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“Oh,” he said in a raspy sort of breath, something short and inaudible, “that doesn’t feel right.”
“What’s going on?”
He didn’t say anything, but started gnawing on his knuckle as if he was thinking of a solution, but he guessed he probably knew what they had to do. He was doubly sure that they wouldn’t ever really do it, though.
“Mike, what’s going on?”
He kicked that limp body in the side, hoping that the spike of pain would somehow wake him up.
“Michael.”
“I guess he probably had too much, y’know,” he said, before grabbing his arms and attempting to lift him. But the body was heavy, and Mike couldn’t get it up, “could’ya give me a hand here, please?”
“What’re we doing?”
“Fuck, I don’t know,” he said, angrily dropping that lifeless corpse and running a hand through his hair, “there- there’s a river down south, I don’t think anyone would be over there at this time-”
“Mike, we’re not doing that, w-we can’t do that. That’s gotta be illegal, right?”
“Okay what we did was illegal, so we’re screwed regardless. This way, we maybe won’t get caught.”
“But if we do, it’s twice the punishment ‘cause now we’re, like, abusing a corpse, and maybe even like we murdered him, depending on how you look at it.”
Michael ran another hand through his hair, and he sucked in a breath, “fuck. Okay, here’s what we’ll do. We-we’ll just carry him over to the hospital and leave him on the doorstep. He . . . he’ll be somebody else’s problem from there.”
“Like an infant at a fire company?”
Michael had this sort of pissed off look in his eye, “yes, just like that,” he heaved and picked up that body again, motioning for Gabriel to carry the latter portion of this unlucky soul’s body.
“Oh, God-” Gabriel said as he grabbed the man’s ankles and lifted him up.
After a few seconds of moving, Mike sat him down and spoke, “we should probably, uh- we should probably hide him somehow, right?”
Gabriel was silent, “. . . yeah, probably.”
“Okay, damn it, grab the rug, we’ll roll him up in it.”
Gabriel hesitated, “but- I like that rug.”
“Idiot, we’re not gonna leave him in it, we’re just using it to move him around so it doesn’t look like we’re carrying a body.”
“But . . . we are.”
“I know,” Michael sounded noticeably agitated, “but we don’t really want people to know that.”
“Right-”
Gabriel grabbed the rug, and they lifted that poor soul’s body onto it and rolled it up. They struggled to carry it after that, because the rug was scratchy and they struggled to find a grip. At once, Gabriel wondered if the person inside it would be uncomfortable, being carried around like this. But he supposed that it didn’t really matter now.
They carried him for a while longer, until Michael dropped him and clutched at his back.
“What’s wrong?” Gabriel asked.
He groaned, “I think I pulled something-” he started rubbing his back along his trapezius.
Gabriel was quiet for a moment. “Can you still move him?” he asked, “we have a while more until the hospital-”
“I-I don’t know, okay?” he said, “this entire thing is becoming so irritating to me.”
“It’s probably more irritating for him-” Gabriel gestured at that lifeless body occupying their antique second-hand rug.
“Frankly,” Mike said, “I don’t think he really cares.”
“Well shouldn’t we?”
“I care if I spend the rest of the semester in jail,” Mike said.
“Then let’s get going-”
Michael moaned in pain as he heaved that body up again, straining his weakened back as he began moving.
“If we cut through this little segment of forest, we should be right at the university health service’s doorstep.”
“Are you sure? Why don’t we just take the roads-”
Mike gestured to what they were carrying and Gabriel was promptly silenced. They began to enter the forest, but Mike winced in pain, dropped that cadaver on the grimy forest floor and rubbed his bare foot.
“I don’t have shoes, man,” he said, “I just stepped on a wicked thorn,” he plucked a thorn nearly three inches in length from his foot and tossed it aside. A pulse of blood came from the wound, and he winced slightly as he took his torn sock off and tried in some dogged attempt to tie a tourniquet. He wrapped the fabric around his ankle, and said that they should continue on as he picked that body up again.
“Shouldn’t we like find some shoes or something?”
“N-no,” he said, wincing in pain as he stepped on a particularly sharp stone.
“Mike, come on, don’t be a hero and shit,” Gabriel stated as he gently laid the body down and looked over at him, “you stay here and watch the body. I- I’ll go find some shoes, or- or maybe go get Lucille-”
“No. No, no no no,” Mike said, “we do not need Lucille. Nor will we ever because he’ll just dig his nose into this whole mess and make us ‘fess up and repent.’ No, yeah, we don’t need Lucille.”
“Come on, Mike, we need his help. Besides, maybe fessing up and repenting wouldn’t be such a bad idea after the shit we pulled tonight . . .”
“No, it’s fine,” Michael attempted to stand, and braced himself with a tree, “I’ll just go back and find my shoes-”21Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtV9xmeX63O
“No, Michael, stay here, I’ll go. Just- just make sure nobody sees . . . all this.”
Mike smirked as if this entire situation was comedic, which, he imagined it was, “right,” he said with a smile.
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“Lucille?” Gabe asked as he knocked on a heavy wooden door marked “606.” He silently prayed that he had remembered Lucille’s room number correctly.
The door creaked open, and Lucille looked as if he had just woken up. It was 3:47 on a Monday.
“Gabe? What could you possibly want?” He was not amused.
“Oh, God- Lucille? Fuck. We messed up- we, we- we did something bad.”
Lucille rubbed his eyes, “slow down, Gabe. What happened?”
“Shit, I don’t know- we don’t have time. Just . . . please, grab your shoes and come help me.”
Lucille caught Gabe on the way out, and gripped him on the shoulder as Gabe was trembling like he had just seen something horrific.
“Gabe?” he said, “what is it? What’s wrong?”
“We did something bad, Lucille . . . I- I don’t think I want to explain it. I- I think you should just see for yourself.”
“Well . . . where is it?”
Gabe steadied his breathing, “a little ways into that patch of woods,” he pointed over to the segment of forest, which appeared dark and brooding under the ominous glaze of the partially starry night sky.
“Goodness, Gabe. I don’t want to have to walk through that- it’s very cold out and I want to sleep. I need rest. I have so much stuff to do-”
“Lucille, I am telling you, we need your help.”
“Who is ‘we’ anyway?”
“Just . . . just me and Mike.”
“Oh,” Lucille chuckled, “the classic.” He scoffed, “I should have known something was going to go wrong when you said you were throwing that party tonight,” he said, “or . . . I guess, last night, seeing as how it’s morning now. You guys are depraved, you know that, right?”
“Yeah, yeah. I don’t care right now, Lucille,” they had begun walking furiously in the direction Gabe had thought was where he had come from, “we have bigger problems.”
“Wait . . . this isn’t related to that party, is it?” Lucille asked as he rubbed his forearms. His hairs had stood up from the cold and the adrenaline of it all.
“I mean . . . kind of? Why does that matter?”
“Because you could have just called someone,” Lucille said, “you won’t get in trouble if you call someone for help.”
“Wait- do you know what happened?”
“I can kind of assume, Gabe,” he said with something like a laugh. Apparently this was amusing for multiple people.
“Well besides, I don’t know if all the shit still counts when the motherfucker up and dies before you even call anyone, so- yeah, I don’t know.”
“Alright but even if you wouldn’t have gotten away, did you ever stop to consider what was right?”
Gabe looked at him, “no, I didn’t,” he said, “can we please stop talking about it? Don’t you think I’m already regretting all this?”
“Yeah, sorry,” Lucille responded as they heard a voice up ahead. They recognized it as Michael’s and hustled to see what was wrong.
They ran up to him, and saw an amount of blood leaking from his right arm.
“God, Michael? What happened?” Gabe asked, kneeling down in an attempt to look at the wound, but Mike pushed him away.
“I’m fine,” he said, “but why is Lucille here? I think I remember specifically requesting that you don’t run and go get him.”
“Don’t get mad at him, Mike,” Lucille chimed in, “you look like you need help.”
“I-” he was cut off by a wave of nausea that struck him and made him turn over and vomit on the ground next to him.
“Yeah, we know,” he responded, “so . . . what did this to you?” Lucille raised up Mike’s arm to see two holes at the center of a swelling purple mass of flesh.
“F-funny story,” Mike said as the color began receding from his face, “so we had the body- oh, wait . . . do you not know about that yet?”21Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZ1ZnOvRkla
“Body?” Lucille raised his voice and looked at Gabe, “what in the world have you gotten me into? I thought someone just got too drunk and needed a ride, or- or maybe someone overdosed, but-”
“Lucille! It doesn’t matter now-”
“It does to me! Have you ever considered that I wouldn’t want to get swept up in all this? Now it is my problem, and it very much didn’t have to be. I ought to turn both of you idiots in and wipe my hands clean before I lose my scholarship or- or worse, I lose my freedom. Or my life . . .”
“They’re not gonna take your precious scholarship, Lucille, believe me, you’ll be fine.”
“But how are you sure?”
“Well, that’s the thing I was gonna tell you,” he gulped, and they noticed perspiration beginning to form along his hairline, “I was sitting here waiting for Gabe to come back and I heard . . . noises, from the bushes next to me, and, long-story short, a snake bit me, I dropped the body, and I ran. I don’t remember where it is either. Y’know, these woods have a funny quality of getting you turned around, huh?”
They were silent for a moment.
“Well, shit, man,” Gabe said, running a hand through his hair.
“What do you mean? That’s a good thing-”
“No, no it’s not,” Lucille added, “we can’t leave him,” he stopped himself, “I pray that it is a him, right Mike?”
“Yes. Christ, Lucille we’re not monsters.”
“Yeah, I’m starting to wonder. Because you didn’t even consider the fact that now we have to go find him.”
Mike was silent for a moment, “. . . no we don’t.”
“Are you serious? You’re considering leaving this guy, a human being, to have his corpse violated by a pack of wild animals when it’s your fault he’s dead in the first place?”
Mike sighed, “see this is why I didn’t want Luci-” he stopped and heaved from the pain.
Gabe spoke up, “look, okay, the fact is that that guy is done for, but Mike is still alive and I think that we have to help him first before we go on some wild chase to find this guy’s body.”
“Okay, well,” Lucille started, “look, Mike needs medical attention. Gabe . . . how about you take him to the hospital and I’ll go find the . . . body.”
“No. No, you can’t do that, Lucille,” Gabe said, “it’s dangerous around here at night. I know you’re not from here, but this is like bear and coyote territory . . . what if something else got to him first?”
Lucille sighed as if his next utterance was his absolute last resort, “I- I have a piece in my room. I’ll go grab it for self-defense, and you can take him to the hospital.”
Gabe was about to say something, but looked over to Michael and saw him losing consciousness and color from his face. He sighed, “fine, fine! But don’t screw us Lucille.”
“I promise you Gabe, I won’t.” They exchanged a charged moment of eye contact, and Lucille began walking off.
Until he was almost out of earshot, when Gabe shouted to him, “oh, and grab me some shoes if you can!” And Michael vomited again.
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“Fucking idiots,” Lucille muttered to himself as he walked back to his dormitory. He really did have a gun in his room, but he doubted he would muster the courage to take it out of its case. His father had given it to him before he left home, actually. He told him that guns weren’t allowed and his father responded, “what are they gonna do, take it?” Lucille couldn’t have found it in himself to argue, so he just took the gun with him. He had never gotten it out since then.
He unlocked the door and heard movement in the dark.
“Lucille?” a female voice asked, “where did you go?”
“It’s not important, Mandie,” he said as he walked over to the bed she was lying in. He saw her raise her eyebrow in the dark, “I’m telling you it was nothing,” he would have left it at that, but his conscience got the best of him, “okay, Gabe and Mike did something stupid at a party and I had to help them.”
“Something stupid?”
“Trust me, you’d be much better off if I didn’t tell you.”
She smiled, “unsurprisingly, I completely believe you,” he brushed her arm gently, “lie down with me,” she pleaded.
“No,” he sighed as he stood, “unfortunately, I can’t right now. But I’ll be back quickly, okay?”
“Okay,” she smiled. She yet had no reason to not trust him.
He knelt down under the bed and slid out a slick black case. 21Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡaexhBGv6XG
Mandie slid to the edge of the bed, “what’s that?”21Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBrClBKmcQk
“Uhh . . . baby you know I’ve always been honest with you, right?”
“Yeah . . .”
He pulled the gun out, “then promise me you’ll keep knowing that,” he said, “. . . even though I have this.”
She did what looked like a double take in the dark, “why . . . why do you have that?”21Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡku3AgHsUmA
“I-”
“Better yet, why are you getting it out?”
He kissed her, “I’ll tell you everything when I get back, okay?”
She looked very displeased, but she knew Lucille was a good man; a real hero, at his core, “. . . okay,” she said, holding out her pinkie, “pinkie promise?”
Lucille smiled, “pinkie promise.”
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“Come on, Mike,” Gabe said as he shouldered Michael’s arm and attempted to guide him along, “it’s only a little while longer.”
Mike said nothing. He seemed to be gasping for air and falling in and out of consciousness. He had vomited once or twice more since they had begun moving, but he hadn’t for some time. Gabe assumed it was because he had run out of liquid to expel.
They arrived at the foot of what their school considered a hospital, and Mike pulled away from Gabe.
He gasped for breath, wheezing and sucking in air as he began to speak, “I . . . can’t . . .” he said.
Gabe looked at him and tried to pull him forward, “come on, man, you need medical attention,” he said, “you look pale, and you’re sweating a lot.”
Mike scratched at Gabe’s hand and yanked himself from his grip, “I-” he heaved, “I . . . d-don’t have m-money.”
Gabe looked confused, “they don’t take money, Michael. It’s a hospital, they take insurance.”
Mike was about to speak again, but he passed out. Gabe hauled him onto his shoulder and approached the door. And the hospital staff were surprisingly pleasant as he explained the unfortunate circumstances. He presumed they dealt with this type of thing pretty often. Of course, he left out several parts regarding their murdered friend lost in the woods and their Lucille waving a gun around trying to find him. But, they gave Michael some kind of medicine, and told Gabe to “go home and sleep it off.”
So he did, sort of. He began the walk home, but began to meander a bit off course, and wandered aimlessly around the campus as if the purpose he was searching for was hidden along the paths. He found his way back eventually. He debated waiting for Lucille or trying to find him, but he thought to himself:
He can handle himself. Besides, I’ll never really be able to find him.
And he left it at that.
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“Dead body-” Lucille called out into the night, as if their deceased cadaver companion.
What am I doing? He thought as he slumped down onto a slightly damp overturned log. He set his gun down next to him and cupped his head in his hands. Before he got involved in this grimy mess of trouble, he was lying in bed cupped in the warmth of his lover’s embrace. He had left her and that to go help people he considered to be increasingly worse and worse friends. He raised his head and looked again around the murky forest, illuminated only by the vaguely fluorescent moonlight. He rose, wiped his pants, and continued on. He was where he had originally found Michael in his . . . sordid state.
He had gotten turned around though, just as Mike had said, and he had become confused. It didn’t help, either, that Michael had had no clue as to where he had “dropped” the body. Lucille was skeptical, because that story sounded odd. Downright unbelievable. It was like he was telling a very poorly crafted lie, and he knew it was terrible, so he didn’t bother trying to sell it. And nobody had cared. Hell, Lucille hadn’t either. But he’s found, especially recently, that not causing commotion was the charming man’s way into the heart. So, in short, he had said nothing. But he didn’t want to do this. He had to so he didn’t cause a commotion.
He began walking again, and saw a rustling in the bushes somewhere out in front of him. He cocked the gun, gulped hard, and began walking forward.
Then, through the moon-dappled canopy he saw a small stray dog perk up its ears, and run from him. He brushed away the leaves and underbrush and saw what the fear that had begun to permeate his mind. That stray had been feasting on the corpse of their deceased college drug addict friend. He gulped again, swallowing what he assumed was vomit bubbling into his mouth, before he began to breathe again.
“Well, shit,” he said, running a hand through his hair.
He thought for a moment, pacing through the forest and around what he considered to be a rotting corpse. Flies had begun collecting around the exposed flesh, and he grew disgusting everytime he looked at it. He slumped down next to it, and looked briefly at the gun as if considering taking his own life. But that would be foolish, so he agreed not to. Instead, he decided to pivot to a new plan.
They couldn’t turn in a body looking like this, so they had to . . . dispose of it.
“Don’t go anywhere,” he told the body, “I’m going to come back to this exact spot, and you will be here.”21Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJXwcFihOz9
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After a few long minutes of walking, Lucille arrived at where he thought Gabe and Mike must have been. He walked to the door of the hospital, and went to the receptionist at the desk.
“Uhm . . .” he cleared his throat, “good morning. How’re you doing?”21Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡytAJv5NaYE
The woman at the desk looked at him skeptically, “I’m doing fine,” she said, “are you . . . here for an appointment?”
“Uh, no- I was actually wondering if you had a patient named Michael Hoffman here,” he looked at her with as polite of an expression as he could manage.
“I’m not supposed to tell you,” she said.
“Oh, well uh . . . if he is here, can you just give him a message?”
She thought for a moment, “I suppose so,” she said, “what’s the message?”
“Just tell him: meet Lucy at the edge of Randall’s Creek,” he said, then he walked off. As he was leaving, though, he thought he saw what was his calculus teacher sitting in the waiting room reading a magazine. He was looking right at him, and thought Lucille wondered why he was here, he didn’t want to seem suspicious.
“Oh, hello Doctor Monroe,” he waved, and Doctor Monroe waved back with a piercing look on his face.
Lucille had chills as he left the hospital. He decided to walk back to the body, irritated that he couldn’t find Gabe or Michael but determined to finish the job as to ensure that none of them received what horrid punishment he was imagining in his head. He thought he remembered where he had left him, and sure enough he found him after another few long minutes walking.
The body was in an even worse state than he had remembered, and the smell coming off him sent Lucille’s mind to reel. Regardless, he knelt down and gripped him by the ankles, then began dragging him through the rough and weeds to what he remembered to be the choppiest part of the creek. He wanted to ensure that the body was washed away by the current.
After a few moments he was there, and he stood and stretched his aching back. He thought about waiting for Mike, but imagined he wasn’t coming and that he had to get on with this.
He thought he should say a few words, so he spoke, “I didn’t know you much,” he said, “but I know your family and friends will be devastated that you’re no longer with us. Even though I’ve never spoken to you, I feel sympathy for your passing, and pray that you can find safe passage through to Heaven,” he stopped for a moment, “. . . or whatever you believed in.” He felt a tear rising to his eyes, but quelled it.
He heaved the body over his shoulder, and tossed it into the river. He watched for a moment as he saw it sink and bubble up as it was swept away by the current. He was disgusted in himself, but mostly just happy that this whole ordeal was over. He thought to sit and rest for a moment, but he noticed that he had a sizable blood strain on his shirt and decided that it was best he returned home before it became bright enough for people to see it.
So he made one last trek through the forest, and managed to arrive safely back to his room.
He heard a voice as he entered, “Lucille?” it asked, “is that you?”
He panicked slightly and quickly tore his clothing off and stuffed it into their trash can, “y-yeah,” he said, “it’s just me, Mandie.”
She entered the entrance area and saw him standing there, shirtless and holding a gun, “what happened?” she asked him, taking a step back out of fear.
He set the gun down on the counter and slumped into a chair, where he promptly began crying. Mandie felt terrible for reproaching him, and ran over to comfort him. She wrapped her arms around him and gently stroked his hair, “it’s okay,” she said, “it’s going to be okay.”
After he could control himself, he looked up to her. He wiped his eyes and spoke, “I- I want to tell you everything, Mandie,” he said, “but I’m just not sure I can.”
She sat next to him and took his hands in hers. She looked him in the eye, “it’s okay, Lucy,” she said, “you can tell me when you want to, however long it takes, and I’ll still be here.”
He didn’t say anything.
“I just want you to be okay . . . can- can you promise me that?” she looked at him, “baby,” she said, “just please, promise me that.”
He gulped, “I promise,” he said, “I promise that it’s nothing and that I’m okay.”
She looked at him, finding it incredibly hard to believe but desperately wanting to, “o- okay, Lucy. I believe you.”
They embraced for several minutes, until he requested that they get some rest. They went to their bed, and fell asleep in each other’s arms, as if everything in the world was fine.
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It was the morning, and Gabe and Lucille had gathered before a radio in one of their common areas. Lucille tuned it to the news, and they all waited with bated breath.
“A young state college student aged nineteen, whose name is being withheld, was found dead at the basin of Randall’s Creek this morning at approximately 7:32 AM. The cause of death is speculated to be nitrous oxide poisoning”
“Well, shit,” Gabe said.
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