Ok, here you go.
For anyone who hasn't read my story yet, I'm posting it as one big piece as opposed to twelve chapters people have to find. For people who've already seen it, ignore this. It's the same thing, just formatted a little differently.
Here you go.
4th Person
Jason
We wake up with the sun in our eyes.
As we groggily get to our feet, we hear the crunching sound of fragments of glass on other fragments of glass in the beige carpet. Our feet start to bleed.
We then notice a strange atmosphere in our normally still room. Ambient sounds from the streets outside are much louder than they should be. There is a draft in the room even though the Super never bothered to install any ventilation system in this building.
Teddy is the first to notice the square red object on our floor, and points it out.
Irwin reaches the only logical conclusion: someone has thrown a brick through our window.
This infuriates Jason. He sees it as a personal attack. He grabs the brick off the floor and almost succeeds in hurling it back to the world outside before Irwin notices the piece of paper strapped to it and stops him. Irwin gingerly unties the string,
"Baling twine, to be exact," Irwin corrects,
and unfolds the paper.
The note is addressed to "Meg," and seems to have been written by a jilted lover.
Irwin confidently concludes that the brick thrower must have thrown at the wrong window. He seems almost happy to have solved such a mystery.
Jason now takes his opportunity to throw the brick out what is left of our window. We sit back down on our bed, exhausted, even though the day just began.
Teddy begins crying as Irwin carefully picks the small chunks of glass out of our feet.
Jason, his unbridled anger reaching its peak, slams his fist into the wall, adding another crack to his collection. "GODDAMNIT!" He shouts.
"Please, Jason, don’t swear." Teddy quietly adds.
Jason turns on Teddy. "Hey! Don’t tell me what to do, you stupid, whiny-"
The neighbor, who none of us have ever seen, cuts off Jason’s reply with a slamming noise on the wall and a loud "Shut up in there, you crazy fuck!"
Jason glares at the wall for a while, and Irwin slowly says, "Calm down, Jason. We don’t want to have to talk to the Superintendent again about noise problems. He said he’d have to kick us out if we kept this up."
Jason pulls out and drives a knife straight into the wall.
One more crack. The Super is never going to return our deposit.
We don’t know where he gets these knives, or where he hides them. We’ve searched his belongings several times but can’t ever seem to find his hiding place. He must carry them on him; he can seem to materialize one in his hand at a moment’s notice.
Between his knives and his temper, Jason rather frightens us. We know he’ll never hurt us, but we worry that he’ll snap someday and get all of us in trouble. If Irwin weren’t here to be his voice of reason, things would have gotten bad a long time ago. Teddy would never be able to talk down Jason by himself, and we all know it.
Well, that’s what Irwin’s for.
"Breathe, Jason. The neighbor just wants quiet."
We all get dressed and leave for work. As we get out our door, a policeman stops us wondering if we know anything about a brick.
Jason is the quickest thinker of any of us. He fields the question. "A brick?"
"Yes, apparently an average-sized brick was flung from one of the windows in this apartment complex this morning. It went through the closed window of a passing car, injuring the driver. Luckily, there wasn’t a collision. No one else was hurt." The policeman pauses. "Do you know anything about this?"
"No, sorry, officer." Jason responds in his most helpful tone. "The guy next door to us might though."
Jason flashes us a malicious grin as he leans in to the officer and tells him that he questions the neighbor’s sanity. Jason mentions several times the neighbor has pounded on the wall screaming for quiet when no one was talking, as well as five or six other things Jason makes up on the spot.
Jason is the quickest thinker of any of us.
The policeman looks at us for a long time before thanking us and moving on down the hall.
Irwin quietly closes the door before the policeman sees the fragments of glass still scattered over our carpet, not to mention the knife-
The knife is no longer in the wall. Jason must have grabbed it when no one was looking.
* * *
Irwin
Jason contained himself as soon as we left the apartment. In the outside world, at work especially, Irwin is in charge. We step out of the subway and begin our five-block trek to the office building where we work.
Well, technically, we work under the building. We work in the archive of the company we serve. One of the basement levels is full to the ceiling with file cabinets, cabinets that contain every important document the company has had for the last thirty years. Our job is to retrieve these documents whenever people need them.
Irwin was the one who got us this job. It’s no wonder we ended up working here. Irwin was the one who wanted to work, and this job fits him perfectly. Organization is essential to archive work, and Irwin is the most organized person any of us have ever met.
A good example of this is what he currently has us doing. Irwin has been timing us for the last three weeks, and has deduced that it takes an average of three and a half minutes to find any given document people ask for.
Irwin is currently having us reorganize the filing cabinets in order to cut this average down to three minutes.
The last crew to work in the archive didn’t have an average. They also probably took hours to find anything. Irwin has made it a personal quest of his to be so good at this job the company couldn’t afford to replace us.
While we are sorting thousands of documents up in the stacks, a voice calls up from the desk.
"Hey, Leonard. Could you come here, please?"
We look at each other for a minute, then Irwin decides to reply.
"Just a second." Irwin pleasantly calls out, then climbs down the ladder and walks over to the counter.
The voice belongs to Gerry, our supervisor. We didn’t recognize his voice immediately because he rarely comes down here himself. Usually he sends his secretary, Sara.
He asks why half of the filing cabinets in the archive have been emptied in the last few days.
Of course. He’s down here because he thinks we’re screwing up. That sums up our existence. No one really notices anyone else until they do something wrong.
Irwin explains his theories about our efficiency.
Gerry only half listens, then asks for the memo on the company’s stockholders from last March 22nd.
Irwin retrieves the document within four minutes, which isn’t bad, seeing as how it was at the bottom of a pile of random papers.
Gerry asks Irwin if he’s thought about his offer to give us an assistant. Irwin tells Gerry that it’s unnecessary. We keep ourselves company down here.
When he sees the look of concern in Gerry’s face, Irwin mentions that it would just be more money for payroll.
Plus, we’ve been doing more work than we’ve been paid for anyway. The company keeps stiffing us on our check. Normally, we’d complain- Jason especially- but we’ve been so happy to receive any compensation that we’ve been reluctant to complain.
Gerry tells us that he’ll look into it.
We know he won’t just from the look he gives Irwin as he says it.
Irwin returns to the top of the stack and begins carefully putting papers back into folders as Teddy begins humming.
We don’t see anyone for the next hour, allowing us to get much further on Irwin’s reorganization quest. The next person to come down the elevator catches Teddy’s attention before the doors open.
We notice him stop humming and look over at the desk when the bell on the elevator dings. When Sara approaches the desk, Jason chuckles to himself.
"Jeez, Teddy. How do you do that? Some kind of chick-radar? I mean, every time a girl comes down here, you perk up like a puppy dog before anyone can see who it is."
Irwin points out that Teddy only seems to do this when Sara comes to get something. The other secretaries don’t seem to have this effect on him.
When Sara calls out for us, Teddy slides down the ladder.
"I’ll get this one, guys." He says as he briskly walks over to the desk.
"Hey there, um… Irwin, right?" Sara seems to guess.
"Teddy." Teddy corrects her.
"Oh, right. Sorry." She continues, "Gerry wanted me to return this, and get the March 25th memo instead."
Teddy is back in two minutes, a new record for us.
"Here you go, Sara."
"Thanks, Teddy." Sara starts walking back to the elevator.
"Wait-" Teddy begins.
Sara stops, but Teddy can’t seem to find the words he’s looking for.
"Will-… what-…" Teddy stammers.
"Yes?" Sara patiently waits for him to continue.
There is a pause as Teddy frantically tries to continue without success.
Teddy’s always been falling in love, but he’s had the level of confidence to talk to girls that he’s had since before high school. This is one of the reasons Jason has never been able to respect Teddy in the slightest.
"Ask her already, for Chrissakes!" Jason bellows out from the stacks.
Teddy glares at him, then blurts out all at once, "What are you doing for lunch?"
Sara smiles. We’re glad. A lot of girls seem to find awkwardness in guys cute. If this weren’t true, poor Teddy would never have a chance.
Sara tells Teddy that she’ll have to work through lunch today, but she’d be happy to meet him somewhere tomorrow.
She goes back into the elevator, and Teddy smiles.
"It’s a date." He softly mutters to himself.
Jason then ruins Teddy’s moment.
"Hey, asshole, you don’t get a break while the rest of us are working our asses off!"
Teddy sighs and rejoins us at the top of the stack of cabinets, and we work through until 5.
* * *
Jason
Teddy brims with joy for the rest of the day.
We go to dinner, drop by the bookstore (Irwin picks up a CD of Goethe’s "Faust"), and we even go to that revenge movie that Jason has been trying to convince Irwin to see for months.
Teddy is so proud of himself that he even smiles through the scene when the heroine smashes a guy’s head open in a doorway, and usually Teddy just can’t deal with violence.
"Would you wipe that stupid grin off your face?! You’re starting to freak me out!" Jason eventually bursts, cueing shushes from the crowd around us.
Teddy just grins even wider.
By the time we get back to our apartment and Irwin puts in his new music, Jason just can’t take it anymore. He’s twitching and glaring at Teddy, and when Teddy cheerfully asks him "What’s wrong, buddy?" Jason just snaps.
He makes it all the way across the room before Irwin can stop him, and lays Teddy out with a blow to the jaw.
All of us, even Jason, can feel the force of the blow.
Teddy just starts weeping. When Irwin tries to reprimand Jason for what he did, he belts out "Leave me the FUCK alone, poindexter! I don’t want any of your psychological BULLSHIT right now, OK?!"
Jason moves back to his chair, and the neighbor pounds on the wall again.
"Hey! Keep it down in there!" The neighbor’s voice comes bellowing through the wall.
Before Irwin can calm him down, Jason screams back.
"Don’t start up with me, you nosy asshole!"
There is a pause before the neighbor responds, more angrily than before.
"You want to come over here and say that?!"
Irwin, helpless, just stares as Jason silently strides out of the room.
Irwin bends down to help Teddy up.
"That’s strange. Jason can usually calm down much better than that." Irwin observes.
Teddy wipes his nose on his sleeve and curls up on the bed, facing the wall.
Irwin sits down next to the stereo and focuses on the powerful opera music.
Five minutes pass before Jason returns to the apartment. He walks briskly to the TV, turns it on, and sits down.
Irwin slowly turns off the music.
"Jason-" He begins.
"What?" Jason replies, sharply.
"Did you clear things up with the neighbor?"
"Yes," is Jason’s only reply.
Jason hopes Irwin will just drop the subject and let him watch Gilligan.
There is a pause, and Irwin decides to investigate further.
"What did you say to him? I didn’t hear anything."
Jason turns around, his eyes boring holes through Irwin. After a pause, Jason slowly explains that he quietly apologized for his behavior, and the neighbor dropped the subject.
Somehow, Irwin thinks that there is more to the story than that, but we decide not to think about it any more.
We pass out at one, then wake up at six to get ready for work.
* * *
Irwin
Teddy and Sara are almost finished with their lunch and the waitress still hasn’t taken Irwin and Jason’s order. Granted, the restaurant is really busy today, but that’s no excuse.
Jason is getting angry.
"Maybe she’s just too busy, Jason." Irwin suggests.
Jason grunts a reply, his head buried in his arms.
"The words ‘too busy’ shouldn’t be in a waitress’s vocabulary, Irwin. If we’re forced to go without lunch today because our waitress is too much of a flake to take our orders, I swear to God I’ll…"
Irwin quickly changes the subject. "Jason, this is what I’ve been talking about. I don’t know what’s gotten into you recently, but you have to keep your temper in check. Calm down. If you keep going on like this, you’re going to get all of us in trouble."
Jason grunts and looks across the room at Teddy and Sara.
"Is that why you’re so…" Irwin looked for the word, "…irritable recently?"
Jason doesn’t respond.
"Teddy’s been moping around the apartment since you…" Irwin catches himself, this is a touchy subject among us.
"Since Jane left." Irwin corrects himself. "And now he might have found someone to help pull him out of this funk he’s been in. Can’t you just let him be happy?"
Jason just keeps staring at Teddy and Sara.
The waitress brings the check to their table, Sara reaches for it, but Teddy puts his hand on it and shakes his head. He pulls out his wallet and starts placing bills on the table.
"He’s picking up their tab." Jason grunts, his eyes narrowing.
"That’s sweet."
"Yeah, except we have to live on that money, especially with the company stiffing us like this."
"Calm down, Jason, it’s only one lunch."
"There’ll be more. I’m just saying that this Sara’s starting to look like a lot of money flying out the window."
Irwin just sighs and shakes his head at Jason.
"Speaking of windows, we need to fix that damn brick-hole. Who’s going to pay for that?"
And Jason keeps glaring at Teddy and Sara.
* * *
Jason
The elevator dings "40."
Today is the day. Irwin has gotten so fed up with this payroll nonsense that he’s taken Jason’s advice to go up and talk to Gerry one-on-one about it. Irwin’s usually very non-confrontational, but he just can’t stand getting one, not three checks from the company each week.
What’s worse, they’re all signed to "Mr. Leonard Martin." We’re not sure how they know about Leonard, but if it’s meant as a joke, we’re not laughing.
The elevator dings "50."
"We should have done this a long time ago, when that first check came. I don’t know why we waited so long." Jason says to our reflections in the cool metal of the elevator door.
"You know full well why we hesitated. Someone in payroll could have been blackmailing us." Irwin quietly responds.
Jason slowly but firmly reminds us. "What happened to Leonard was an accident. It wasn’t our fault. It could have happened to anyone. Besides, we were all kids then."
He adds, "it was a long time ago."
The elevator dings "55."
Irwin clenches his fist. He wants to say a lot of things to Jason right now, point out a lot of details. Like how it wasn’t just some "accident" that Leonard had, he was killed. Right in front of us. Like how we woke up in the hospital, and Leonard wasn’t there, or anywhere else anymore. Like how it was Jason’s idea in the first place to race that guy down Main Street. Like how Jason reached over with his foot and planted it on the gas pedal when Leonard said he wanted to stop. Like how he didn’t let up until the truck slammed into the side of our car.
Like how Jason’s first conscious words were, "We’ve got to get out of here."
The elevator dings "60." The doors slide open. Irwin lets the matter drop.
We walk down the hallway to Gerry’s office, and Sara buzzes us in. She smiles at Teddy as we walk by. They’ve been going out for six months now, and Teddy won’t stop blabbering about how he thinks she might be "the one." It’s driving Jason crazy.
Gerry looks up from whatever he’s doing.
"Oh, hello." He nods at us in greeting, then looks back at the papers on his desk. "What do you want?"
Jason nudges Irwin with his elbow. Irwin stammers, "Uh, sir, uh, there seems to be a problem with our paychecks. I know we’ve talked about this before, but, um, nothing is seeming to be done about it?"
Irwin has never been good at talking to superiors.
There’s a pause as Gerry doesn’t respond. Jason explains, "There’s three of us working down there, and we’re only receiving one check each week." He looks over at Irwin. "There, see? It’s not so hard."
Gerry looks at us for a long time. Irwin starts to think this wasn’t such a good idea. Gerry turns back to his computer, and tells us to take our problem to Payroll. Jason explodes, and slams his palms down on Gerry’s desk.
"NO! We’ve taken your CRAP for too long, Gerry! Either you call Payroll and clear this up, RIGHT NOW, or you’ll lose the best archive team this company has ever had!"
Gerry slowly looks from his computer, to Jason’s hands, then up to his face. "Well, I’m sorry to hear that. You can drop off an official resignation at the front desk. But, for now,-" He reaches for the "call security" button on his desk.
"Don’t bother, sir. We can escort ourselves out." Irwin calmly says, and we walk out the door.
* * *
Teddy
Teddy is alone.
He’s in the basement archives, concentrating on Irwin’s filing system so he can forget the last few weeks.
Project SPONGE is filed before Project SPUD.
Jason was too angry and Irwin was too proud to ask Gerry for their job back. Teddy needed it the most. It kept him close to Sara. He came back without telling the others, got on his knees, and begged for his job back.
Office Furniture is filed before Office Supplies.
After we were fired, Sara offered Teddy the spare room in her apartment until he got back on his feet. Teddy wanted to accept, but that would mean leaving Jason and Irwin to fend for themselves.
Teddy tries to remember whether uppercase or lowercase letters are filed first.
When Teddy mentioned Sara’s offer to Irwin and Jason, Jason got angry. He said Teddy was abandoning them, his closest friends, after all they had been through-
Teddy climbs down the ladder to get more unsorted, unfiled papers.
Jason stormed out, leaving Irwin and Teddy in the drafty apartment. After a talk, Irwin decided he’d better stick with Jason and make sure he didn’t get into trouble.
Neither came back that night, or any night after.
Teddy stops to wipe a tear from his eye, then tries to remember whether P comes before Q, or the other way around.
Teddy moved in with Sara and didn’t leave a forwarding address at the apartment. He felt bad leaving the others, but they seemed to have left him anyway. He would miss Irwin being around, because Irwin always knew what to do, but he wouldn’t miss Jason.
Thinking that about one of his lifelong friends made him uncomfortable, but he knew that Jason was a bad influence on him.
He was comfortable where he was. Sara let him stay, as long as he paid his half of the rent, and he was happy.
Teddy closes a filing cabinet drawer, climbs one step up the ladder, and opens another.
The work has been going slower without Irwin’s guidance, but Teddy has been doing fine.
Even though he is alone.
* * *
Irwin
The last few weeks have been a blur. Irwin and Jason are at the deli counter of a supermarket. Irwin is trying to decide whether to get ham or roast beef for next week’s batch of sandwich lunches, and Jason is leaning against the glass, looking happily around the store.
"This, Irwin, is the smell of freedom." Jason says as he takes a deep breath.
"No, Jason, it’s the smell of a deli counter." Irwin coldly replies. "Excuse me!" Irwin calls to a nearby clerk, who proceeds to ignore him for the fifth time.
"Oh, come on." Jason turns to Irwin. "You can’t convince me that you aren’t enjoying the sudden lack of commitment we’re experiencing."
"Actually, I can. We haven’t found jobs yet, and we’re quickly running out of money."
"Yet you’re at a deli counter, ordering roast beef for sandwiches?"
"You know I won’t function without my deli sandwich in my lunch." Irwin mutters. "Besides, I’m trying to order ham."
Irwin shouts at another clerk, who just ducks into the kitchen.
"I swear, the service here is abysmal."
Several minutes pass as Irwin waits patiently for the next clerk to come by. Jason’s just staring into space, grinning ear to ear.
"I hope Teddy’s all right." Irwin says as another clerk passes him by.
"Screw him." Jason laughs. "I think his leaving was the best thing that’s happened to me. I feel powerful. Seriously, you haven’t told me what to do in days, weeks even. I haven’t heard a ‘quiet, Jason’ or ‘calm down, Jason’ or anything like that in a while."
"Quiet, Jason."
"See, now you say that, but I won’t listen. Listening to you only got us trouble."
"I never led us to-"
"We’re homeless, Irwin. We’re homeless, unemployed, poor. You’re trying to convince me to spend our last money on Ham.
How does listening to you help?"
Jason flexes his elbow, and catches his knife as it slides down his sleeve.
"In fact, Irwin, you’re pretty much useless now, aren’t you?"
"That’s not true. You know without me,-"
"Shut up!" Jason explodes. "I’ve had it with you!"
Jason slams Irwin against the glass and drives the knife deep into his belly.
"Goodbye, Irwin."
"Jason," Irwin coughs, "Without me, you’re dead. You understand that?"
"I don’t think so."
Jason pulls the knife out and plunges it in again, and Irwin collapses to the ground. Jason wipes off the knife and sheathes it.
"Now, what to do..."
Jason whistles as he walks off down the next aisle.
* * *
Jason
For some reason, Teddy can’t work today. No matter how hard he tries, he can’t remember how Irwin’s filing system works. Teddy’s sitting on the ground, papers and files free of their cabinets in a veritable sea all around him. His back is pressed up against the counter people come to if they need him, so he is as far away from filing cabinets as he can be without abandoning his post. The counter top stretches over his head, shielding him from view.
Teddy puts his head between his knees. He’ll never figure Irwin’s system out. The last person that wanted a document had to wait ten minutes for Teddy to find it.
He claimed that even the last archive employee, "Illiterate Steve," could find files faster.
This just hurts Teddy’s feelings.
Teddy hears the low rumble of the elevator coming down to the basement, and Teddy knows that Sara is on board. He stands up as the doors open.
Sara’s inside, but she’s crying. As she steps out, the doors close and the elevator starts making its trip back up the shaft.
"Sara, what’s wrong?" Teddy softly says as Sara wipes her eyes.
"Well, you see-" She stops as the rumble of the elevator ceases momentarily, then starts up again.
"Oh no. He’s coming down. Hide, Teddy." Sara quickly says as the elevator dings.
Teddy hits the ground under the desk just as the doors slowly slide open. Teddy hears fancy Italian leather shoes strike the concrete floor.
Gerry has just stepped out of the elevator.
Gerry starts softly talking to Sara. Teddy can’t hear the exact words they are saying, but he gets the gist of it.
Apparently Sara had misfiled some papers that could be used against the company. Apparently several executives could have been arrested due to this. The papers have been found, but the executives are still upset.
Apparently Gerry’s good word to these executives is the only thing that will keep them from pressing charges.
Apparently Gerry wants to make Sara work for this "good word."
Sara refuses, but Gerry threatens still further. He says that they should discuss this matter further in his office.
Gerry drags Sara onto the elevator, and they disappear into the upper levels of the building.
Teddy twitches with anger. He feels his heart beating faster, he feels pain in his hands...
As he looks down, he realizes that his fingernails have cut into his palms after his hands had been balled into fists.
Teddy looks around, wondering what he should do. Suddenly, a voice comes to him from the filing cabinet jungle in front of him.
"That really sucks, man. Stuff like that shouldn’t happen to nice girls like Sara."
Teddy shivers. He knows that voice.
"Guys like that scum Gerry should be taught a lesson, shouldn’t they?"
Teddy feels his anger whither away, as the voice grows stronger.
"You know what we have to do, Teddy." The voice says coldly.
A thick file comes hurtling through the darkness and crashes in front of Teddy, scattering countless memos into the distance. It is the current company directory, containing all employees’ names, phone numbers, and addresses.
"No, please." Teddy begs.
Jason steps out of the shadows. "We’ll have to kill him, Teddy."
* * *
Teddy
We’re standing outside Gerry’s back door just after three o’clock in the morning. We’re wearing dark clothes and a ski mask just in case anyone sees us.
Right now, Jason is picking the lock on the back door while Teddy stands guard. Teddy’s very nervous.
"I don’t like this."
"Of course. You want to back out NOW, after driving the whole way here."
Teddy looks around nervously again. "Where’s Irwin, Jason? I thought he was with you."
Jason stops and turns to Teddy. "He’s... working, Teddy. He’s working full time now. He sent me to check up on you."
"Where’s he working, Jason?"
"A graveyard. No more questions, I’ve got to work." Jason goes back to fiddling with the lock.
"I wish Irwin was here."
Teddy looks back over Gerry’s backyard. He can see his breath. He wishes he was at home, out of this cold, holding Sara in his arms, free from all worries-
The lock clicks and the door slides open.
"We’re in, Teddy."
We slowly sneak through Gerry’s expansive house, up the stairs, and find the master bedroom. Before we open the door, Jason stops Teddy and hands him the knife. It seems heavy in Teddy’s quivering hands.
"This is your fight, Teddy. You’ve got to do this, not me."
Teddy tries to plead with Jason, but Jason’s cold, dark eyes remain firm, fixed on him.
We enter the room. Teddy slowly creeps up to the bed, and lifts the knife above Gerry’s sleeping form.
Teddy closes his eyes, but can’t bring himself to drive the knife downward.
"Jason, I can’t do it!"
"Shh! Do you want to wake him?!"
Teddy frowns. "Well, maybe that would be the best thing. At least I’d still be able to sleep at night."
Gerry stirs, but remains asleep.
"Teddy, if he wakes up, we’ll go to jail. You’ll never see Sara again. Do you want that?"
Teddy slowly faces Gerry and raises the knife again. Jason begins chanting "Do it. Do it. Do it." as if to make Teddy more comfortable with what he is about to do.
Teddy’s about to drive the knife into Gerry’s upper chest when Gerry’s phone rings. Teddy drops the knife and Gerry wakes up.
Jason quickly crosses the room, picks up the knife and drives it into Gerry. Several times.
Gerry’s wife wakes up and screams. As Jason turns to her, Teddy backs slowly into the corner, tears already coming to his eyes.
He can’t shut out Jason’s actions. He can’t pretend they’re not happening. Even when he closes his eyes, he sees.
A light clicks on down the hallway. Children’s voices can be heard, calling for their parents. Jason tears off down the hallway, leaving a trail of someone else’s blood.
Teddy curls up into a ball and shivers.
He wishes he wasn’t alone.
* * *
Jason
Teddy stumbles down the street, hoping passersby won’t notice him. His front is literally soaked from slipping on the mess Jason left behind in the hall.
Teddy started running before the screams stopped echoing down the long hallways.
Jason had to go to prison. Teddy had to tell the Police.
Teddy stops at a street corner, unsure where to go next. He can’t remember where the station is. Whether he should take a right or left, he doesn’t know.
He takes a left and keeps walking. He needs to keep walking, otherwise Jason might find him.
The sound of footsteps breaks through the silence of three o’clock in the morning. Jason is coming, following him.
Teddy breaks into a run, frantically looking for somewhere to hide.
Jason calls out to him from a block back. "Teddy, slow down! I need to talk to you!"
Teddy tries to keep running, but his breath is already shortening. He never was a long-distance runner. Gasping, he reaches a stoplight and pushes the button to walk.
Behind him, Jason is jogging along, getting closer.
Teddy looks back and forth. No cars are coming. He stumbles across the empty street.
He’s halfway down the next block when he feels Jason’s knife fly into his lower leg.
Teddy screams and collapses. Jason catches up within seconds, and pulls his knife back out.
"Where are you going, Teddy?"
Teddy spits the words out between jaws clenched tight from the pain.
"You need to be locked up, Jason. You’re crazy."
"No, Teddy! WE’re crazy. WE. Not me. You had just as much to do with what happened tonight as I did."
"NO I DIDN’T!" Teddy rolls over onto his stomach and tries getting up. Jason rests a boot on the small of Teddy’s back and leans in close to him.
"As far as the law is concerned, you did. You’ve got blood all over you, you’ve got a motive and I don’t. Hell, You’ve even got your fingerprints on my knife. If you try to turn me in, all you’ll get is arrested."
Teddy coughs. "I’ll... Be able... To convince them..."
Jason smiles. "Yeah, maybe you might. I hope you realize I enjoy my freedom, and I will go to any lengths to keep it. If you are serious about going to the Police, I’m going to have to do something drastic."
"Kill me then, and be done with it! I don’t want this anymore!"
Jason takes his foot off Teddy and rolls him over.
"I’m not going to kill you. You’re my best friend, Teddy. We’re going to have lots of fun together from now on. But, I’ll have to do something, now won’t I?"
Jason walks off.
Teddy gets to his knees, and realizes what Jason is going to do.
"No! Jason, please! I won’t go to the Police, just leave her alone!"
And Jason keeps walking.
* * *
Teddy
Teddy limps slowly down the stairs to the subway station. He knows Jason will be down here. He has to find Jason.
He sees flashes of the last hour.
Lying on the pavement, using his shoelaces as a makeshift tourniquet. Apparently some of Irwin’s first aid stayed with Teddy.
Walking four miles to Sara’s apartment on a barely operating right leg. It took him longer than he hoped. By the time he got to the door, the sun was peering over the horizon, looking at the results of listening to Jason.
Sara’s door was open. Jason didn’t even bother to close it after he had finished. The lock was still in its place in the doorframe. Jason just kicked the rest down.
A small pool of red seeped out the bedroom door. Teddy didn’t want to go in, he knew what waited inside.
Jason had scrawled a message to him on the wall, near the phone, where Sara would leave notes for him before he went to work in the morning.
"I’ll see you on the subway, Teddy."
Teddy stumbles down the last few steps, and up to the counter where you buy tokens. He knows he looks like a crazy man. He hopes they won’t care. They don’t seem to.
He pushes his way through the turnstile, and gets on the first train that arrives at the platform.
He sits down at an angle, so as to avoid getting blood all over the seats. Well, also to avoid rubbing the seats on his wound, although at this point, Teddy didn’t really care anymore.
A familiar face takes the seat next to him.
"Still thinking about going to the cops?"
"No."
"So, we understand each other."
"No, Jason. I understand you, but apparently, you don’t understand me. If you did, you wouldn’t have made the mistake of killing Sara."
"Mistake?"
"She was all I had to live for. Now you don’t have anything to use against me. You don’t hold anything over my head. You shot your sole hostage, and only succeeded in pissing me off."
"Wait." Jason’s getting scared. "You said you weren’t going to the Police."
"I’m not. I’m going to kill you."
Teddy reaches into his pocket and pulls out a kitchen knife from Sara’s apartment. As he thrusts it toward Jason’s side, Jason leaps up into the aisle.
"Whoa there, Teddy. Let’s not get drastic here."
Jason drops his hands to his sides. Teddy instinctively rolls to the side, and Jason’s knife becomes buried in the wall where Teddy was sitting.
The early morning commuters begin shifting quietly to the front of the train, away from the crazy men clad in black and splashed with red.
Teddy slowly stands up, his face twisted with rage.
"You don’t deserve the air you breathe, you psychotic..." Teddy forces himself to say it. "ASSHOLE!"
"What are you going to do about it, huh?!"
Teddy doesn’t move.
"That’s right, dipshit. Nothing. You aren’t going to do anything, because you CAN’T do anything. You have no backbone. Now SIT DOWN, and we can talk about this like intelligent, civilized-"
Teddy punches Jason in the dead center of his face, crushing his nose instantly. He lifts Jason back to his feet and gets ready to hit him again.
Jason hits first, knocking Teddy several seats toward the front of the moving train.
"Are you done?"
Teddy sits halfway up, then collapses again.
"Are you DONE?!"
Teddy gets to his feet.
Screaming, Teddy charges Jason. He hits Jason in the chest with the full force of his body, and carries him toward the back of the train. They slam into the back door, breaking the window looking over the tracks disappearing behind them into the tunnel.
Teddy grabs Jason’s legs and lifts, flipping Jason out the window. Jason grabs Teddy’s arm and pulls.
As the commuters look on in horror, both men crash to the track, sending sparks flying through the tunnel, lighting up the inside of the car in a cool shade of blue.
* * *
Leonard
The world goes on. People wake and sleep, the sun rises and sets.
A man goes to a factory every day for twelve hours in order to feed a family of six. A woman teaches children at an elementary school because an accident in her teens revoked her ability to have her own.
A Police detective spends thirty hours at a time at work, buried in a sea of paperwork, trying to convince himself that he’s making the world a better place for his son, but his son becomes part of the "wrong crowd" because his father was never there for him.
A man lost in himself commits suicide by jumping from a subway.
The news barely mentioned it the next day. "Man on subway scares crowd, leaps out back of train." In a world of crackheads and acid-droppers, a man who hears voices doesn’t frighten people anymore.
The body of Leonard Martin was discovered in a subway tunnel on January 8th. His parents identified the body on January 12th. Their statement mentioned that they were glad for the closure his death brought. They hadn’t heard from Leonard since he disappeared from his hospital bed after a car accident four years ago.
Eyewitness testimonies described the strange man as talking to himself for a short time before flying into the sudden rage that ended his life. The names "Teddy" and "Jason" were mentioned.
Leonard’s parents recognized the names as Leonard’s imaginary friends from childhood. "Leonard spent all his free time with Teddy, Irwin, and Jason." His mother commented.
Criminal psychologists took five minutes to classify Leonard as having split personalities. After interviewing co-workers about Leonard’s recent behavior, they also deduced that the "Leonard" personality was all but destroyed in the car accident.
The three remaining personalities had been vying for control of Leonard ever since.
Policemen took the knife out of the wall of the subway car and tested it for DNA. Besides matching it to the murders of Leonard’s girlfriend, Sara, his boss and his boss’ family, evidence was found on it linking the knife to dozens of murders since Leonard’s disappearance four years ago.
This list includes Leonard’s neighbor, who was discovered dead in his apartment after neighbors began complaining about the smell. He had been dead for four months.
Leonard’s death affected very few people. His body was cremated, which is almost redundant after having laid on the third rail for several minutes before being thrown off, and life went on, as usual, without him.
The ten-year-old short of money still delivered papers every morning. The actor just out of college still waited tables every day, waiting for his big break. The retiree who lost everything still worked a minimum wage job, scraping his way through life.
Leonard and the archives were replaced by a computer and a single worker, and the average time to recall a file in the database is five seconds.
Every morning the sun rose, and every evening the sun went down again. Seasons changed through their regular cycle, and people quickly forgot Leonard, just as they will eventually forget everyone.
And maybe that’s for the best.