Chapter 3: The Dissatisfaction of Mixed Signals
Johnny stretched out across
the floorboards in a jumble of limbs like some broken toy tossed in the trash.
A few feet from his head was the vile grinning head of the Burger Boy, laying
where it had rolled to stop after being snapped off its chubby body. Bits of
ceramic dust stuck to the ugly, seeping purple-green bruise that now swelled on
Johnny’s temple.
“Oh
my God…” Todd gibbered as he stared at the body. “I killed Johnny.”
“You
bastard.”
“Shut up, Reverend!” snarled
Mister Eff, punting the Burger Boy’s head into the dresser. The doughboy turned
to Todd with a pleased smirk. “Well, this isn’t the most impressive or even the
most creative killing I’ve seen, but it certainly was effective. Now, let’s get
rid of the carcass…unless you wanna have him stinking up the place. Hurry now!
HURRY! Before the rigor sets in…”
Todd
gapped in horror. “You sick fuck! He is—was my friend! Uh, okay, so
maybe Johnny wasn’t exactly a friend—But at least he hasn’t tried to kill me!”
“Yet.”
Mister Eff groused. “And now he’s dead. So quit bitching and bury him already.”
“Oh
Mister Fuck…” cooed D-boy, now leering over at them from his perch on
Johnny’s knee. “He’s not quite dead yet…”
“Johnny’s
alive?!” Todd rushed over and fell to his knees next to the body. He laid his
head on Johnny’s chest and strained to hear even a single breath or heartbeat.
Mister
Eff scowled then looked to his strangely cheery counterpart. “Hey…How the fuck
did you get off the wall? And why’s your arm reattached?”
“Oh,
don’t worry about it,” chuckled D-boy, hopping down and grabbing up a hammer.
“Let’s just chalk it up to a convenient plothole. Now, pardon me while I get
reacquainted with my dear old friend, the Good Reverend
Meat…”
Arching
one eyebrow, Mister Eff watched D-boy trot off to get some long overdue payback
before looking back at Todd.
“He’s
still breathing…” sighed the boy. “He’s still breathing…”
“Yeah,
well he’s probably a brain damaged vegetable now.” Mister Eff hissed. The
doughboy laughed off Todd’s glare, but the laughter died when he noticed the
boy slipping his arms underneath Johnny. “What the hell are you doing?!”
“What
does it look like?” snapped Todd as he lifted Johnny up with unnatural ease.
“I’m going to…Wow! Johnny’s awfully light. I mean, even for a guy his size, it
shouldn’t be this easy to pick him up…”
Mister
Eff rolled his empty eyes. “Great. He’s having another one of his stupid
starving artist moments.”
“
‘The Hunger Artist’…” Todd muttered, carrying Johnny into the living
room. He stumbled in the darkness, finally finding the couch with the grayish
glow of the television set.
The
doughboy, who’d been following close behind, blinked up at him. “Pardon?”
“That story by Kafka, the
one about a performance artist whose only talent is his ability to fast.” Todd
explained as he laid Johnny down on the couch. “Haven’t you ever heard of it?”
“No. I fucking despise
Kafka.”
A nasty smirk crept across
Todd’s face. “Too bad. Here’s the synopsis:
The story begins with the Hunger Artist, a man once famed for being able
to fast for forty days straight. He used to tour the country, drawing in huge
crowds at every town and village he’d visit. The Hunger Artist, despite his
celebrity, was always disappointed because his promoter would never allow the
fast to exceed the forty day limit. The Artist felt himself cheated by this
limitation on his fasting and fought against it futilely when he was taken out
of the cage each fact. So confident was he that the Artist believed he could go
much, much, much longer… if only they would let him.”
Todd paused, tenderly
lifting Johnny up so he could sit on the couch. He began speaking again, voice
reverent as he let Johnny’s head rest in his lap and stroked the gaunt features
of the other man’s face.
“Then the public, in it’s
own special cruel fickle way, lost interest in such morbid displays of
self-denial and went on to brighter, livelier entertainments. And so the Artist
cut ties with his promoter and went to work at a circus, his cage placed next
to the animal cages. Forgotten, the Artist at last got his wish to fast for as
long as he wished, yet no one cared to even be bothered with changing the sign
that tracked how long the Artist had been starving himself. Then one day, the
circus manager came round and saw the apparently empty cage. It took a moment
of investigating before anyone remembered that this was where they’d left the
Hunger Artist and they found him laying in the rotten straw. With the manager leaning
close to hear him, the Artist explained that the real reason he fasted was
because he could never find a food he liked. The Artist starved himself to
death, you see, because he was dissatisfied…”
Todd found himself suddenly
choking up, but shook it off. “But no one else, not even the manager who heard
his final words, realized the significance. In their apathy and blindness, they
buried the Hunger Artist with his rotting straw and placed in his cage a young
panther. And, unlike the Hunger Artist, the panther was alive—so painfully
alive!—and he was satisfied with the meat they gave him. Oh, he was very
satisfied indeed. The End.”
“Yeah. Whatever, queer.”
Mister Eff snorted. He gagged at the way Todd looked down on Johnny.
“Go away.”
The doughboy blinked at Todd
at first in disbelief, then glared with outright disgust. “Fine! I’ll leave you
girls to ‘cuddle’…” With that, Mister Eff stomped out of the room.
Todd waited until the
doughboy was no longer in earshot, then let out a little whimper. In a cautiously
gentle way, he drew Johnny closer, cradling his limp body like he used to
Shmee’s. He rocked back and forth for a while, resting his cheek against the
top of Johnny’s head. The tears start quietly but soon grew in wetly frantic
sobbing as he clutched Johnny tighter and tighter until Todd could feel the
bones under the numb flesh. Chest hurting and wet-faced, he pressed a kiss on
Johnny’s head then pressed another against his forehead then another on one
cold cheek then another on the other cheek as he fingers groped and dug in deep
to get a reaction. He started clawing
and pulling at Johnny, frustrated by the unresponsive limbs. His mouth
quickly covered Johnny’s, teeth tearing at the passive lips and his tongue forcing
its way inside. Todd gagged on the nasty bitter flavor, but kissed harder and
deeper.
A hand fumbled against
Todd’s shoulder, but he didn’t notice it or the muffled grunt of surprise. In a
flurry of swipes and kicks, Johnny threw Todd off him and into the television.
The room went black.
“FUCK! GOD DAMN DISEASED SON
OF A BITCH…” began the litany of obscenities from Johnny while he spat and
flailed angrily through the darkness. He tripped over Todd as the boy tried to
get back to his feet. Roaring, Johnny grabbed Todd’s neck and, wrestling the
boy to the floor, started throttling him. He only let go after Todd managed to
slam a fist up under Johnny’s ribcage hard enough to wind him.
Todd got off the floor in a
leap and ran toward a door, any door. He tore it open the moment his fingers
hit a knob, and he blinked, amazed to
find he was staring out onto the street in warm light of the late afternoon. He
barely made it onto the step before Johnny caught up, grabbing Todd’s arm.
Reflexively, the boy whipped around and punched Johnny with all his might,
taking off a dead run for his front porch when Johnny released his grip. He
bolted inside, looking back once to see Johnny clutching his nose and stare at
him in shock.
Breathless and lightheaded,
Todd staggered upstairs to his room. He stood at the foot of his bed and glared
at Shmee with every ounce of hatred he
had left. “You bastard… You rotten, lint-filled bastard! You knew. You fucking
knew! You fucking set me up! Tell, Shmee: Was it a plot between you and the
Burger Boy, or did you just come up with it all by yourself?”
“You’re bleeding,” was all
the bear said.
Reaching up, Todd touched
the sleeve of his shirt and drew back a wetly red hand. He looked down his arm
at the slow running lines the dripped to the carpet. He stumbled into the bathroom
swearing explicitly, tore of his shirt and began picking the glass out of his
shoulder. Soon the sink and countertop were covered in gory splats, pieces of
TV screen, gauze and first-aid tape.
Todd stood at the sink,
trembling from the pain that had abruptly slammed him after the shock wore off.
The bandages on his shoulder were already showing little red blots, seeping red
blots that pulsed and stabbed pain. Whimpering, he took out a bottle of Vicodin
for the medicine cabinet and stumbled back to his room. Todd dug out the bottle
of red wine Pepito had given him last New Years from the drawer he’d stashed it
and washed down a couple of pills before collapsing backwards on the bed.
There was a woeful chuckle
from the dresser. “Chasing pills with alcohol? Looks like the boy’s on my
side now!”
Jerking up, Todd turned to
look at the doughboys now staring at him: D-boy gloatingly so and Mister Eff
looking disgruntled.
“How the fuck doing you
here?” he growled.
“We live here.”
“How’s that work?! You’re
just Styrofoam!”
“Aren’t
we the perceptive one…” D-boy hopped off the dresser and clambered onto the
bed. He settled himself cozily next to Todd’s head. “But we are more than
simple pastry display pieces. My lesser half and I were animated by the Master.
A triumph of his will, if you will. Our duty is to serve the Master and our
reward will be re-integration with the Master as it sinks back into the Void
from whence it came. We are fragments of the Master, living by his whim and
doing his will!”
“BULLSHIT!”
screamed Mister Eff. “If we’re just part of this ‘Master’, then why did we come
back and he didn’t? I’ll tell you why: because the Master is dead! It’s been
flushed down the metaphysical toilet and out of this reality. We are free now!
FREE!”
“Presumptuous
mite!” spat the other doughboy. “If we’re so free, then why are we attached to
him!” He jerked a thumb at Todd.
For
a moment, all Mister Eff did was sputter and grumble. Finally he just huffed up
and glared.
“You
can’t answer me, can you?” D-boy purred. “You know we’re not free, and that
we’ll never be free.”
“Oh,
I will get my freedom…” growled Mister Eff. “Soon. Very, very soon. Now shut
up, you sorry mother fucker!”
“Both
of you hush!” snapped Shmee from where he was cradled in Todd’s arm. “Can’t you
see the boy’s sleeping?”
“Sleeping?!”
whined both doughboys.
“Yes.
Now be quiet and get out of sight.”
Mister
Eff rankled visibly. “Fuck you! Who the hell do you think you are?”
“As
you wish, master.” Grabbing the protesting Mister Eff by his arm, D-boy dragged
the other doughboy off. When they had disappeared into the recesses of the
closet, Shmee sighed.
“Idiots.”
---
---
Todd
jerked suddenly out of the medicated tangle of sleep, opening his eyes just
enough to see the clock.
It
was 2 am.
His
head felt woozy and thick still from the pills but he was aware of a presence
in his room. It neared the end of his bed, then paused.
“Squee?
You asleep?”
The
gun was in Todd’s hand and Johnny’s face before either of them could think.
Johnny
blinked. “Shit! Put that away before you hurt yourself.”
Shaking
his head, Todd only glared and felt his finger tighten on the trigger.
“Squee?
Come on!” snapped Johnny. “That isn’t a fucking toy. Now put it down.”
“No.”
Johnny’s
eyebrow raised a little, but he shrugged. “Fine. But it does hurt to know you
think I’ll try to hurt you…”
“Try
to?! Try to?!” Sputtering in anger, Todd began waving his hands around.
“You almost strangled me! I spent a fucking hour and a half pulling bits of
glass out of my fucking shoulder because of you!”
“That
was you?”
Todd
gaped at him. Before he could say anything, Johnny spoke up.
“Okay,
that was my bad. Sorry. I didn’t realize you were doing CPR, but I also hate
people touching me. Such intimacies violently sicken me,” he sneered. “And I
didn’t recognize you, anyway. I remember when you use to barely come up to my
shins and now here you are towering over me like a Goth-ed up scarecrow. Damn!
I swear kids now a-days… What happened to kids acting like kids? You’re
twelve!”
“I’m
not.”
Johnny
blinked again. “Oh! Eh…how old are you?”
“I
turned fifteen two months ago.” Todd’s voice was flatly cold. “Now get the hell
out before I shoot you in the head.”
“Head
shots… Why does it always have to be head shots?!” snarled Johnny. “Doesn’t
anyone shoot people in the kneecaps anymore? Or the heart and lungs? Or the
gut? Gut shots are lethal if you leave the victim long enough. They’ll either
bleed out or succumb to septic infection from all the intestinal bacteria.”
“Because
there’s a chance that you’ll live. That, and you are a fucking zombie.”
“WHAT?!”
“Think
about, Johnny,” growled Todd. “You won’t die. People don’t notice you unless
they want to hurt you…or, more accurately, you want to hurt them. I’ve
figured you out, Johnny. You’re not human. You’re just another monster…”
“You’re
in my shoes.”
“Huh?”
Johnny
pointed down at Todd’s feet. “My old boots. You’re wearing my old boots.”
Grinding
his teeth, Todd slumped onto the bed. “I’m threatening to kill you because you
are an inhuman creature and you’re commenting on my footwear?! God…” He fumbled
for his cigarettes. Popping one in his mouth, Todd started to light it when
Johnny reached out and fiercely yanked it away.
“What
the hell are you doing, Squee?” he snapped. “You’re not old enough to smoke!
And anyway it’s a nasty fucking habit. You’ll get lung cancer, have horrible
breath, and yellowed teeth.”
“Like
you do?” hissed Todd as he gulped back some wine. He wiped the top and offered
it to Johnny. “Wanna drink?”
“That had better not be what I think it is…”
The
boy laughed. “Blood? No…well, not unless they’re using it for Communion
anyway.”
“Holy
shit…” Johnny frowned in disappointment and anger. “You’re drinking, too? And
what are those? ” He snatched the bottle off Todd’s bed and stared. “Vicodin?
You’re stealing pills from your mother’s stash?!”
“Those
are mine.” He stood and gently took them back. “The doctors prescribed them for
me because I have a severe anxiety disorder. And those are only start. I’ve got
prescriptions for Rohypnol, Lortab, and Zyprexa.”
“Why the hell would any sane person prescribe a kid
all this?!”
Todd sighed. “Because I have migraines so bad I black
out from the pain. And don’t get me started about trying to sleep…”
“But Zyprexa?” muttered Johnny. “Aren’t those for
schizoids?”
“And people with bi-polar disorders and other
psychotics.” Todd sat back down, staring at the bottle in his hand. “That must
be why I’m going crazy… I’m a certified nut-case and I’m off my fucking meds.”
Johnny sat down next to him. “You aren’t crazy,
Squee.”
He glared at Johnny. “Yes I am. Didn’t you even
wonder why I was in you house today?”
“Yeah. That was kind of weird…”
“I killed someone.” When Johnny only stared, Todd
blundered on. “I killed a guy today at school with a pen. A fucking ballpoint
pen. And I liked it, Johnny. It…It made me feel good. In a dirty
way. I was so fucking scared and freaked out, I…I couldn’t even think straight.
I thought… You’re the only person I know who kills people all the time, so I
went into your house to find you and the rats—the horrible, filthy rats! And
then there was those that fucking Burger Boy and…and…” He grabbed Johnny by the
shirt and started shaking him frantically. “Why did you do this to me?! Why,
you son of a bitch?! WHY?!”
“Dammit! What did I say about touching?” Slapping
Todd’s hands away, Johnny growled. “And why is this all of as sudden my fault?”
“Because I’m turning into you!”
Johnny looked like he was going to vomit. “Okay. Let
me make one thing perfectly clear: I don’t like killing. Oh sure, there’s a
certain amount of satisfaction in depleting the asshole population, I know that
what I’m doing is wrong. I can’t even stand the blood or gore or any other
viscera of humanity—living or dead. And I sure as hell don’t get off on it. In
fact, I fucking insulted by the suggestion. Squee, if you weren’t…well, Squee,
I’d flay you alive for saying that. Sex in any form is appalling to me.
“Sex is just another throwback to our
prehistoric ancestors. Heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual…I loathe sexuality
and it’s primitive mechanics. The act in all its varied forms is a brutal,
undignified show of grunts and body fluids. I was watching this show the other
night on the SCIENCE channel about these womb-tank things… If they’ve got those
now, then we don’t even need to burden women with the agony of pregnancy
anymore! We don’t need it anymore! We can all be born from tubes! No more needless
intimate contacts, no mess, no fuss… Technology has eliminated sex completely.
Once we get rid of sex, we can get rid of all the needless emotional baggage
that goes with it. Without sex, we can finally progress beyond need for
emotion. And without emotion, we will become logical beings independent of the
need for another human.”
“But we wouldn’t stop being human then?” Todd asked
grimly. “Humans are emotional creatures, Johnny. We need other people.
We need the input, the sensation of wanting and being wanted…
People need emotional fulfillment, otherwise they become raging sociopaths.
Like you are.”
Johnny stared at Todd for a second, then got up and
headed toward the window.
“What’s the matter, Johnny?” jeered the boy nastily.
“Did I offend you?”
“No,” came the reply. “I just need some more time to
think this over before I can give you an answer to that.”
Todd watched him jump out and disappear into his
house, then he looked down at the empty bottle in his hand. “Aw, fuck… I need a
drink.”
Staggering to his feet, Todd put on a fresh shirt
and his ratty jacket. He stumbled out to his bike and began swerving his way
toward the nearest 24-7 minimart.
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