A Death Scene

Paul looked into his eyes and saw a desperate searching there. It was greater than any other kind of desperation he had ever seen. It was deep, pure and intense and it bore into him. Karl was transformed from the tormentor into the conquered. Karl was made weak and grasping, but more so than he had ever made Paul. Paul would walk away from this. He didn’t know what he might walk into, but he would walk away.

The rest of the world was like the sound of cars on a distant road when walking through peaceful countryside fields; Paul could just about believe that it was not a part of where he was at that moment and immerse himself in the act. The darkness around them was like a blanket and even the scream of the train as it had shot across the bridge overhead had seemed far away. The sickly yellow light that illuminated the underpass as best as it could made it all surreal and dreamlike for Paul, perhaps nightmarish for Karl.

Karl had not shouted or screamed. However, each sound that had been made by the pair had been too much for Paul. It was silly to think it but it had reminded him of teenage masturbation shut away in his bedroom – the fear that those outside would recognise some sound he made and know what he was up to. The shame of it. Though most of the noises that he and Karl had made would probably be dismissed by any passersby as the usual scuffles and excited nonsense of any Saturday night, he had had a moment or two of panic. However, the act was essentially done now and the only sound was Karl’s garbled, gargled and muffled pleas for… Paul knew not what. There was nothing much that he could or would do for him at that point.

When the metallic smell of Karl’s blood punctured the moment the mood was lost for Paul. The smell of urine also came to Paul but he wasn’t sure whether that was Karl or just the usual aroma of the underpass. He kind of hoped it was Karl but he found the idea of it repellent too. There was still a trace of the cheap scent that Karl was wearing as well amongst the other smells but it was less noticeable amongst the newer and more exciting smells. It was the smells that brought Paul back to himself and the real world. There was a horrid smell like hydrogen sulfide under that bridge that had had hardly any impact upon Paul until he came back to himself.

A refreshed anger took over him and he beat at Karl; he hit his face and shook his arms in an attempt to loose the grip that Karl had upon his denim jacket. Again, Paul had barely noticed this aspect of the situation, that Karl had had such a grip of him. Later he would laugh to himself at the thought that he had been “so lost in Karl’s eyes” for a while, it was such a clichéd expression of tenderness he found it amusing. Though, his obsession with Karl was a bit like love; dark and twisted but just as pure and blind.

It seemed like an age had passed but eventually Karl’s grip did loosen and his body did slacken and Paul rolled him, with some effort, toward and into the long grasses just outside the underpass that smelled of piss and rotten eggs. In the dark of night, poorly illuminated by lights under the pass, the body seemed to be obscured but he couldn’t tell whether it would remain that way in the cold light of day. Well, what did it matter anyway?

He went to put his hands in the pockets of his jacket and then felt the cooling, sticky and congealing stains on himself. The colour of the denim was too light and the stains were obvious, even in the poor visibility he had. Once he got into the town centre he might draw attention to himself. He began his walk along the river and, as he did so, slid out of his jacket and threw into the waters. He felt bad about that; he hated the people that threw their crap into the river and he felt sad for the animals that had to endure this human waste.

He zipped up the hoodie – black, like his trousers, and showing no visible signs of blood spatter – and enjoyed the walk home. He didn’t know what was coming and whether he would be caught sooner rather than later, but he did know that on Monday morning he would be able to go to school unafraid for the first time in two years; there’d be no Karl to push him around, there’d be no Karl pick on everything he did and make him feel faulty, there’d be no Karl to hawk phlegm wads into his face, there’d be no Karl to hold him down in the toilets while he sprayed water from his mouth into his face.

There’d be no Karl.