by Dan Cummings
‘Well he did a great fucking job there, didn’t he? You said you didn’t know why they blamed you, now you’re saying some secret nutcase you’ve never mentioned before is the very reason Noakes and Shit Storm are out for blood. MATT IS DEAD BECAUSE OF YOU!’ Sam beat the dashboard so hard it burned his palm. Neil hung his head, shouldering the burden of his friend’s words. ‘Well, who the fuck is he?’
Neil licked his lips, his mouth feeling very dry and his heart drumming against his ribs. ‘You know I moved to this district right before high school started, well, before that, me and some of the kids from my old neighbourhood used to bike out to Rawlins Pond in the summer to swim, mess about on the rope swing. One day that summer, we got there to find a truck half-submerged in the deep end by the steep wooded hill. It had crashed through the barrier up on Wilmslow Road. There were bullet holes along the sides of the truck and the windshield was shattered, but there was no sign of the driver or anybody else, just a bunch of unmarked barrels floating in the water. We were all about to turn back to our bikes and head home to tell our parents, but Ben and Max, the two biggest assholes from our neighbourhood had followed us out there that day. They were big and mean and a bit older than us, and they never passed up an opportunity to wail on us. So, as usual they knocked us around, kicking, punching; throwing all of our bikes into the shallows. And being the sick cruel bastards they were, they couldn’t resist dunking us in the pond and holding us under the water.’ Neil couldn’t bring himself to look at Sam.
‘Those barrels, they’d spiked the water we’d been choking down with some kind of hallucinogen. Ben and Max had had their fun with me for the moment and were practically drowning a skinny asthmatic boy called Richie. So I waded over to the side and told them to stop. Ben didn’t like that, he punched me and climbed on top of me, beat the shit out of me. That’s when all the others started screaming. Ben and Max got spooked and left us alone when they noticed that everyone was freaking out, screaming about the messed-up shit they thought they were seeing. Sharks in the pond, talking flowers, faces in the water.’ Sam was drawn helplessly into Neil’s secret history, fearful but intrigued at where this disturbing path was taking them. ‘Lying on my back, through one swollen eye—’ Sam flashed a quick look at the cyclic history rimmed around Neil’s eye ‘—I saw this large frog backstroking though the pond. It’s funny—’ Neil’s expression begged to differ ‘—but despite everything, all the fear and yelling, I remember thinking how strange it was that the frog was dressed like Mr Toad. Anyway, turns out the police had already been on their way to investigate the crash before we arrived at the pond. When they finally showed up they found five kids having a meltdown around the edge of the pond.’
Neil’s voice grew steadily more disconnected, an autopilot service for his conscious detachment. ‘Richie, Sally, Aarav and Jo all suffered extreme mental breakdowns. Sally threw herself in front of a train. The rest are sealed away in institutions throughout the county.’ He seemed to blink awake. ‘I was the only one who recovered, but I still kept seeing the frog. I came to accept this, keeping it to myself, afraid of being locked away like the others. Scared of what my parents would think of me having an imaginary friend. He wasn’t imaginary, Sam.’ Neil was out on a limb here and he knew it, locking eyes with Sam, his intense stare conveying as much trust and honesty as he could manage. ‘For the rest of that summer, he was the only friend I had left. He’d show up in my room at night, talking to me, joking, playing video games.’ Sam realised he had a hand over his mouth to wall up any scathing derision. ‘Over the next few weeks I learned quite a bit about him. He’s not really part of a single species but a large mishmash collection of nomadic creatures. He explained that when one of his kind crosses the membrane and forges a link with another being, if it’s strong, it’s for life, trapping them. They can’t really exist, or…survive—’ Neil’s hand bloomed like a flower, trying to express his awkward explanation ‘—in any meaningful way without their partner.’
‘Like a symbiotic relationship?’ Sam felt like he was helping a maniac shape a delusional fantasy.
Neil nodded weakly then reconsidered. ‘More like a parasite.’ He pushed on. ‘As the days went by, Frogmore became increasingly visible until the point where he was just another living, breathing creature, having to hide under my bed or coats, whatever he could use.’
Sam felt hollowed out, too numb to deny or fight what he was hearing, but he could still snipe, ‘And your mom and dad didn’t happen to notice a big talking frog hiding in your room?’
Neil swallowed. ‘Frogmore has a type of teleportation. Wherever he is, at any point in time, he calls it the Lily Pad, and whenever he wants he can jump off and swim away.’
Sam stared at him blankly. ‘That’s convenient.’
‘Ben and Max continued to be the pricks they always were, and they caught up to me one afternoon a few weeks later when I was out on my bike. They cornered me at the viaduct, you know the one by Tower Walk? They knocked me around, called me head-case…then Frogmore came out of nowhere. Needless to say, his rescue attempt went too far. He didn’t even hesitate.’ Neil snorted a mirthless laugh at the memory. ‘He just picked up this rock and went at them. Hitting and hitting and hitting.’ Neil appeared to be staring off into the next county somewhere, or maybe just the neglected barrens of his memories. ‘Before long they were unrecognizable, just clumps of red mush. Then, like it was the most natural thing in the world, he just bundled their bodies into the gorge and told me that he sensed my fear. He asked if I was okay and I think I just grabbed my bike and tore off faster than I’d ever pedalled before. That scared the shit out of me. Trouble was, I couldn’t escape him. He kept appearing, apologising, rationalising. I started to feel like I was no better off than my friends in the grave or the institutions. At least they hadn’t befriended a murderer. I had to come clean, so I talked to my parents, keeping the stuff about Ben and Max secret. I explained that I had been hallucinating and they consulted a child psychiatrist called Dr Bernhardt. He helped a lot, was good to talk to. He ruled out schizophrenia as the cause and summed it up to my past exposure to the chemical and prescribed a course of medication, Risperdal. But it worked. Somehow, it must have interfered with the mental link between Frogmore and me. By the time I finished taking them, Bernhardt gave me the all clear. I felt like I could start my life again. Started at Hawthorne, met you and—’ Neil strained the next word out ‘—Matt. And I thought I was free of Frogmore.’
The ensuing silence was deafening inside the tight quarters of the van. ‘I wish I had a joint.’ This wasn’t glibness on Sam’s part, he looked utterly broken having just found out one friend was dead and another could very well be ready for a straitjacket. ‘I’m supposed to just believe all this.’
Neil had a wealth of patience reserved for Sam’s doubt. ‘Froggy? Frogmore, come out.’
Sam looked at Neil in astonishment, even accusingly, wondering to what depths his best friend was willing to commit to his fictional narrative to disguise his own homicidal tendencies. Had Neil gone schizo and somehow murdered Lloyd? Was Noakes even dead? Sam wanted to reach for the screwdriver still waiting in his glovebox. Neil’s eyes were soft but unflinching, needing Sam to stay in the moment with him, to believe him. Sam was about to make his move, diving for the Phillips and ordering Neil to get out of the van, when a strange noise akin to a watery belch caused him to jump in his seat. It had come from the rear of the van. Morbidly eager to know what the hell made the noise but too scared to poke his head into the back, he looked like he had just stepped on a landmine, a click like a giant clock informing him that his whole world was about to be blown to pieces any second now. His stupefied eyes shifted to Neil who nodded, serene but saddened by circumstance.
Sam laid his fingers on the headrest and very carefully peered into the rear of the van. His stomach clenched in horror, his fingers digging in like clamps. Two great eyes blinked wetly, aping the curiosity which must be pouring from Sam’s eyes. The
tweed-jacketed frog-boy rose up from its amphibious squat into a comical two-legged gait, hands stroking the walls and ceiling as it approached the front seats delicately. ‘Sam, it’s an honour to meet the boy who is such a close acquaintance of Neil.’
Sam moaned breathlessly like he had been kicked in the testicles, his lips parting like a dilating void into madness. As he threw himself backwards into the steering wheel, his elbow blurted a harsh cry from the horn as he made to leap from the vehicle.
Neil’s hand shot out, clutching Sam’s arm and snapping his attention from the ludicrous oily trespasser in his van. ‘Sam, SAM! It’s okay. He’s here to help us.’
Despite his theatrical baritone, despite the dapper headwear and jacket, Frogmore’s pleasantries did little to dissuade Sam from something he was absolutely certain of; this creature was off, a disquieting façade of polite mannered charm sheathing a sinister potential. ‘Neil,’ Sam mumbled through heart-pounding restraint, ‘get out of my van. Both of you get the fuck out. Keep away from me.’
Frogmore removed his hat, feigning hurt, clasping it by his bare waist between webbed fingers. Neil squeezed Sam’s shoulder, a reminder of their friendship and bond. ‘Please, Sam. Believe me, I know how insane this is. Imagine how long it took me to grasp that I wasn’t cracking up. Look at him, you can’t doubt your own eyes. He’s real…he’s a friend.’ Even through the white noise of shock Sam heard the trace of doubt in those final words. ‘And we need him. Staubach is worse than Noakes. He’ll be after us now.’ Neil rubbed his face, his skin pale and ill-looking. ‘Froggy can protect us.’
Sam’s voice was almost a full octave of incredulous hysteria above normal. ‘Then why don’t you have your friend here commit another murder to save you?’
Now Neil took offence, his patience more limited than he thought. ‘You laughed your ass off when Lloyd drowned, now you’re suddenly mourning the deaths of these scumbags?’
‘I’m not mourning them, you crazy fuck. Thinking karma was going full circle is one thing, finding out they have been murdered by this…thing is completely fucking different.’
‘Well karma isn’t going to stop Shit Storm sticking a knife in us,’ Neil yelled back, his tumultuous emotions bursting forth and burning his cheeks. Sam’s eyes kept switching between Neil’s semicircle of stitches and the ooze-skinned face of Frogmore. ‘And what about Noakes’s uncle? What if he comes after us too?’
Sam punched the wheel, bleating the horn again. ‘Then I guess we’re more fucked than I thought.’ He whipped a pointed finger at Frogmore but didn’t dare look at him. ‘Is he bulletproof? He got any other neat little tricks to help him go fucking Rambo on some real life gangsters?’
Neil chomped down on his frustration. ‘He’ll be smart about it, quiet. It’s not like anybody will suspect him.’ Tears spilled from Neil’s eyes as he forcefully shook Sam. ‘They murdered Matt last night and laughed whilst doing it. Where did you think it was going to go from there, name calling and wedgies? We’re already being set up to be killed. We’re out of options here.’ Sam saw the fevered mania in his friend’s eyes, and imagined a dozen awful scenarios where Staubach and large, ruthless, shadowy men giggled and relished his execution. ‘They all have to die. It’s them or us. It’s the only way. I’m sorry, Sam. It really is.’
Sam dropped his face in his hands wishing it all would go away. Then he heard a soft suction-cup sound as Frogmore took a step closer. Flinching, he gawped at Frogmore’s sympathetic half-smile curling his mottled mouth. Sam couldn’t get the odour of damp soil and pond water from his nasal cavity.
‘Now, you’re my ward too,’ Frogmore assured. ‘A friend of Neil’s is a friend of mine. I’ll handle this Staubach fellow tonight once my power has had a chance to rest. As for Noakes, he died in that car of his. Perhaps his uncle won’t presume foul play. In which case, this entire debacle could all end quite peacefully tonight.’ Watching how Neil grasped Sam’s shoulder, Frogmore reached out one sinewy alien hand and copied the act of comfort. ‘And then we can all be friends, right, Neil?’ Frogmore’s bulging yellow orbitals calculated Neil’s voice and body language for several seconds.
‘Of course, Froggy.’
Sam didn’t like the touch of the slimy thing but felt trapped, unable to offer any further offence to the one thing which might be able to keep him alive. The gravity of the situation had laid his soul low and now it was dragging his chin into his chest. ‘I don’t want to die. Not yet, it’s too soon. I’m just starting to figure things out.’
Neil’s dark thoughts of violent men and torture were shone upon by the colourful visions of a fledgling romance with Lindsey. ‘Same here.’
The wet bloated mouth of Frogmore became a stern noble line of trust and promise. ‘I’ll never let anyone hurt you, Sam.’
Chapter 32
Grainger had been uncomfortably quiet for several minutes, his eyes catatonic like gimlets piercing the bloodied and disjointed corpse of Jason, hanging like a greaser Christ from heavy chains outside one of the mechanics’ bays.
‘Ralph, can we take him down yet?’ Garth looked at Grainger sympathetically, knowing there were no magic words of comfort.
Grainger blinked several times and swallowed a bitter lump. ‘Yeah, take him down. Have you read it yet?’
‘I wanted to wait until you were here, it just seemed proper.’
Grainger patted Garth on the back as the old mechanic signalled Mac and Cal who, with as much delicacy as they could manage, released the chains and carefully lowered the blood-dripping, mangled form of Noakes. Mac pulled a filthy, oil-stained towel from a bench to cover the body but had second thoughts, it was hardly an ideal shroud. Grainger admired the sentiment and declined Mac’s offer with a minor wave. Noakes’s entire white t-shirt was a deep soaked crimson, hanging in tatters to partially reveal the ugly lettering on his chest, a meaningless anagram of gore.
Garth threw a glance at Tully who was waiting quietly and professionally beside his Jaguar, smoking a cigarette and watching the early morning birds take flight from the wall of pines. ‘Ralph, would you rather call one of your buddies in blue? Forensics. You don’t need to deal with this right now.’
Grainger stared at him like he just spat on his shoes. ‘Someone just murdered my nephew. They left a message, I’d like to know why.’
Garth nodded acquiescently. ‘I’ll fetch some water.’ He quickly went into the office and returned with a glass of tap water.
Grainger’s shadow loomed over Noakes’s body like the spectre of death, as Mac and Cal stood away at a respectable distance and resembled loose ends. Grainger held his hand out to accept the water, then, steeling himself, he crouched and with respectful fingers, lifted up the tatters of the shirt and poured the cold water over the chest and abdomen of Noakes, washing away enough of the dried blood to discern the ragged lettering. 2 DOWN was scrawled across his powerful, still chest and below it, across his abdominals, KARP’S GUARDIAN ANGEL. The I of GUARDIAN wasn’t a carved letter but rather the instrument of the wording, a large sliver of windshield glass embedded in the torso like a sharp red-stained quill.
‘Is this something to do with that schoolkid?’ Garth asked, taking the empty glass from Grainger’s limp grip.
Grainger looked up at him, squinting in the bright morning light or maybe from the mingling pain and rage contorting his insides. His eyes were drawn back to the flesh-tattered lettering. Suddenly, he sprang up and marched over to Tully. ‘Call Alvey, have him and some deputies find the Firebird and clear the body. Keep it quiet.’
Tully flicked his cigarette butt into the weeds poking through the cracked cement and did as he was told, snatching his phone from the dashboard.
Grainger had his own call to make. ‘Staubach, fancy making some easy money? Yeah, tonight. No, Noakes won’t be helping…he’s dead.’ Grainger had spent his whole life around hoodlums and knew the full gamut of wrathful responses to the murder of a close friend or family member. Some screamed and shouted, oth
ers cursed and ranted, some became helpless beneath a torrent of tears, and a few physically lashed out and destroyed the nearest thing to hand. But Staubach defied Grainger’s expectations. Whilst the seasoned gangster only tended to associate the wild youth with his nephew, the last remnant of his sister, he knew enough about him to expect that somebody with the nickname Shit Storm might go off quite vocally over such big news. But instead, Russel Staubach’s voice took on a tone as cold and dark as the bottom of an iceberg. Grainger knew he could count on him to help deliver some retribution with interest.
Chapter 33
Dodd tiptoed through the kitchen of his own house like a thief. His entire existence within this box of resentment was one of few words but many fists. The sound of the living room’s TV kept him updated on his dad’s undivided attention, some war movie by the sounds of it. Dodd should be okay providing he made his coffee and was gone before his father made a wrathful pass to the fridge for a daytime beer. Dodd’s skin felt warm and itchy, his armpits growing moist, his whole body operating on reserved energy from his lack of sleep. After getting back from Hard Luck Haven he felt soiled, a dirt which had besmirched well beyond his skin and all the way to his soul. A stain which would never wash off. He still couldn’t believe what he had been complicit in. At first it seemed righteous and just, getting fired up by Noakes’s good arguments and Staubach’s infectious rallying for fire and brimstone, but during that drive to the town’s blind spot, with Matt unconscious beside him in the back, everything had started to slowly shift into focus. All the talk of strength and protection, of doing what needed to be done, started to fall apart at the seams. Murder, it wasn’t in him. Except that now it was all over him and always would be.
The switch on the kettle clicked, steam bellowing out from its spout. Dodd had dropped three spoonsful of coffee into the cup and the water seemed to struggle against the thick, black sludge. A mosquito whine droned through the glass of the kitchen window, causing Dodd to cast his tired, washed-out blue eyes out to the source. Being in the corner house on the street, he was able to see past the bushes and trashcans to the gentle decline of the road, catching Staubach racing up the soft hill atop a lime-green blur, whooshing past the neighbours’ cars at the intersection.