Jake

"Want to see a dead body?"

Jake was lying in the tall grass a few feet away from me when he asked that question. I looked over at him.

"What are you talking about?"

"I asked if you wanted to see a dead body. Do you?"

"That's not funny, man," I said.

"I'm not joking. I found a body yesterday. I wasn't gonna tell anyone, but I figure it's all right to tell you. You'd never snitch about it."

I still thought it was some kind of sick joke, but when I saw the look on his face, I knew that it wasn't. I was unsure of what to say. Yes, I admit it, I was scared. But, being twelve years old, I was also curious. Some part of me wanted to see what death looked like.

"Okay."

He took me into the woods on the east side of town. We walked for what seemed like an eternity. I forgot to take off my shoes when we crossed the small creek that ran through the woods, and each step brought a weird squishing noise from my wet shoes. We walked on and on, and I was beginning to think that the whole thing was a scam when Jake stopped suddenly in his tracks.

"What is it?" I asked.

"It's right about here."

He looked around for a minute, then walked over to some bushes. He parted them and disappeared. After a moment he called to me.

"Come on, I found it."

I hesitated a moment, then parted the bushes and made my way through. There was a small, murky pond on the other side.

"There," Jake said, pointing to the other edge of the pond.

I looked, and saw what I at first thought was a bundle of discarded clothes floating at the edge of the water. After a moment I realized that the clothes had not been discarded. There was someone wearing the clothes, and that someone was floating facedown in the dirty water. My stomach felt like it was doing a cartwheel.

"I told you," Jake said triumphantly. "You didn't believe me, did you?"

"Who is it?"

"I don't know. Come on, let's get a better look."

He made his way around the pond. He looked back at me, saw that I was not following.

"Come on, already. It can't hurt you."

I reluctantly followed him. I stopped ten feet away from the body, but Jake walked right up and stood over it. It was a woman, I could tell even with the body facedown. The top was a pink t-shirt, the short arms ruffled at the edges. Her jeans had been stained a dark shade of blue. The skin of her bare arms was mostly pale, but was mottled with dark patches. Jake picked up a stick and used it to poke her upturned back.

"Want a poke?" he asked.

"No. Let's get out of here."

"Hold on. I want to see her face."

"What? Why?"

"I want to see if I recognize her."

"But you can't touch her."

"Yes I can. See?"

He tossed the stick aside and bent to the body. He gripped her right shoulder with his left hand and the belt on her jeans with his right. He pulled and slowly turned her over. When I saw what had become of what had once been a woman's face, I doubled over and vomited painfully. It felt as if my stomach were trying to exit my body through my throat. When at last I was able to stop, I looked up at Jake. He was looking down at the body with something almost like reverence, as if he were looking upon some holy object.

"I want to go," I said.

He didn't appear to hear me.

"Jake, we have to go!"

He looked over at me.

"Okay, let's go."

------

I couldn't sleep that night. Every time I closed my eyes I saw her. Twice during the night I had to rush to the bathroom to throw up. The next morning I sat at the breakfast table pushing my food around but not eating. I was tired, but I didn't think I'd ever sleep again.

"Is everything all right, Jeremy?" my mother asked.

"Yeah, everything's fine," I lied.

I didn't think she believed me.

"You look pale as a ghost. Maybe I should check your temperature."

"No, I'm okay, Mom. Really."

At school I couldn't concentrate. My weariness didn't diminish, and a little past ten o'clock I proved that I could indeed fall asleep again. My teacher woke me up with a shake.

"Jeremy, what do you think you're doing?"

"I'm sorry, Mister Gundersen. I didn't get any sleep last night."

"No excuses, young man. I have no tolerance for students who don't take class seriously. Go to the Principle's office."

"But---"

"No buts, go."

Giggles from my classmates. I left Room 236 and headed toward the front office. As I passed by the door to the boys' bathroom, it opened and a hand reached out and grabbed me, pulling me in. It was Jake. I hadn't wanted to see him, had even taken a different route to school hoping to avoid him. The way he had stood there, looking at the body, had unnerved me. It occurred to me that something was very wrong with my friend Jake.

"How'ya doin' Jeremy? Where've you been?"

"Uh, I've been around."

"I didn't see you on the way to school."

"I woke up late, so I had to take a short cut."

"Good. For a minute there I thought you were avoiding me."

A small smile spread across his lips, and I wondered what he found humorous about the situation.

"I have to go to the office. What do you want?"

"The office?"

"Yeah, Mister Gundersen got pissed because I fell asleep in class."

"Yeah, well, screw all that. We're ditching this craphole. I have something I want to show you."

I didn't want to see it, I didn't ever want to see anything he had to show me ever again.

"I really shouldn't ditch. I've already ditched twice, if I do it again my parents'll kill me."

"Don't be such a baby, Jeremy. Come on, you have to see it.

Something in his eyes told me that he wasn't prepared to take no for an answer. For the second time I allowed Jake to show me what he'd found.

-----

Somehow I already knew what it would be, but there was something I hadn't expected. This time it was a kid; he looked about the same age as Jake and I. His body was in the woods, but not near the pond. Someone had covered his body with leaves.

"It looks like someone bashed his head in with a rock," Jake said, sounding almost ecstatic. "Cool, huh?"

I felt queasy.

"We have to tell someone about him and the woman."

"What, are you crazy? What if they try to say that we did it?"

"Us? We're just kids."

"Kids can kill, too, Jeremy. They'll say we did it and lock us up. No way."

"But we can't just leave him out here, or the woman in the pond. We've got to tell someone, Jake."

He looked at me with an icy stare, a stare that made my insides turn to liquid.

"Don't tell anyone. Anyone. Do you hear me?"

Suddenly I was sure I knew who covered the boy's body with leaves, and I knew better than to disagree.

"Sure, I won't tell anyone."

"Good. Let's go."

He covered the body up again and we left.

-----

My parents threw a fit when the school called. I told them that I'd left school to come home because I was feeling sick. Neither of them ever arrived home before six o'clock on weekdays, so they had no way to know if it was the truth or not..

"I knew something was wrong with you this morning," my mom said. "You looked so pale."

That night I barely got any sleep, and the next day I told my parents that I was too sick to go to school, and after one look at me they had no reason to doubt it.

"Will you be all right at home by yourself while your father and I are at work?"

"I'll be fine, Mom."

"Maybe I should see if Miss Trumble will come over and watch you."

"It's okay Mom, I can take care of myself."

Although she didn't seem too sure about it, she let me stay home alone while she and my dad were at work. I spent the day lying in bed, thinking about those two dead people in the woods. Jake had killed them both, I was sure of it. I had to stay clear of him, but I couldn't stay out of school forever. Maybe another day at the most, then my mom would make me go to see Dr. Kline. When he told her that I wasn't sick at all, I'd have a lot of explaining to do. I couldn't tell anyone about the bodies, I felt sure of that, but not because I feared being blamed. What I feared was what Jake might do to me, or worse yet, what he might do to my family. I tried to find some way out of the situation, but nothing came to me. I was lying in bed, my thoughts racing, my stomach rolling, when he said my name.

"Jeremy."

I sat bolt upright. He was standing over by the window, but the window was closed and locked. I'd been facing the bedroom door and knew it'd never opened. So, I asked the obvious question.

"How did you get in here?"

"Oh, I have my ways, Jeremy. Why didn't you show up to school today?"

"I was feeling sick, so my mom told me I could stay home for the day."

My palms were sweating, and it felt like I was breathing too hard. I could hear the blood rushing in my ears.

"Are you sure it doesn't have anything to do with the things I showed you?"

The things. That's what he called them. He was insane, of this I had no doubt.

"No, it's not that. I've just been feeling sick lately."

He just stood there and stared at me. It was like he was probing my mind, looking right into me and searching for the hint of a lie.

"Be at school tomorrow. Don't make me come looking for you."

He left me there, sweaty and shaky. I knew that I had to rid myself of him somehow. I would have to figure something out before the next time I saw him.

-----

When my parents came home I told them how much better I felt. A day of rest really did me well, I told them. I didn't get much sleep that night either, but for some reason I no longer felt tired. The next morning I got dressed, ate a quick breakfast, and headed off to school. This was it, I told myself. It was do or die time. I expected to see Jake on the corner of Euclid and Jayhawk, where he usually waited for me, but he wasn't there.

Maybe he got run over by a car.

But I knew that I wasn't that lucky. He'd be at school, and I thought I knew exactly where to find him. When I got to school I made my way directly to the boys' bathroom near my classroom. There were a couple of kids in there shooting the breeze, but Jeremy wasn't one of them. I went into a stall and closed the door. After closing the lid on the toilet, I sat there, waiting. He would come, and until he did I would wait. Eventually the bell rang, and the kids who were in the bathroom headed to class. After a few minutes, I started to think that maybe he wouldn't come after all. Then there was a knock on the stall door.

"Wakey, wakey, my friend."

I thought it was strange that I hadn't heard him come in. The door to the boys' bathroom was very squeaky, and it wouldv'e been nearly impossible for him to open it without me hearing.

"Come on out," he said.

I tried to swallow, but my mouth was dry. I stood and opened the stall door. Jake was near the row of sinks, staring at himself in the big mirror there, fixing his hair.

"It's about time. Come on, we have to go."

"Go where, Jake?"

"I have to show you something. This one's the best of all. Come on."

"Where to? I want to know."

He turned to me then.

"To your house, Jeremy. There's something there that I have to show you."

My parents. I couldn't remember If I'd seen them that morning.

"No," I said. "I don't want to see anything you have to show me. Not anymore."

"But this is the best thing yet, Jeremy. You'll get a kick out of it."

"No. No more."

His face changed, his eyes clouded over. The air felt electric.

"Come! The fuck! On!"

"No!"

He charged, but I dove back into the stall and pushed the door shut. He began banging on it, and he was screaming at me, howling in anger.

"Open the door, you little shit! You have to see this!"

I opened my backpack and took out the gun that I'd taken out of my parents' closet the day before. Jake was still banging wildly, now shouting a string of obscenities. I threw the stall door open and pointed the gun at him. He stared at it for a moment, then smiled.

"Do you really think you can kill me?" he asked.

That was when I pulled the trigger, and half of his face disappeared in a pink vapor. He fell to the floor and I stood over his lifeless body. Some kid I didn't recognized came in and saw us there, then ran out of the bathroom, shouting for help. I would have to explain to them that I had no other choice. He was a maniac, a killer. I had to shoot him. I was sure that they'd understand.

-----

After that things get a bit screwed up in my mind. I don't remember much of anything from then until now. I know that they found my parents in their bed, dead from gunshot wounds. I know that I was put in handcuffs. I tried to tell them that it was all Jake's fault. I told them to go and check the school bathroom, he was there, I'd killed him. That was when they had a psychologist come in and talk to me. He asked me all sorts of questions, but I didn't want to answer them.

"Just look in the bathroom," I told him. "I shot him."

And then they put me here. It's some sort of hospital, and all the patients here seem kind of weird. I still don't understand why I'm here. Why couldn't they understand that it was Jake who killed those people? It's all so absurd, but at least one question of mine has been answered. I know now why they couldn't find Jake. Although I was sure I'd killed him, he didn't die. Somehow he survived, and he escaped from the bathroom before the police came. I know he's still alive because he visits me here. I've asked him to stop coming, but he won't listen. He always comes late at night, after I'm locked in my room. I can't figure out how he keeps getting into the room. All he says when I ask him about it is that same answer about having his ways. Most nights he doesn't even say anything to me. He just sits in the corner, watching me and laughing. I don't want him to bother me anymore, but I can't get him to stay gone. He just sits there laughing, watching and laughing, laughing until I think it will drive me insane.