Pressure

by Jeff Strand

  “Everything,” said Jeremy.

  “No. You’re right, he’d freak out, and then everybody will find out. You know Darren’ll tell about the strip club. And then we’ll all pay for it, big-time. Mr. Sevin will take away every bit of free time we’ve got until summer. We might even get kicked out.”

  Somehow I didn’t think my parents would welcome me back into their home with open arms if I got expelled. My next stop would be military school. Probably in a remote location. Somewhere chilly.

  “So we’re gonna let him get away with it?”

  “No, but…” I trailed off, unable to think of an alternate solution. We certainly had to let Peter know that his dog was dead, but while I hated the thought of letting Darren go unpunished, was it worth getting in that much trouble ourselves?

  I truly believed that Killer Fang had been dead when Darren found him. But maybe next time the dog wouldn’t already be dead.

  Would he stop at dogs?

  “What if we…I don’t know, what if we kept it between us, and we just made sure he never did anything like that again?”

  “Kept it between the three of us or the four of us?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “I’m not gonna babysit him for the rest of my life. I don’t care if I do get in trouble. He’s not gonna get away with this. Peter loved his dog!”

  “I’m not saying he has to get away with it, just that we don’t have to get anybody else in on it.”

  “So, what, you want us to give him a spanking or something? He cut our best friend’s dog’s tongue out! Just for fun!”

  Jeremy was right; we couldn’t let Darren get away with this. But there had to be a way we could take care of the problem on our own. Maybe just knowing that he’d been caught would keep Darren from doing this kind of thing again, or maybe…

  “I know what we could do,” I said.

  “What?”

  “We could scare him. You, me, and Peter can figure out a way to scare the hell out of him. We’ll scare him so bad that he will never, ever do something like this again in his entire life.”

  Chapter Six

  Getting back into the residence hall was ridiculously easy. Parents who paid the tuition with the expectation of a secure environment were getting ripped off, big-time.

  On the way back, Jeremy and I worked out a plan. I would have preferred something a little more subtle and a little less cruel, but the end result was one that we could both live with. We also played Rock, Paper, Scissors to determine who had to tell Peter about Killer Fang. Paper covered rock and I won, but after we snuck back into the room I decided that Jeremy’s rage about the entire situation meant that he might reveal too much before we were ready, so at the last minute I offered to take on the miserable task.

  Peter was still snoring. I shook him gently until he opened his eyes.

  “What do you want?” he asked sleepily.

  “I have to tell you about Killer Fang.”

  Peter immediately sat up. “You found him? How is he?”

  “He got…” My throat closed up and it took me a few seconds before I could continue. “He got hit by a car.”

  Peter’s lower lip began to tremble. “He’s okay, though, right? He’s a pretty tough dog. I bet he made it through okay.”

  “He got killed. Darren found him.”

  “Darren doesn’t know for sure, does he? He could be wrong. Killer Fang’s a pretty smart dog. I don’t think he’d let himself get hit by a car. He wouldn’t do that.”

  “He got killed,” I repeated.

  “Oh.”

  Peter rolled over on his stomach and buried his face in his pillow. His whole body began to quiver. I wasn’t sure how to console him, and after standing there for a long, uncomfortable moment, I went to bed.

  When we got up the next morning, I was very relieved to see that Darren was there. I’d half expected him not to return to the room, maybe even to run away from Branford Academy altogether. I lingered behind with him as Peter and Jeremy went to take their showers.

  “Did you do it?”

  “Yeah,” said Darren, almost pouting. He held up his hands, which were raw and swollen. “Look what happened ’cause I didn’t have anything to dig with.”

  “Too bad for you.” While I hoped that none of his teachers asked Darren to explain what had happened to his hands, I certainly wasn’t going to feel sorry for him.

  “I should have used the dog’s jaw,” he said, looking me straight in the eye as if daring me to take offense.

  The frightened, pleading Darren of last night was gone. I couldn’t help but take a small bit of pleasure from knowing that soon it would return.

  “You were wrong,” Peter told me as we returned to the room after lunch to pick up our materials for our next class.

  “I was?”

  “I talked to Darren. He said he doesn’t think it was Killer Fang that got run over. He said it was a little black dog, and that the people who hit it took it right to the vet.”

  “I guess I was wrong, then.”

  “I’ve read a lot about how dogs can find their way home, no matter how far it is. He’s pretty fast. It’ll probably take him about a week to get back home, so that’ll be around Sunday or Monday.”

  “Well, that’s good to hear.”

  “Yeah. I hope he doesn’t get too hungry.”

  Jeremy and I didn’t speak to anybody else about our plan for the rest of the day, or all day Friday. I was growing more and more uncomfortable with the whole idea, but Jeremy was insistent. Darren needed to be punished, and Peter needed to accept the fate of his dog.

  “And it’ll be fun,” Jeremy said.

  I strongly disagreed about that aspect, but each time I considered telling Jeremy that he’d have to do this without me, I remembered the headless carcass on the garbage bag. Even though he knew how much Peter missed his dog, how much he loved it, Darren had mutilated its body. He was a sick, scary kid, but when we were done with him, he’d be on his best behavior for the rest of his time at Branford Academy, and hopefully for the rest of his life.

  Saturday evening. Jeremy and Peter had already snuck out of the building. Darren was seated at his desk, lost in thought. He held his pen but hadn’t written anything for the past twenty minutes.

  “Put on your jacket,” I told him.

  “Why?”

  “We’re going out.”

  “Screw you. I’m not going anywhere.”

  “You are so. You have to apologize to Peter. You’re going to take us out to where you buried the dog, and you’re going to say you’re sorry for lying about it being a different dog.”

  “Yeah, right.”

  “I’m serious, Darren. It’s mean to let him think he’s still alive.”

  “Then go out there and show him yourself.”

  “Yeah, and while we’re there we’ll just show him what you did.”

  “I don’t even know what you’re talking about.”

  I desperately wanted to smash my fist into his lying mouth, but of course I didn’t, and not just because I was fairly sure that he could beat the crap out of me if it came down to it. “Don’t lie to me.”

  “I’m not. I have no idea what you’re talking about. Leave me alone.”

  “You have a choice,” I said, struggling to make my voice sound as cold and calculating as I possibly could. “You can come with me and help Peter get over this, or we can show him what you did to his dog. We can show him that you ripped his tongue out. Maybe he’ll do the same thing to you for lying.”

  “Ooooh, I’m so scared,” said Darren, but his eyes seemed to indicate that the statement wasn’t necessarily sarcastic.

  “Put on your jacket.”

  He did.

  “Why is he so much in love with dogs, anyway?” asked Darren as we walked along the sidewalk. “They aren’t like people. They don’t do anything.”

  “They do a lot of stuff.”

  “Like what?”

  “They catch F
risbees, they fetch sticks, they let you pet them…”

  “So? What makes that so great?”

  “Have you ever had a dog?”

  “No way.”

  “Have you had any pets?”

  “Just a goldfish that we flushed.”

  “So, then, you don’t know what it’s like.”

  “I don’t need to know what it’s like. I can see what it’s like. Dogs don’t do anything but run around and slobber. Only stupid people like them.”

  “Well, good, you don’t ever have to have one, then.” I’d always wanted a dog, but my parents wouldn’t allow it. Too much trouble.

  We left the sidewalk, and a few minutes later my knees weakened as we entered the moonlit woods. I even felt a little scared, almost as if I were the one with a nasty surprise awaiting me.

  What if Darren had another pocketknife?

  What if he’d already killed Peter and Jeremy, and their headless bodies were buried next to Killer Fang? Or their chests were slit open, just waiting for Darren to reach inside and—

  Stop it. You’re being an idiot.

  At least I hoped I was.

  We ducked through the bushes and stepped into the clearing.

  “What the hell…?”

  A noose hung from a branch of the largest tree (which wasn’t all that large, since this wasn’t exactly an immense forest). At least it was supposed to be a noose; Jeremy hadn’t tied it very well and it was more of a lopsided circle. A wooden crate was positioned directly under the rope.

  Movement to the left. I stepped out of the way as Peter came up behind Darren and grabbed his arms, holding them behind his back as Jeremy slapped a strip of duct tape over his mouth. Darren struggled frantically, twisting and kicking, but Peter held him firmly while Jeremy unspooled more of the duct tape, covered his mouth with a second layer, and wrapped it all the way around his head three more times.

  Peter wrestled Darren to the ground, and together he and Jeremy taped his hands together behind his back. Darren got in a good kick that nearly knocked Jeremy off balance, but it wasn’t long before they’d pulled him back to his feet and dragged him over to the crate.

  I was supposed to be helping, but all I could do was watch.

  It took nearly a minute of struggle before Peter and Jeremy finally got him on top of the crate. Jeremy pointed to me. “Get over here, Alex!”

  I hurried over to the tree, climbed up onto the unsteady crate, and placed the noose around Darren’s neck.

  “Don’t move,” Jeremy warned him as I jumped off. “If you fall off this, you’ll choke to death. Do you understand?”

  Darren shouted something incoherent at him through the duct tape.

  Jeremy raised a fist. “Do you understand?”

  Darren continued shouting for a few more seconds, but then finally went silent and gave a small nod.

  “Good.” The three of us stepped away from the makeshift gallows and took a moment to catch our breath.

  Peter looked terrible. Even in the poor light I could see that his eyes were red and puffy, and he had the look of somebody who’d spent the past hour being kicked in the head.

  “Okay, let’s do it so we can get back,” I said.

  “Darren Rust, you have been accused of the crime of murder,” said Jeremy in a booming voice. “You hunted down Peter’s dog, Killer Fang, and you stabbed him to death with your pocketknife, and you dragged him into the bushes and chopped up his body. How do you plead?”

  Darren said something that we couldn’t understand.

  “Nod for guilty and shake your head for not guilty,” said Jeremy.

  Darren shook his head.

  “We know what you did. We all know. We can look into your very soul and see what you did, Darren Rust. And you must be punished.”

  I’d written the line about looking into Darren’s very soul, and I was amazed by how well Jeremy was able to deliver it.

  “You must be punished for your cruel actions, for your taking of an innocent life. You must suffer just as Killer Fang suffered.”

  Peter glanced over his shoulder. “Did you hear that?”

  We all looked back in that direction. We waited for a few moments, hearts racing.

  Nothing.

  “The words of the Bible say, ‘An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth,’” Jeremy told Darren. “To punish you for what you’ve done, we must chop your head off and shove maggots in your eyes. We must cut open your stomach and make you eat your food again. Maybe we’ll even surgically implant a tail so we can rip it off.”

  That last line hadn’t been planned, and certainly wouldn’t have been approved by the creative team.

  “Peter, as the owner of the victim, do you feel that the punishment of the accused is fair and just?”

  Peter nodded. “I do.”

  “Alex, as the impartial witness, do you feel that the punishment of the accused is fair and just?”

  I nodded as well. “I do.”

  “Then, Darren Rust, you have been fairly sentenced by a jury of your peers, and you must accept the punishment we have decided for you.”

  The three of us simultaneously took a step forward.

  The crotch of Darren’s pants darkened.

  “The accused has pissed his pants!” Jeremy gleefully announced. “He has wet himself in court! Oh my God!”

  I looked over at Peter. He didn’t seem amused.

  “Did you see that?” Jeremy asked me, laughing. “What a baby!”

  “Knock it off,” I told him.

  “But he pissed his pants!” Jeremy pointed to him. “I can’t believe he did that!”

  “Shut up, Jeremy.”

  “Fine, fine, fine.” He resumed his booming tone. “If the accused would like to speak any final words before his sentence is carried out…well, too bad, because his mouth is taped shut. I guess we should’ve taped his wee-wee, too.”

  “Damn it, Jeremy…”

  “Okay, okay. Darren Rust, upon the count of three the jury of your peers will carry out your punishment. One…”

  We all took another step forward.

  “Two…”

  Darren looked terrified and frantically began struggling to free his taped hands.

  “Three!”

  Darren stepped backward to get away from us, and the crate toppled onto its side. I swore I heard a loud crack as he dropped. Before I could fully register what had happened, Darren was dangling from the tree, the noose tight around his neck.

  “Shit!” Peter screamed.

  Darren’s legs kicked wildly two feet above the ground as he struggled to get free. Peter and I rushed forward, and I immediately received a violent kick to the chest that knocked me backward several steps, gasping for breath.

  “Stop moving!” Peter shouted at Darren, but the accused was too panicked to listen.

  Jeremy just stood there, frozen.

  I ran back over to the tree, turned the crate right-side up, and pushed it underneath Darren’s feet while Peter tried to keep him steady. Once Darren was on solid footing again, I hopped up onto the crate, quickly loosened the noose, and removed it from his neck.

  His skin was red and glistening where the rope had dug into it.

  Peter and I helped Darren down from the crate. I hurriedly unwrapped the duct tape from around his head, ripping off some hair in the process. Darren sucked in a deep breath, sounding like he was hyperventilating.

  “Aw, God…look what we did to his neck!” Peter said, his voice frantic.

  Jeremy still hadn’t moved.

  Darren fell to his knees, coughing and choking. I tried to free his wrists, but my hands were trembling too badly to unpeel the edge of the tape.

  “Are you okay?” Peter asked. “Can you breathe?”

  Darren continued coughing. He might have been sobbing, too, but I couldn’t tell.

  “We didn’t mean it,” I insisted. “We were just trying to scare you.”

  “Get away from me!” Darren managed to shout. �
��Just leave me alone!”

  We all moved away from him. Darren stayed on his knees for an unbearably long time, just staring at the ground and trying to catch his breath.

  Finally he spoke: “My neck hurts.”

  “We’re sorry,” I said.

  “I mean it really hurts. It might be broken.”

  “It can’t be broken,” Peter said.

  “Shut up! You don’t know! Get this off my hands!”

  It took a couple of minutes, but I finally managed to get the tape off his hands. He held them in front of him, clenching and unclenching his fists; then he touched his neck and gazed at his red fingertip.

  “I’ll probably have to go to the hospital.”

  “You might not,” said Peter. “It doesn’t look that bad.”

  “Well, it feels that bad! You guys made me bleed out my neck! I might die! I hope I do die. Then we’ll see what happens to you!”

  Jeremy suddenly came out of his daze. “So, we’re even, right? You killed his dog and we got back at you.”

  “I didn’t kill his dog!” Darren shouted, so loud that Peter, Jeremy, and I all instinctively looked back to make sure nobody was around to hear.

  “But you cut him up.”

  “So what? I cut up a dead dog!” Darren ran his palm across the side of his neck and held it up to show us. “Look what you did to me! His dumb dog was already dead when I found it, so all I did was biology. You guys were almost murderers!”

  “No, we weren’t,” I said. “I told you, we were just trying to scare you.”

  Darren shoved his palm into my face. “That’s not what this looks like.”

  “But it’s true. We were going to let you down.”

  “I don’t care. I’m going back to school, and I’m going to tell Mr. Sevin exactly what you fuckers did to me.”

  He walked off.

  We helplessly watched him go.

  Chapter Seven

  “He won’t tell anyone,” said Jeremy, as Darren turned and vanished from sight.

  “What do you mean?” I asked. “How can he not tell anyone? You think he’s just going to wander around with a bloody neck?”