5
That’s what they’re like, realised Alfonz with disappointment. You come to them with a smile on your face and they still don’t accept you. They scream, shriek and cover their eyes. They move away from you and one of them, that Max, even throws up. That’s what they’re like. He told them he only changed because of them and they rejected him in spite of that.
How they had disappointed him! Cut right into his heart.
That’s what they’re like.
They had hurt him.
Enough was enough, he would not stand for it any longer. Enough was enough.
They had no respect for him or his property. They did not even look where they trod, running around like headless chickens. They had knocked his rucksack over. How did they think he would get to his name without his rucksack, without proper tools?
Everything came out, the pliers, the axe, everything. They trampled on the fuses. What a lovely name those had: 1,5A. What he would not give for a name like that!
Was it possible that they were just clumsy? No, no, they were evil and wicked!
All of them.
He picked up the axe and looked around the dining room.
There was nobody there. They had left him on his own. Is that how a friend should be treated?
“Where are you?” he shouted, surprised to see the spray of red droplets filling the air, “Yoo hoo, where are you?”
They were hiding. His last hope. Maybe they were playing with him, maybe they were not wicked after all?
“Yoo hoo, where are you?”
He looked past the table lying on its side and saw Samo, cowering on the floor with his head between his shoulders.
Slowly Alfonz reached with his hand over the edge of the table, coming closer and closer to the shoulder. But before he touched it a few thick drops fell off his fingers and onto the white T-shirt.
Samo looked up.
“Tag, you’re it!” said Alfonz in a friendly manner, covering the face in front of him with blood.
Samo screamed, jumped up, pushed Alfonz away and ran towards the door.
They’re pushing me away, thought Alfonz. They don’t want to play, they’re shoving me away just as they’ve been doing for years. The new wave of fury was not like the quickly extinguished flash of the previous ones, this one grabbed him and would not let go of him.
“Samo, Samo, I’m coming,” he said and went out.
Really, he may be angry but he was fair, too.
“I know, Samo,” he said, “I know, you’re not completely bad. There’s something good in you too.”
Raf was hiding behind the kitchen door, listening. At first he did not know what the strange bubbling noises were and it was only after Samo’s screaming and escape that he realised what Alfonz was saying and that frightened him even more.
What had happened? Suddenly and without any reason his friend had changed into a madman, who first mutilated himself and was now after them.
Raf felt nauseous and he had to use all his self-control to stop himself vomiting.
Where was Max? Raf had not really noticed him in the panic but he had a vague idea that he had run out. So, was Raf alone in the house?
Slowly he tiptoed to the window and looked out.
Alfonz walked right in front of him and Raf nearly screamed.
He had not seen him, he was looking for Samo.
Raf looked towards the shed and he thought Samo could be there.
And that was exactly where Alfonz went.
Samo grabbed the door handle and flexed his muscles. From the first time he had lifted a weight he had always believed that the strength he was trying to build would come in very handy one day. If all the loose ends in one’s life did not get tied up at some point, would there be any sense in it all?
He had never thought he would need his strength to escape a lunatic. But this was for real, a fight for survival that only the strongest would win. So many times he had said: there is no mercy. They had been sitting in a bar, the sun shining, that strange thing which throws a different light on everything and which now seemed beyond reach; anyway, they had been sitting in a bar and he had said: fight for survival. Stay alive. Without mercy. And now his words had become reality. And they lay heavily on his stomach.
I mustn’t let up, he said to himself.
I mustn’t!
With both hands he held the door handle on the inside of the shed where he had hidden, feeling his strength spreading upwards from his wrists, elbows, biceps, across his shoulders and into his back. There was no force which could tear those hands away from that handle! Mad Alfonz could hammer on the door all he liked, he would never get in.
His confidence started to grow slowly, making him more optimistic.
Maybe Alfonz would not even find him? Did he go somewhere else, to catch somebody else? Max, he was the one who had got them into this shit. Where the hell was Max? And Raf, the clumsy Raf? He had probably fallen somewhere and was now lying there, moaning.
Strength, strength in his muscles.
How big they were, bulging in the light of the moon.
It was too light, too light. He looked back and saw that the back wall of the shed had long ago fallen down and blackberries grew in between the planks of wood. Alfonz was slowly coming nearer through the bushes, seemingly unfazed by the thorns.
Alfonz said:
“Samo, I’ll be honest with you. You’re not all bad, at least you weren’t bad to me. But the time of reckoning has come.
I only want what everybody wants: to know what’s good and bad in a friend. When we see what there’s more of in you, then we can decide what to do with you.
When I remember school, the first thing that springs to mind is the day when you kicked me in the changing room. With your right foot, so that foot is bad. Don’t shout and deny it now, you should have thought of it then. And that time, when I scored the decisive goal, quite by accident, I can tell you that now — the ball came towards me and I kicked it with all my strength just to get it as far away from me as possible and stop everybody teasing me again. That’s how I scored that goal. But that doesn’t matter now, what matters is that you shook my hand then. Your right hand was kind to me. I thank it for that. But not the whole of it. Don’t think I’d forgotten. Twice, during lessons, you gave me a sign with your middle finger. Come on Samo, now it really is time to let go of that door handle. You won’t? Alright then, I won’t force you. Anyway, your right hand really was kind to me but not the middle finger. It was vicious. Just like your mouth, which has always grinned, like Max’s. And your tongue — well, a third of it was good and two thirds bad, I’d say. Occasionally you did say a kind word to me and I won’t forget that.
Your eyes, well, they always looked at me unkindly. But that’s what your eyes are like, it isn’t your fault. I haven’t got an opinion about your left hand, it… oh, I remember now! Once, when they took us to the cinema, you offered me some crisps with it. Your left hand goes on the good pile than. Left foot… I don’t remember anything about it. Let’s say it remains neutral, we don’t assign it to either side. Is that OK?
OK. It’s important that you agree. I wouldn’t want you to think that I’m biased or accusing you of something you haven’t done.
We haven’t got much left. Your chest — no opinion. Stays with the neutral parts. But I can tell you, it would help you now if you’d ever given me a hug. Just look how big your chest is. It would certainly swing the scales onto
