by Dan Cummings
She didn’t like the thought of any harm coming to him and before she knew she was doing it she pushed her lips into his. Matt softly turned his head away from the press of her glossy lips. Her enthusiasm was doused like a bucket of cold water. ‘What’s the matter?’ Her eyes became little shards of stone, her body language defensive. ‘Am I not…slutty enough for you?’
Matt tilted his head, looking at her from the corner of his eye, trails of smoke jettisoning from his nostrils. ‘You’re drunk, Deb. I’m not going to be another creep. How about you give me your number instead?’
Her vodka-blurred eyes softened and focused on him as she considered the proposal. She made him wait. Her lips slowly revealed a top row of perfect white teeth. ‘Maybe. But I might only like you when I’m drunk.’
‘Then I’ll bring booze with me.’
Her face shone with promise. ‘Pass me your phone.’ After tapping her number into it she thrust it against his chest and cast a vigilant eye across the ghosts amidst the trees and the intoxicated clusters of seniors. ‘Okay then, outlaw. Should we get going before they catch you?’
*****
Keeping the wooden support beams and the occasional hay bale between him and any unseen threats on the hay-strewn dance floor, Neil quickly veered over to Lindsey. The skinny X-Ray girl laid eyes on him first, and Lindsey’s followed. He could smell her perfume, cleanliness and flowers. Suddenly, his mind hit a conversational fork in the road, one which could tank any possible relationship right out the gate. Should he play it casual and pretend he wasn’t risking a mauling or just be brutally honest and explain how he wanted to see her but needed to leave at the earliest possible convenience?
The light in her doe eyes radiated, a sparkling contrast to the pale foundation make-up and fine tracery of black cracks running around her chin and delicate cheekbones. ‘Neil,’ she celebrated, arms opening. ‘You came.’
Surprised by the enthusiasm, he found his cheek smothered by the monochromatic pinstriped shoulder ruffles of her dress. Nevertheless, he gratefully took the opportunity to return the embrace, careful not to spill beer on her back or poke X-Ray girl with his baseball bat.
‘What happened to Trump?’
‘He didn’t get elected.’
Her smile floored him. ‘Ha, that’s pretty funny.’ She looked around his tall frame, noticing Sam looking like he was waiting for a dodgeball to be hurled at him. ‘Hey, Sam,’ she greeted. Sam nodded and went to wave; realizing he was raising his weapon, he blinked and used his cup hand instead.
Neil wished more than anything he could keep a casual dialogue going here, but with each passing second he was waiting for a crushing hand to close on his shoulder. ‘Lindsey, I know I literally just got here, but I can’t stay. I’m sorry.’
Her face dropped from carefree to disenchanted, and he felt like such a prick. ‘Why?’
With a now customary endangered species neck swivel, he said, ‘Noakes and Staubach are looking to beat the shit out of me, Sam and Matt.’
She appraised his costume again and her cautious gaze dwelled on the bat in his hand. Her eyes asked the questions before her mouth did.
‘It’s a long story. But I really wanted to see you tonight, even if it was only for a minute. I don’t want to pull you away from the party, but maybe if you get bored—’
‘You’re not too sharp are you,’ she teased. ‘I’m only here because you said you would be.’
Neil tried his best to look cool, he really did, but his cheeks hurt from the smile he returned. Before another word could tumble from his mouth, Lindsey was on her tiptoes, locking her black coloured lips to his own. The kiss was an explosion of senses and the world seemed to fall away in a peaceful tongue-tied delight. She pulled away, and he knew that she now owned a piece of him.
‘Well we should probably get going now. Have you seen Deb? Matt is looking for her.’
She released her arms from around his neck and he instantly felt cheated out of the moment. ‘She went outside. Some asshole—’ her glare shot to a worse-for-wear Zorro slouching against a hay bale ‘—wasn’t taking no for an answer.’
Neil couldn’t see Matt in the vicinity. He asked Sam for a report over his shoulder, who simply shrugged hopelessly. ‘Maybe Matt’s out there too,’ he said to her, gesturing for them to leave. She bid a quick farewell to her musical classmate and turned to leave. Neil loved the sensation of her hand in his. He patted Sam on the shoulder. ‘Let’s go.’
Sam shot him a withering stare built from bitterness and greasy, cold fear. ‘Hey, don’t let me keep you.’
The three of them inched their way through the tide of bodies, eyes locked on the wide barn entrance and the field beyond. Several dancers stepped aside, leaving an opening and a perfect view of a maudlin Dodd, decked out in an inflatable penis costume. For one brief moment, the jolt of adrenaline seemed to clarify and freeze-frame the moment for Neil, and he could make out Dodd’s sense of self-pity bleed into purpose.
‘Fuck,’ Neil and Sam said breathlessly.
Dodd, the giant pink phallus, quickly shoved his way through the partiers towards some dark corner of the barn, no doubt to run this up the ladder to his superiors.
‘Quickly.’ Neil leaned into Sam and Lindsey. They quickened their pace, dipping and dodging through the crowd of classmates. Like it was some kind of premonition, Neil did feel a hand clasp his shoulder, wrenching him back a step through the din and light. Lloyd’s rotten corpse stood there in the centre of the dancefloor, his wide shoulders and chest projecting dominance. But Neil didn’t lose anything in stature. He was acutely aware of Lindsey’s hand and the baseball bat in his mitts. The scent of testosterone must have spritzed the warm barn air because immediately a ring started to form around the four of them, dozens of pairs of eyes exhorting the hostility. Neil was gently warding Lindsey and Sam behind him. His knees trembling from the adrenaline dump, he wanted nothing more than to grab Sam and sprint, but that dumb piece of primitive hardwiring in his brain wasn’t authorised to risk him looking weak and shamed before Lindsey.
Lloyd sized him up and looked sincerely amazed. ‘You got some balls, Karp,’ he called over the music. ‘I heard you stepped up to Staubach. He’s just dying to fuck you up.’
They were probably the only direct words Lloyd had ever spoken to him since the first day of school, being more content to use his jock credentials to treat him like a gnat. Lindsey began dragging him away.
‘You don’t need that bat, brother. I’ll go easy on you,’ Lloyd taunted after them.
Sam felt like he had dodged a bullet and with no small degree of shame, felt relieved that Lloyd’s attention had been largely reserved for Neil. Choking back his self-loathing he pushed on, snatching glimpses of Lloyd stalking after them with a taunting grin across his bloodied features. They didn’t get more than three paces outside the barn when Neil raked a dirty trench in the grass with his jarring skid. Standing there waiting were Noakes and Staubach. They were dressed casually in jeans and hoodies except for one exception, the pair of them wore blood-smeared yellow smiley faces. Even with their finer details covered, Neil knew it was them. Noakes had his tattooed forearm tightly around Matt’s throat, his inked hands unmistakable. Matt was still thrashing and spitting obscenities whenever breath was available, until without warning or comment, Staubach shoved his baseball bat into his stomach. Matt’s lungs deflated as Noakes allowed him to drop onto the beer-sloshed grass like a grand piano crumpling from a six-storey fall. Deb was standing off to the side, begging them to leave him alone. Noakes nodded to Staubach, who rolled his shoulders, loosening up.
Delivering a single stiff kick into Matt’s back, Staubach pointed directly at Neil. ‘Hey, Karp. This could be the only Halloween party where you’re still going to look like a fucking corpse by next week.’
A mewling little giggle came from somewhere behind Neil and he didn’t need to look to know who it was. Sam looked behind him though, and sure enough, strolling behind Lloyd was Do
dd, the giant inflatable dick. Sam was so scared all he could do was quiver and pray that the people starting to close in around them would spare them what was coming.
Neil let go of Lindsey’s hand, ‘I’m sorry about this. Stay back, okay?’ He turned to the smiley faces. ‘Leave them alone. It’s me you want, Shit Storm.’
Staubach tilted his big yellow smiley face and paused. ‘The fuck did you just call me?’
‘I’m calling the police,’ Lindsey replied, reaching into her handbag.
‘Hey, baby,’ Lloyd leered, ‘whatcha got in there?’ He snatched the bag out of her grip, holding it aloft whilst she protested.
Without thinking of the fuse he was lighting, Neil spun and swung a messy but effective haymaker into Lloyd’s jaw, dropping him to the soil. Excited roars of approval rivalled the music still rattling the night.
‘Neil,’ Sam warned, his voice tiny and almost unheard.
Shit Storm was speeding towards Neil, Matt’s bat poised over his shoulder and ready to swing. Lindsey screamed as Staubach swung. Neil barely managed to get his own bat up in time, absorbing the blow which would have shattered his ribs, the vibrations thrumming painfully up his arms. Noakes was about to stroll over to join in when Matt, still gasping, lunged up and punched him in the balls, dropping him down to his level amongst the patchy blades of grass. Staubach was raging beneath his mask, grunts practically billowing steam as he brought up the bat for a second home run attempt. Lloyd was there first, elbowing Neil in the back of the head and collapsing him like a felled tree. The pair of them loomed over Neil, ready to break him apart. Neil heard a soft hollow clink, watching as Shit Storm bent at the knees, dropping the bat and holding the back of his head. Matt had demonstrated his good pitching arm with an empty beer bottle. Not about to pass up the opportunity, Neil kicked out at Lloyd’s right knee. The pop was audible and revolting and sure enough, Lloyd collapsed right beside him, howling in anguish. Before Neil could scramble back up, Staubach had literally beat him to the punch, his fist slamming into his left eye socket with a flashbulb of white light, returning him to the ground.
With one hand tentatively resting over his testicles, Noakes pulled his Glock from the back of his waistband to a chorus of startled gasps and bleats. Thumbing the safety off, he removed his mask and told Matt to turn around. Matt felt like he was fighting for balance at the edge of a precipice, about to fall any second, helpless in the face of greater forces at work. It was too late, he had made his move and now nothing was going to spare him, he would have to take his licks in front of everybody. He was about to oblige Noakes by charging at him and, in a perfect world, maybe tackling him to the ground. But then he saw why everybody was suddenly so rapt with terror. Noakes’s lifeless stare burrowed through Matt, the automatic’s sight coming to rest on his dirt-streaked chest.
‘No one here is dumb enough to speak about this.’ Noakes addressed the scared-stiff crowd. ‘Not the cops, not your families…nobody. Anyone who does, we’ll find you.’ Silence was their only response. ‘Staubach?’
Staubach continued to rub the back of his head, peeled off his own mask and shot a swift look at Noakes.
‘Last order of business. Make it quick.’
Shit Storm’s perpetually bloodshot eyes ticked with carnage. Lloyd continued to roll around, gripping his knee whilst Dodd simply watched the events unfold with dumb fascination. Lindsey and Deb flicked back and forth between Matt’s hostage situation and Neil. Sam seemed to have retreated to some distant happy place in his mind, bat held tightly but redundantly in a two-palmed grip. Everyone watched as Staubach aimed up, buckling Neil’s knees with a stiff right cross before following him to the ground where he began to rain blows onto his face and covering arms. When his heart was pounding and his mind was cleansed of the barbaric hostility, Staubach panted like a dog and with a soft and fluid motion, pulled a switch blade from his pocket like it was a deftly timed card trick.
Lindsey was crying at this point, begging him to stop. She knew she couldn’t call the police. She knew Staubach was beyond dysfunctional and well onto the dark winding path to career criminality. Neil was in and out of consciousness, numb to any pain, such sensations were remote stations in this fuzzy tranquillity. Fear too, had become almost foreign, a hazy awareness like he had become detached from some inconsequential existence. Through blood-welled vision, he noticed with unmistakable calm as Staubach popped the blade out, light glinting from it like a red welder’s spark.
Before blacking out for real, he noticed one other thing and experienced the strangest sense of déjà vu. Through a gap in the gathering, he could see Frogmore was standing alone by the lake, animated with emotion and speaking words he couldn’t hear. Neil’s spinning cognition tried like hell to understand what the worried amphibian was telling him…begging him. But darkness took him down.
Chapter 16
Neil stared at the artificial paradise palm tree in the corner of Dr Bernhardt’s office, imagining a spatter of blood rolling off the frond tips like fresh summer rain.
Bernhardt cleared his throat gently, wanting Neil to engage with him. ‘Tell me about this Frogmore character, Neil.’
An image of Frogmore swinging a chunk of bloodied rock shattered his trance. Neil looked at Bernhardt’s open face in either shyness or embarrassment. ‘He — err, after what happened to my friends, he was the only friend I had left.’
The doc didn’t carry a trace of scepticism or judgement, only a deep well of patience and understanding. ‘It sounds like Frogmore was helping you through a very traumatic time. Sometimes we need another, a stranger perhaps, who we can voice our problems too. Some matters are hard to discuss with our loved ones for fear of misunderstanding or rejection. Was Frogmore a good listener?’
Neil could barely restrain himself from chewing his fingers and shifting in his seat. He nodded, arched his back and tried to find some degree of comfort beneath the inquisitive gaze of the shrink. ‘Yeah, we talked. He was good company for a little while. Maybe I depended on him too much. I might have been too vulnerable.’
‘That’s perfectly understandable after your ordeal.’ Bernhardt’s kind green eyes crinkled at their corners, his rust-coloured hair catching fire from the sun gleaming through the window. ‘Would you say it was a feeling of your vulnerability which made you explain him to your parents?’
Neil tried to catch his breath but gave up and shrugged lightly. What did Bernhardt want? The truth? Fuck that. ‘I suppose so. I just…I couldn’t keep him to myself anymore. I think I needed to find help to get rid of him. I don’t need him anymore. I don’t want him anymore.’
‘That’s very strong of you to seek help, Neil. That’s why I’m here. I want to help you dispel this, for want of a better word, this crutch. Because I believe by the time I’m finished with you, you will have made a full recovery. Your preparedness in facing this matter head on is a remarkable start. The unknown substance you and your friends were exposed to produced these visual and auditory hallucinations. For your friends, they were erratic and unfocused but it seems like you managed to fix yours to an anchor point, this Frogmore character who was able to help you manage your grievances.’ Bernhardt laced his fingers together, inching across his desk to close the physical space between them. ‘Is Frogmore here now?’
Neil shook his head silently, then said, ‘I asked him to give me some space.’
‘Would you say you’re capable of exercising control over him?’
Neil had to think carefully about that, hearing the soft, wet crack of a broken skull. ‘I think so…I thought so.’
‘How do you mean?’ A modicum of caution slipped into Bernhardt’s voice.
Neil quickly dismissed the error. ‘No, I do, I’m in control. He listens to me, it’s just now and then I can’t help but listen to him. He talks a lot.’
‘I can actually help you maintain control. With your parents’ consent, I would like to prescribe you a course of medication to help you shut out Frogmore’s voice.�
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Neil hid a nervous smile with his twitchy palm. Poor old Bernhardt actually believes Frogmore is some make-believe madness. What have I got to lose? If Frogmore insists on renting a room in my head then maybe these pills will evict him. Frogmore may be a living creature, but if I’m a cabbage he might die of boredom.
‘I would like to maintain these appointments to monitor your progress, Neil. If the medication helps you to silence Frogmore then I can wean you off it. It may only need to be a temporary measure.’
Neil’s foot tapped like a jackhammer and he flashed a heinously tense grin.
*****
Coming to, Neil watched the yellow street lamps zoom past like trailing comets across the black emptiness from the back seat of his parents’ estate. He must have nodded off after Martin dropped a despondent Sam and Matt off at their homes, departing with weary goodbyes.
‘God, I hope that heals okay,’ Neil heard Helen grieve, her voice full of protective hurt.
Martin replied with calming reassurance, gripping her hand lightly, not wanting to put further stress on her or his son. ‘He’ll be okay, hon.’ He quickly glanced over his shoulder at Neil. ‘Son, you still awake?’
‘I’m awake, Dad.’ He put their fears to rest whilst continuing to relive the brutal confrontation in stark vignettes. He hadn’t been unconscious long. For a short while there had been vague episodes of diving and resurfacing. Snatching coalescing glimpses of off-kilter monsters clearing a path, of being helped into a car. A taxi maybe? A few people with him in the back seat. With a bit more clarity he recalled the dazzling brightness of the hospital ward and being guided by Sam and Matt past fellow injured and sick patients.
In a curtained off bed area in the emergency department, a haggard doctor asked him some basic questions about the incident. Neil’s body must have been truly drowning in stress hormones as he felt largely like a giant cotton wool ball. He had explained that he couldn’t recall snippets of the night which the doctor assured him was perfectly normal for his condition, assessing it as a grade three concussion; loss of consciousness for five of so minutes with some retrograde amnesia and disorientation. So instead, Matt and Sam filled in the blanks for Neil, but even in his groggy state he was acutely aware of the fictional story they were feeding the doc, pinning the savage wound on a slip down a rocky embankment at the farm.