Barbed Boys

Chapter 2

☢

It was silent for a moment.

Holy shit.

Mother of.

Fuck.

The scream that tore out of my throat was unlike anything I'd heard in my entire life. I'd always liked to think, during those times you create dramatic scenarios in your head, I was the type of person who when placed in a life or death situation would react with natural instincts and a sound mind.

That did not seem like the case.

One moment I was running for my life and the next I was watching someone die. My brain couldn't process everything at once. I saw red, it was everywhere. Shooting someone's brains out was messy.

My body trembled, it was like the bullet was inside me, rattling around my body and bouncing off my bones.

Shouldn't it have been loud? Why wasn't it loud? No one would have heard that from outside. No one knew someone had just murdered Randy.

Then I felt it. The warmth of it on my skin, my face my hands my sweater. It was blood. Oh god. Oh god it was blood. I saw it on my hands and it was something I'd never forget. Everywhere, it was everywhere. It was on the floor, on the counter, on the ice cream display case, on the soft serve machine. The one I'd just cleaned the one I'd-I'd-

It was on me.

On my face.

Made me feel dirty, itchy, tingly. In a way that made want to scratch my skin off. And yet.

I couldn't move, could barely move. My mind was buzzing, racing, running, flying, but it was like slow motion. Like one breath took days to bring in and Randy would never take another one.

My eyes dropped down and I finally stumbled backwards. He was staring up at me. Randy. His eyes were open and there was a hole in the middle of his forehead, perfectly circular. It wasn't so big. It didn't look so big, but the back of his head. It was open. Gone.

The light, the mischief, the life that had been in them. Gone forever.

I'd watched this happen. It wasn't a movie, it wasn't a dream as much as I felt like it should. Like it could be or would be. It was real, I knew that in the stickiness of the red splatter on my face and hands. I knew it the eyes I'd never forget, in the sound of that tick-thump splicing through my ears over and over and over.

"I thought you were keeping her busy, Vin."

The voice that broke through the pregnant silence was light.

Deep Voice cleared his throat from behind me, "She got away from me."

"This little thing? She's a waif." Amusement. It was threaded through his words, like this whole thing was one massive joke to him.

I raised my chin a little bit. Pathetic defiance. It did nothing for my situation. My attacker said nothing in response for a moment.

"Did I not tell you to keep her in the back till we were done?"

"Yes, Boss. You did."

The man, the one who had held Randy in place nodded his head, taking a casual step over the body, taking care to avoid stepping in the crimson puddles on the floor. His steps were carful like it would be inconvenient to get the blood of his victim on his shoes. I trembled as he came towards me, hands tucked into his pockets like he hadn't just used them to help kill somebody. Like he did it everyday. Maybe he did. Something like this, it's not done by a first time killer. I watched enough t.v. crime shows to know that much. I just never, never thought I'd see it in real life.