Mindf**k

by Fanie Viljoen

  I stared at the ground. As if I wanted to say that I was sorry. I didn’t mean it. Sorry, Partygirl.

  But I didn’t say it. I chased away all the thoughts that tried to surface in my mind, attempting to feel nothing.

  It happened.

  Live with it.

  ‘Lost anything?’ one of the cleaners suddenly asked behind me.

  He would never know just how much.

  Something has changed

  My mind was a mess as I lumbered back to the main building at the swimming pool. I saw nothing around me. Heard nothing. I only thought about her. About Partygirl.

  I soon found myself sitting in a car and driving back to the gate along the resort’s road. I must’ve stolen the car, I thought vaguely. But I couldn’t remember doing it. In the rear-view mirror I noticed the small window at the back was broken. The loose wires from the hotwire job hung at my knees below the dashboard.

  The car’s entry ticket was sticking out of the ashtray. I handed it to the guard at the gate and quickly paid. ‘Keep the change.’

  I didn’t want him getting too close to the car and having a better look. He might notice that there wasn’t a key in the ignition. When he lifted the barrier, I drove out, relieved. I stepped on the gas pedal and the car roared forward.

  The road back home was like a bad trip in which Partygirl didn’t feature anymore.

  A car turned off with me at the Nelson Mandela exit at Bloem. And right again to Langenhoven Park. It followed me through the streets. Past the Pick ’n Pay, down Dirk Opperman Street.

  The car’s windows were tinted but I recognized the car.

  It was Kerbs.

  Fuck knows, I didn’t have the strength to deal with him.

  My heart started racing, I didn’t know why. We were friends. But something had changed. I felt it in my gut.

  What did he want?

  I stopped at the Caltex garage and left the car there.

  Kerbs drove by. I saw him turning his head in my direction when he drove past me, his arm hanging out the open window.

  I raised my hand to greet him but he had already turned his head away, his eyes fixed on the road.

  I quickly started for home, on foot. I wished I could have just driven back to my house but I couldn’t show up at home with a stolen car. It would have been plain stupid.

  It was a long way home. I glanced back occasionally while still keeping my pace. Kerbs could have appeared behind me again at any moment. There were too many cars around. I tripped over a rock when the umpteenth car drove past and I glanced fearfully over my shoulder.

  When I finally reached our road I quickened my pace. And then I saw it: Kerbs’ car was parked on the sidewalk.

  He was waiting for me.

  Smaller steps. Smaller and smaller steps.

  Something has changed.

  Rapidly increasing heartbeat, sweat running down my back.

  My eyes slipped out of focus, then back in focus.

  What did he want?

  I approached, saw the painted flames on the doors, the bumper sticker: Just visiting this planet. The word Kerberos was painted on the car’s boot. Kerbs found it in a book. In the Greek mythology Kerberos was a hell hound with multiple heads that welcomed people to the realm of the dead. He had to see to it that they couldn’t get back out again.

  Kerbs got out of the car. He stood there in the open door, smiling in very much the same manner as Friday night, that devilish smirk.

  ‘Where were you?’ he asked. His voice sounded weird. Friendly and firm at the same time.

  ‘Don’t worry, I know,’ he said before I could answer. ‘You should stay away from there. You’re gonna drop us all in the shit.’

  ‘I had to go and look.’

  ‘At what?’

  ‘If she is really dead.’

  ‘But you know that she’s dead.’

  ‘I saw her.’

  ‘We all did.’

  ‘Afterwards. When we came back.’

  ‘You’re talking shit and you know it.’

  ‘No.’

  Kerbs slammed the car door closed. He approached. ‘And? Is she really dead?’

  ‘The grave is still there.’

  ‘But is she in the grave?’ Again that unearthly laugh. Mocking, as if he knew the answer.

  ‘I don’t know. Probably. I couldn’t dig it up, there were people.’

  ‘Oh, you’re fucked in the head, Burns. So let me help you.’ He now stood right in front of me, forcing a whisper through his clenched teeth: ‘She’s fucking dead. We killed her and –’

  ‘You killed her! We only helped to bury her.’

  ‘No, Burns, we did it. Remember? You took her first. Got your rocks off and everything. And then I took her, and then Sky –’

  ‘Sky was outside the tent the entire time. He only saw her when she was dead already.’

  ‘No, Burns. You’ve got it wrong. First you, then me, then Sky. And then you again. And you bashed her head against the gas cylinder. You were fucking wild, Burns. I couldn’t believe it. Not from you, buddy.’

  His words slashed through my mind. That wasn’t how it happened. Fuck knows, it wasn’t.

  ‘No, Kerbs. It was you … it was you!’ I yelled at him. ‘Ask Sky. He’ll tell you.’

  ‘I’m afraid Sky can’t say anything anymore.’

  Ice cold words. Kerbs’ eyes bore through mine. I suddenly realized what he was actually saying.

  ‘Sky wanted to go to the pigs, Burns. He wanted to tell them what you’ve done. Squeal. I decided: to hell with it, you don’t do that to your friends. I took care of him, Burns, for you …’

  I had to swallow hard at the puke pushing up my throat. Shit, everything around me was falling apart. Kerbs slipped into focus, out of focus. His voice seemed far away.

  ‘Don’t worry, nobody will find him. And he won’t be able to talk anymore. And neither should we. We should go on as if nothing happened. We don’t know anything.’ He grabbed my shirt and forcibly pulled me closer. ‘We didn’t see anything, didn’t hear anything. Okay, Burnsie? Okay?’

  I probably nodded, perhaps even said yes. I can’t remember.

  But Kerbs was satisfied. And that was all that mattered.

  Brandy doesn’t work

  I went to bed with one of my dad’s bottles of brandy. (Weird that he didn’t take it with him, now that he was on that downhill slide.) Morning came and I decided to throw the empty bottle away when everyone had gone. Curled up in a ball it felt as if someone was playing a boyband CD backwards in my mind. (And no, it didn’t sound any better.)

  The sun shone through my window, directly onto my bed. I was still fighting against waking up. Why couldn’t I just sleep? Forever and ever and ever. Then I wouldn’t have to struggle through this wasted life. Everything was in turmoil. Broken, fucked up.

  I thought about Sky who lay dead somewhere. What did Kerbs do to him? It would be something cruel. I knew Kerbs. He wouldn’t settle for second-best, he would have made sure.

  Sky always had a soft side. At times I wondered why he hung out with a guy like Kerbs. It was looking for trouble.

  Come to think of it, I should’ve known that too. I did know it. That was why I befriended him. Because of the imminent possibility of danger. But I never thought that it would go that far.

  I wondered if Sky knew that Kerbs was going to kill him. Did he see it coming? Probably not, otherwise he would have done something.

  His parents were still in America. They probably hadn’t been informed yet.

  Should I go to the police? Should I tell them about Partygirl and Sky?

  And Kerbs.

  I shut my eyes.

  Everything was fucked up.

  There was coffee in the percolator when I stepped inside the kitchen. I poured myself a big mug. I thought about drinking it black, without sugar, but it tasted so bad that I tossed in the milk and sugar.

  I thought I was seeing things when a strange man came through the door.
Blond, sturdy, tall. Probably ten years older than me. He stared at me for a while without saying a word, got fruit juice from the fridge and poured himself a tall glass. I watched him the whole time. He sat down opposite me at the kitchen table.

  ‘So, you’re Chris?’ he said.

  ‘My dad taught me not to talk to strange guys.’

  I had an idea who he was: Mom’s boyfriend. Fucking toy boy.

  ‘Your dad isn’t here anymore, is he?’ said Toy Boy.

  ‘And you think you are?’

  He smiled, nodded his head.

  ‘My name is –’

  ‘I don’t give a fuck what your name is.’ I got up and made my way to the door. ‘You screw around. That’s all I need to know about you.’

  ‘Anthony!’ he called out after me. ‘My name is Anthony!’

  I slammed my bedroom door shut, put on a CD from KoRn – Take a look in the mirror.

  I turned the volume way up.

  I pulled a T-shirt over my head, dragged my fingers through my hair and grabbed my wallet. Kerbs said that nobody would find Sky but I wanted to go to his house and see for myself what was going on. Had he been murdered there? Then the place might still be covered in blood.

  What would Kerbs have done with Sky’s body?

  ‘Where are you going?’ my mom asked when I stepped out the front door.

  ‘To town,’ I said. ‘I’m taking the bus.’

  She continued talking but I wasn’t listening. It couldn’t be important anyway. And if it was, I just didn’t care.

  The security gate slid open. I quickly stepped through.

  ‘I was wondering when you would come,’ someone said behind me.

  It was Sky.

  How do you tell someone that he is supposed to be dead?

  My heart missed a beat. My whole body turned cold. I stood there unmoving, saying nothing. Feeling dead inside.

  ‘You look as if you’ve seen a ghost,’ said Sky. His voice sounded different. Normally he would laugh, but his face was solemn, expressionless. This frightened me even more.

  He approached. I stepped back.

  ‘But you …’ The words vanished on my tongue. How do you tell someone that he is supposed to be dead? ‘What are you doing here, Sky?’

  Again he approached, again I stepped back, blinking my eyes. Perhaps he’d disappear. I tried thinking clearly. Tried figuring out what the hell was going on.

  But Sky still remained in front of me. The living dead, or something like that.

  ‘Has Kerbs been here yet?’ asked Sky.

  I nodded. ‘What are you doing here?’ I repeated.

  ‘What did Kerbs say, Burns?’

  I swallowed heavily. ‘He said that you were dead …’

  ‘Dead?’ The old Sky would have smiled if I’d told him that. But not now. His expression stayed fixed like a TV newsreader’s.

  ‘Does it look like I’m dead?’

  Fuck, yeah, I thought. Or perhaps not, I couldn’t really tell. I didn’t answer.

  ‘I’m not dead, Burns.’

  ‘Kerbs said he killed you because you wanted to run to the pigs. Wanted to tell them …’

  ‘He told you a bunch of crap. You know him by now, don’t you Burns?’

  I still didn’t know if I could believe him. He just looked so weird.

  ‘Come take my hand, then you’ll know.’

  He held his hand out to me. I expected blood to come trickling down his sleeve any second, flesh falling away in his hand, leaving the bones exposed. Yellow white.

  But that didn’t happen.

  I carefully reached out my hand. My heart started beating faster. Faster.

  I touched him …

  And my hand went right through his!

  ‘Fuck!’ I screamed and almost crashed to the floor.

  ‘And now?’ asked Sky. ‘Why are you scared? This isn’t anything new for you, is it?’

  ‘Are you shitting me? Who are you?’

  ‘Sky. You know that.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Come on, Burns, we’re buddies.’

  ‘No.’ I tried catching my breath. My eyes were glued to Sky. ‘What do you want?’

  ‘I came to warn you,’ said Sky. ‘One last time.’

  ‘Warn? Against what? Do you still have those damn visions even though you’re dead?’

  ‘All the time, Burns. It’s like a bad rash that won’t go away.’

  ‘Then what is it? Tell me so you can fuck off.’

  ‘He’s going to kill you.’

  ‘Who? Kerbs?’

  Sky nodded.

  I stared at him. I didn’t know if I should believe him.

  ‘He’s afraid that you’re gonna tell. You already went back to Aldam. He didn’t like that. The warning lights in his head already went off, Burns. He’s got a plan for you. He knows how he’s going to do it, where he’s going to do it. Maybe he’ll chop you up into little pieces. Maybe he’ll feed you to the dogs, bit by bit.”

  ‘No, shut up, I don’t want to know. Shit, why are you telling me all this? It’s crap and you know it.’

  ‘Have I ever been wrong, Burns?’

  I kept quiet.

  ‘You’ve got to get away, Burns. Far away. And you can’t come back. Don’t tell anyone where you’re going. Kerbs will find out and he’ll come for you and he will kill you. Even if you try hiding in the darkest alley in Hillbrow, he’ll find you.’

  I felt numb with despair. ‘Where should I go?’ My voice sounded weird to myself.

  ‘Anywhere. But you have to hurry. He’s on his way.’

  What I know

  I’m performing magic. Mind magic. And you’re my volunteer.

  That’s what Sky had said in my dream. The one I had before we went to the MindFuck festival.

  Was he still doing it? Was this what that was?

  Or didn’t I hear correctly? Did he say We’re performing magic or I’m performing magic?

  I couldn’t remember. We would have made more sense. We – Kerbs and Sky. They were up to something. I just didn’t know what the fuck it was. My head was spinning. I tried reasoning but one thought just tripped over another. Like Grade 1 kiddies who all wanted to stand at the front of the queue.

  Write it down. Write down what you know for certain, it’s the only way you’re going to think this thing through, I decided.

  I tore a page from my Math book. (I should probably have gone back to school already. What day was it? It didn’t really matter.)

  The pencil case popped open in my hands as I tried opening it. I had to crawl behind my bed to find my pen.

  With one hand I smoothed out the page.

  Think.

  Where did it all start? What happened first?

  The white page cried out to me. Interrogated me.

  Where?

  Why?

  Who?

  What?

  I tried thinking.

  The first thing. What was the first thing? My mind didn’t work anymore.

  Write down only one word. One thing you know for certain, Burns.

  One bloody word, Burns.

  The page remained white. The pen sweated in my hand. I knew nothing, nothing, fucking nothing.

  A sweat-, snot- or teardrop dripped onto the paper. The paper absorbed it, enlarging the stain.

  Blood.

  I wrote it down in outsized letters across the white paper. Scratched over the letters until they flowed into each other. Until the paper tore and I was eventually etching the word into the wooden desk.

  That much I knew, there was blood.

  That’s what my dream said. That’s what Sky said too.

  There will be blood. And there was.

  Or was there?

  Doubt: the eighth sin.

  Am I sure there was blood? I tried remembering how the blood flowed from Partygirl’s head. I tried to remember what colour it was, what it smelled like, what it felt like. But the part of my brain that controlled the sight, smell and touch,
had shut down. (It is now safe to turn off your computer.)

  Then I didn’t know it for sure. If there wasn’t any blood, then it meant …

  I crumpled the paper into a ball. Tore it apart, tossed it aside.

  Blood was still etched on the desktop. I scratched it out with my pen. Just a bunch of lines. Out, out, damned spot. I smashed the pen to pieces against the wall.

  I knew nothing.

  Amazing to have arrived at this point and look back only to see nothing.

  I grabbed a gym bag from my closet and started stuffing it full of clothes and other crap. Anything really. Sky was right. I had to get away. But not just away from Kerbs. From him as well. I had to start over. Clean slate. Somewhere where the people didn’t know me. And I wouldn’t get involved with people like Kerbs and Sky again.

  A pain shot through my head. Instant headache.

  More clothes, toothbrush, toothpaste. What else? I didn’t know what else I needed because I didn’t know where I was going.

  Pain pulsed through my temples.

  Blood that couldn’t pass through the veins.

  We’re performing magic. Mind magic

  And then, as if an angel had appeared out of the mist, I suddenly knew what Kerbs and Sky wanted to do. It was a game to them. Good cop, bad cop. Kerbs, the dangerous guy who was capable of murdering Partygirl and who tried desperately to pin it on me. Kerbs who lied and said that he had murdered Sky because he wanted to go to the cops. Sky who feigned warning me against Kerbs. Who wanted me out of the way. Perhaps they were both setting a trap for me so that they could kill me …

  But why? I said that I would keep my mouth shut. They needn’t have worried.

  Then the answer flashed through my mind. The same reason Kerbs gave for killing Partygirl.

  Because he could.

  dnuoranruT

  The house suddenly felt like a cocoon, warm and suffocatingly dense with the silk threads closing in tighter around me.

  I tried not to move my head too much. Perhaps it would help to get rid of the headache, I thought. I knocked back a few pain pills. Don’t know how many. I just tipped the bottle in my mouth and swallowed. When they didn’t all want to go down at once, I drank more water straight from the tap.