Haze Bois

Chapter 2

When Caleb arrived at Johnny’s place he didn’t slow to knock. He instinctively knew the front door was open.

It would be generous to say people like Johnny were overconfident, but Caleb knew the truth – that they were just plain stupid. They found him sat in the kitchen, hunched over digital scales. Whatever he was weighing disappeared into his pocket as the group walked in. Johnny’s face transformed from fear to relief as he recognised the intruder, for a brief moment at least. His eyes shifted nervously over Caleb’s face, reading the anger.

“What can I do for you lads?” Johnny asked, offering a false grin. He clapped his hands together, circling the kitchen and feigning confusion. He had to know why Caleb had stormed into his house uninvited.

“I know it was you,” Caleb stated, “And I get why, sort of. You’re upset my brother left me in charge. You were with him from the beginning, when I was just a stupid kid, right?”

“What you saying, man? I ain’t got no issue with you or your brother.” Johnny shrugged, eyes darting to the table.

“He’s looking for his phone so he can call his boys to back him up.” The voice whispered. Its foreign, rasping quality sent a chill through Caleb’s spine, but at least it was giving helpful hits.

Before Johnny had a chance to move Caleb swiped the contents of the tabletop to the floor with his forearm. The phone, scales, and dirt encrusted plates clattered to the floor. It took three stamps to bust the phone into several pieces; the last sent the battery skittering across the tiles. Johnny stared down at for a few seconds more than was normal. He had to be high. No real surprise there.

The noise alerted a girl to the kitchen. A girlfriend? Or some girl he was selling drugs to. She stepped carefully over the smashed plates and wrapped the oversized cardigan she was wearing more tightly around herself. Caleb vaguely recognised her but couldn’t recall her name.

“What’s going on, Caleb?” She asked. There was detectable guilt in her voice. She knew what Johnny had been up to. Had to.

Ignoring her completely, Caleb began searching the kitchen for a knife. He found a suitable one in a drawer filled mainly with clutter and placed in gently on the table. It wasn’t sharp, but since it was only for show, it didn’t matter.

“I saw this Japanese movie the other night, where the guy betrayed his boss. He cut his finger off by way of apology. It was all very dignified,” Caleb threw up his hands as he explained the purpose of the knife.

Johnny let out a startled laugh but it sounded more like a cough. “That’s a great story, mate.”

He shrugged “Okay, I’ll put it more simply. You can cut one finger off, or I’ll cut them all off.”

Caleb smiled. He told his lips to form a sweet, subtle crescent but his reflection in the oven revealed a failure in translation. He looked psychotic.

“That’s it. I’ve had enough of your bollocks, you jumped up little prick,” Johnny said as he moved in to throw a punch.

Time seemed to slow, and that coupled with the predictability of his opponents movements meant the punch was easy to dodge. Caleb stepped forward and raised his knee, connecting it squarely with the solar plexus. As Johnny doubled over he bought his elbow down into the back of his head, dropping him to the floor with a thud.

He heard the girl shouting at him to stop, and Kenny soothing her.

With his foot, Caleb flipped Johnny onto his back and then sat heavily on his chest and punched him in the face a couple of times, splitting his lip and breaking his nose. Blood and spit sprayed up from his mouth as he coughed and spluttered.

Caleb turned to his wide-eyed friends. “Aman, go in my bag and get the secateurs.”

“The sec-a-whats?” Aman frowned.

“The scissor-looking-thingies,” Caleb explained with a sigh.

Caleb tested them, getting used to the grip. He’d stolen them from his Aunt Carol’s shed, since his own mother didn’t bother with gardening. She had bought a lawnmower in 2013, used it once or twice then left it to rust in the pile of household appliances even the scrap metal guys wouldn’t take away.

“You aren’t serious. Come on, man,” Johnny cried.

The girl was also crying out for him to stop. Kenny sat by the fridge with her, trying to placate her. “He won’t really do it,” Kenny whispered to her. Assuring her. And maybe himself too.

“No! No, don’t! Don’t!” Johnny squealed. He screamed as the Caleb squeezed the handles together.

“Just listen to me,” the inner voice spoke up again, and began to sing the song “Downtown”. Caleb wasn’t sure when he’d learned the upbeat lyrics. Maybe that voice really wasn’t his own. He wasn't sure if that was a comforting thought or not.

Over the singing he could faintly hear Kenny repeating the words, “He won’t really do it,” over and over, the girl whining and Johnny’s cries.

He may have sung along with the voice at one point, as the fingers piled up and his hand became slick with blood. It was getting harder to grip the plastic handles and Johnny was starting to turn a deathly shade of grey. It had to be unlikely he would die of blood loss, as unhealthy as he was.

Caleb turned back to see the horror-stricken faces of his friends. Aside from Kenny, Caleb had hand-picked the ones with low empathy, sadistic tendencies and high tolerance for violence. They were briefed beforehand and happy to assist, but the stark reality was proving too brutal for them.

“One hand down,” Caleb announced. Even his spoken voice sounded odd, like it belonged to someone else.

“Please don’t, Caleb. Please don’t, please,” Johnny begged. His voice was barely above a whisper as he repeated the words like a mantra. It wasn’t the pleading that convinced him so much as his own fatigue and sudden awareness that he might have taken things too far yet again, and with a wider selection of witnesses than anticipated.

“Oh, don’t be hasty now... why don’t you ask him who gave Amy Carlson the idea to steal from you?” The voice urged.

“Guess what?” Caleb whispered to Johnny.

“I don’t... I don’t—” Johnny’s eyes darted about as he appeared to desperately search his own brain for an answer to the rhetorical question.

The only answer required was “What?”

“I know you told Amy and her boyfriend to steal from me,” Caleb revealed with a smile.

All life drained from Johnny’s face. He seemed to fold in on himself, shrinking. Grey skin became translucent, slick with cold sweat.

‘Is he going to deny it, make excuses, shift blame... or apologize?’ Caleb wondered, but after a brief pause Johnny burst into tears.

Caleb sighed.

“Whatever,” he shrugged. He picked up a finger and squished it between his own. “You’re going to want to put these on ice and head to the hospital. They are pretty good at reattaching stuff.”

The girlfriend scrambled about the floor, collecting the severed digits. Caleb stepped over her and narrowly avoided squashing one underfoot.

Talk was fairly subdued on the walk home. A few of the guys made comments about the girl wearing nothing but a cardigan. Apparently, they had gotten a flash of her bra and it was see-through. When they arrived at Caleb’s he left them to their conversation and searched his phone, googling the term, “auditory hallucinations”.

He read articles about schizophrenia and bipolar disorder but had none of the other symptoms.

“I’m not a hallucination,” the voice interrupted his research.

“Then what are you?” Caleb muttered.

“I’m the one who saved you from prison.”

“So it wasn’t a fluke?”

"No. I needed you free and cleared of suspicion.”

“Why thought? Why me?”

"Your mind is special. It is... like mine.”

“What are you mumbling about?” Kenny asked, interrupting the internal conversation.

Caleb shook his head. “Nothing important.”