’s back, screaming, “Stop! You’re hurting him!”

  His dad grunted, trying to keep up with the compressions while also fighting Kyle. Henry lunged forward, tackling Kyle to the ground. Both boys hit their heads with a loud smack against the ground. Henry tussled with Kyle, holding him to the floor.

  “He’s trying to save him, idiot!”

  Henry’s emotions fled wild. He couldn’t control them. He had no idea what he was truly feeling. It was a mix of anger and sadness. And he didn’t know what to do. He just looked back at his dead baby brother and cried. Kyle ran inside and dialed 911.

  But he wasn’t calling for Max.

  He called the police on Henry for hurting his wrist.

  Henry snapped the pen in half, thinking of what Kyle did. At the hospital, Kyle admitted that he was trying to teach Max how to swim. Henry knew then that he hated Kyle. He started to practice how to hunt and stalk his prey. All the feelings and urges Henry was told to suppress came tumbling out. There was no controlling them.

  Henry stared up the stairs, picturing the trembling girl holding a gun. He laughed about how easy it was going to be. Although, he never made a page for her. He never thought Kyle would make another friend. He scribbled down the name: Marie.

  Henry whispered under his breath, something that he had whispered three times before.

  “I’m coming.”