The Rage Room

by Lisa de Nikolits

  And then Shasta walked down the stairs and I thought Jazza would come in his pants right there and then. She was wearing a pair of my boxers,with the waistband rolled down, and she’d tied the T-shirt to reveal her taut midriff. She looked sizzling hot.

  “You see,” I said and there was a note of hysteria in my voice, “we’re all here! Party time! Jazza meet Shazza! And may your hearts entwine and may you live in health and prosperity forever, amen. Although, Jazza, last time I noticed, you were doing a bear dance with a rabid squirrel, n’est pas?”

  “Sharps,” Jazza commented evenly, “you’ve lost your mind.”

  This made me laugh even harder. I sank into the sofa and sobbed with laughter, and Shasta and Jazza exchanged a look.

  “I’m Shasta. I know him from the bar,” Shasta told Jazza, and he looked confused.

  “What bar? And when did you get a tattoo?” He leaned forward. “What the fuck are you doing with Janaelle’s name on your wrist?”

  “You know Janaelle? How do you know Janaelle?” That cut off any hilarity. I sat up and glared at him. “How the fuck do you know Janaelle?”

  “Buddy! Of course I don’t know her. I know of her. The evil queen of doomsday. She’s from the video game, Alterna Inferma. It’s that mastermind life-is-chess war game, man—you loved it! And she’s The General. If you kill her, you live forever! But you know that, Sharps. We used to play before you met Celeste. You had this major crush on Janaelle! Everybody did.That was the point: get to the end and you had sex with the evil but stunning queen of doomsday!”

  I threw up. Spewed projectile green smoothie vomit all over my carpet. So much for the dust bunnies being the most of my cleaning problems. And I guess I lost my super pills. Shasta and Jazza shot away from me.

  I knelt next to my vomit, pounded my thighs with my fists, and howled. “I’ve lost my mind. I have. You’re right Jazza, I’ve lost it. And we’ve only got twenty-four hours this time, and I don’t know what’s real any more. You came here to kill my family, didn’t you? I was supposed to come and get you, but here you are.”

  Jazza looked stunned. “What do you mean?” he stammered. “I would never hurt anybody.”

  “Liar!” I rushed at him and wrestled him down, rolling him in my vomit. Frantically, I body searched him and found a gun in the waistband of his jeans. “You see!” I shrieked. “You were! You were! My babies! You killed them!” I sat back on my haunches, holding the gun, my chest heaving.

  “I think we need to take a moment,” Shasta said, and she ran upstairs and came down with a bottle of pills in her hand while I stayed where I was, gun shaking up and down with every breath, my eyes unblinking, staring at Jazza.

  “What happened, man?” I asked him. “Seriously. What’s up? Last time I saw you, you were in love with Ava and delighted to have her sit on your lap and encourage you to embezzle funds, pin the blame on me, and live happily ever. Then all of a sudden, you killed yourself. Then the next time you killed my family.”

  He looked baffled. “You are so fucked,” he said. “But you aren’t entirely wrong. I did think about killing myself. But then I thought I’d destroy your life well and truly first.”

  “Okay,” I said slowly, “but why? Why not live with Ava forever and amen? Oops, awomen?”

  “Because she wouldn’t have me! She used me, Sharps! You were right. She said I had not proven myself worthy, all because of one mistake! One fucking mistake! That I told you about her and me! And she stopped giving me my post-scour meds the nanosecond after I pressed TRANSFER on the bank funds. She dumped me and cut off my meds.”

  “What meds did she give you?”

  “I have no idea. But they balanced out my brain. Without them—argh, fuck it Sharps, I’m beyond repair. I have desires, Sharps, desires that sicken me! That’s why I had to kill myself. But then I thought, no, YOU must suffer before I go because this is all your fault, your fault!” He growled and howled like an animal in pain, and Shasta held out the bottle of pills.

  “Clonazepam,” she said. “Because we need to take this down a level.”

  “Where’d you get them?” I knew the contents of our bathroom closet inside out because I needed to keep an eye on Celeste. “There are no drugs in this house. In Celeste’s purse, yes, but not in this house. Well, some sleeping pills in her bedside table, but that’s it.”

  “I knew where to look,” Shasta said. “The CrystalMeBooty pink shoebox.” She gave me a pill. I stared at it. I didn’t want to take it. “The pink shoebox?” I sank back on my heels and then sat down cross-legged. “I feel like we’re all so confused here. Like a bunch of déjà vu moments are cross-pollinating and making crazy patterns in my mind. I need a moment. Everybody shut the fuck up!”

  38. IS IT ALL A GAME?

  I TRIED TO GATHER MY THOUGHTS. “But wait!” I shouted. “I know! Jazza! Alterna Inferma. There were all these countries around the world, and you dropped through a black hole to access another city in another timeline. And you were given a task and you chose a crew and you had to go through a maze and cross borders and the crew was always the same but the places and tasks were different. I had Mr. Kung Fu, Mr. CleanMachine, and The Beauty Queen, and I was The Fixer. We went back in time, too, right back to the Victorian era when kids worked in sweathouses, and I freed them. And then I was in Africa. But there was always a clue that twisted the game. Like one time, I nearly got to the highest level—I was about to meet Janaelle and be knighted and have mind-blowing sex—and then I realized I wasn’t The Fixer, I was just Mr. CleanMachine, and I knew because I found his inline skates in my suitcase and his bruise on my knee.” I started crying. “That was the game, wasn’t it? And we were chased by The Shadows, like stingrays in the sky, and we got trapped in abandoned buildings and had to find our way out. And there were nuns in long black habits with big white penguin cowls. The nuns were like big whiskered rats. And The Grackle was supposed to be my best friend, but he left me. And I had my arsenal, furniture polish, bleach, and silver polish, and I kept everything clean, even ironing the sheets that I had washed in extra hot water. I scored points that way.”

  “Sure, buddy,” Jazza said, and I noticed he exchanged a glance with Shasta. I slammed my hand down on the coffee table.

  I threw the gun and the pill onto the floor next to me and I rubbed my eyes hard. “Don’t humour me. What was the game if not that?”

  “It was about cheating death,” Jazza said. “Coming back to life. We died and we lived again, but only if we died the right way. But you are right, we saved orphans. You liked to save orphans.”

  I hit myself on the forehead. “That’s it! Because of Mother! She said it herself, she’s not my mother. She chose me, she said. Or did she say my father chose me, and she thought he had made a mistake? I can’t remember. Either way, I was a mistake. Maybe that’s why I killed her. No! I killed her because she was going to turn me in. But did I turn her in for gardening? I did not. You see. I remember. I went back, and I remember why.”

  “Sharps, your mother is alive,” Jazza said, and he sounded tired, like he was getting bored by this game, only it wasn’t a game.

  “She is now. I know that,” I said. “I’m not stupid, Jazza! I know that! But she will be dead, and she’ll deserve it too. But not my kids, not them.”

  I looked at my watch. “Where is Celeste? She should be back by now.”

  “They haven’t even been gone an hour,” Shasta said. “It’s not even ten a.m.”

  I grabbed the portable comm. “She mustn’t come home. We need to save the children.”

  Shasta laughed. “Yeah, like Celeste is the one to save the kids. She’s sick, your wife.”

  I looked at her. I wasn’t sure how much more I could take. I put my hands over my ears. “I don’t care,” I said. “I can’t hear it.”

  “She made me watch porn with her!” Shasta shouted. “She paid me to watch porn
with her—how sick is that? In Bax’s room, when it was just him. Then up in Sophie’s bedroom, full of FluffSqueaks and pink toys. She liked watching porn in the kid’s rooms. She hated your bedroom, with that creepy painting of that ugly old guy, and she took the portable comm into Sophie or Bax’s room and paid me to watch.”

  “I can’t hear this!” I yelled. I looked over at Jazza, and he must have grabbed the gun when I wasn’t looking because he had it in his lap. He was transfixed by Shasta.

  “That’s why I had to come back,” Shasta said. “I recognized you the minute I saw you that night. And then you got talking about time travel, and I thought it would be a way for me to come back and get Celeste to own up to what she did. That’s why I stalked you. Do you think I care about the science or you? I wanted to punish your wife. She ruined me. She drugged me. She gave me date rape drugs. Eugh. That voice. Sweetie baby honey, schnookums. Let me lick your face, smell your fresh baby girl smell. Eughh, yeah, it was her. I want to kill her myself.”

  I stared at Shasta. “I do know you,” I said slowly. “From church. And yes, you used to babysit.”

  “The church was the connection,” Shasta sneered. “There you were, singing your stupid ass off, and meanwhile it was where the parents abusing kids made their plans to meet and fuck––it was the base for their sick operations. Pretty much all the women were in on it. The men were so fucking stupid—none of you had a clue. But the rich women liked to pay the girls and the boys too.”

  “Why didn’t you say anything? How were we supposed to know?”

  “Who could we tell? Anyway, it wasn’t bad at first. It was good money, and it even seemed like fun. Kinda like our own secret world. We could buy all the shit we wanted. But then it got gross. But who would believe us? My own mother had parties. I tried to talk to her, but she just said, ‘Shasta, if you don’t want to play the game, then don’t. But don’t you rain on my parade. And don’t try telling your father because I’ll have him send you to Dr. Oliver and Dr. Oliver has his own habits, which I know about. So if you try anything, honey, you’ll end up worse off than before, in rehab for the emotionally disturbed.’ My mother’s parties were all boys. She said she loved the smell of teenage boys. And I guess your wife loved the smell of me. And now she’ll pay.”

  I leaned down and picked up the pill I had dropped. “But she’s not here. And I don’t know what’s real anymore. I don’t know who to trust.”

  I turned to Jazza. “You stole the money and pinned it on me and if you don’t kill my family and then yourself, it will be pinned on me, and then my kids will live but their mother is a pervert and I’ll go away for rest of my life.”

  “Maybe I don’t want to kill myself anymore,” Jazza said and he looked a lot more cheerful than he did when he arrived. “This is so screwed up it’s renewed my interest in life. And now Shaz is here, and that changes everything. I mean, look what just walked into my life, oh so pretty. Like I told you, Sharps, I have desires, and cheerleader girls are right up there.” He held the gun more firmly, and as I watched, his expression changed, a bruised storm moving across a sky, a bully with a lethal weapon.

  “And now it’s time for some fun,” he said and pointed the gun at Shasta. “We’ve all been so serious up to now. Shop talk all the way. Shazzie, how about you do a striptease for us, pretty please? Come on, nice and slow. Pretend you’re listening to your favourite song.”

  “You’re nothing but big talk and no action,” Shasta said defiantly, and Jazza aimed the gun at me. “You think so? You want to try me? I owe him nothing. He didn’t even make me his son’s godfather. Do you know this is only the second time I’ve ever been here? The first time was to help unpack. Like I was a mover! I’d love you to give me a reason to shoot him and then you’ll be stuck here with me and I will do whatever I want with you and then I might leave the kiddies to live with Celeste the Sicko.”

  Shasta peeled off her T-shirt. Her long, firm breasts were larger than I had thought they’d be, and her nipples were huge and dark brown, which surprised me.

  “Good. Now the shorts.”

  Shasta started to pull them off and I looked away, but Jazza waved the gun at me. “We’re in this together; watch the show. Don’t want to hurt her feelings now, do you?”

  I forced myself to look at Shasta. She was standing still, her hands hanging limply at her sides. “We need some music,” Jazza said. “Only problem is that Sharps has terrible taste in music, don’t you, buddy? But hey, maybe you can find one song that’ll make the cut. Find us a song. And in the meantime, Shasta, move around, do something—you look stupid just standing there.”

  Shasta began to sway a bit, this way and that. Her eyes were glazed and she was covered in goosebumps and her nipples were hard, a detail I didn’t want to notice but did.

  “You know what,” I shouted at him, “this is why I didn’t make you godfather of my kids. You’re sick, and I always knew it. Sure, you’re clever—you’re such a clever boy—but you’re disgusting. It wasn’t the scour that ruined you! You were born ruined! And you were stupid enough to think Ava could love you! Ha! I always knew you were a loser.”

  Jazza shrugged. “Whatever. I’m in control now. Find us a song.”

  I leaned towards the VinylMobile entertainment system, and as I did, the portable comm attached to it began to ring. The coincidental timing of my reaching for it and the ring tone caught us off guard, and we all stared at the comm.

  “It’s Celeste,” I said, seeing her beauty badge flash across the screen. “I have to get this.”

  Jazza jumped up and held the gun at Shasta’s temple. “Say a word about any of this and she’s dead.”

  I grabbed the receiver and cupped it under my chin and into my ear. Celeste’s face boomed onto the screen of the VinylMobile. I motioned the others to be quiet, and I said my wife’s name as if it was a question. “Yes, Celeste?” I was so proud of myself for how calm I sounded.

  39. THE BEGINNING OF THE REAL END

  “SHARPS,” CELESTE SAID, AND HER FACE had that weird up-the-nostril angle, “the kiddie winkles and me are going to Mummy and Daddy for the holidays. Honey, you’ve been behaving so strangely lately, you’ve been worrying me. And then you hit me. You hit me! I mean really, Sharps, Daddy wasn’t happy to hear about that. He’s flying us to Real Life Florida now. We’re at the airport. I told the ticket seller it was a family emergency, and I was right. You’re our emergency and we’re leaving you.”

  “You’re leaving me? You can’t leave me! I know I shouldn’t have hit you, but you forgave me.”

  “I never forgave you.” Her face was pulled into an expression of disgust, and the comm was so close I could see the fine hairs on her upper lip. I would have thought she’d have those zapped long ago. I was distracted by that fluffy down—was she even a blonde? But she forced me back to the present crisis. “I wanted you to go to work thinking everything was fine. I was going to pack up properly, but then you wouldn’t leave. I thought you had left, but then there you were, slumped on the floor. So I couldn’t even pack properly! But Daddy said we’ll buy new stuff. He said for me to tell you he’s very disappointed in you, Sharps. And he knows about the money. He said he couldn’t imagine you showing that kind of initiative, that you were the world’s biggest procrastinator, and I agreed. I told him the only thing you were proactive about was cleaning the counter like a maniac before I even did anything on it!” Her voice sounded indignant. “But anyway, that’s all by the by. We’ll let you know what’s going to happen. We may stay in Real Life Florida with Mummy and Daddy and never come back—we’ll see.”

  “But they’re my kids!” I yelled. “Not just yours. You can’t take them from me!”

  “You struck me, Sharps. I’ve taken pictures of the bruise. And there’s the years of emotional abuse, which all my friends will testify to. Years of it! And do you have money for a lawyer? No, you don’t! So if I were you,
I’d let us go. Besides you’ve got other things to deal with, like Daddy said.”

  “Mrs. Barkley!” Shasta shouted but the screen went dead and Jazza and Shasta both stared at me.

  “She left. With the kids.” I threw myself on the sofa and buried my face in my hands. But I was just acting. I knew Jazza had lost concentration. I’d seen the gun dangling slightly from his hand. I let my body slump completely, as if I had given up on everything, and then I lunged up in a single movement and tackled him to the ground. I needed to get the gun away from him

  Shasta jumped to one side and watched us, her hands up by her face.

  Not only did Jazza have a weight advantage over me, but I was weakened by the jumps, and I was thinner than ever, frail. My head was throbbing with pain, and every heartbeat pushed a wall of jagged iron pieces into the soft flesh of my eyeballs. There was a black cloth shrouding my vision, and I saw fuzzy shapes more than anything.

  Jazza gained on me, twisting me underneath him, and I heard him laughing. He dropped the gun and started strangling me, and I, crushed by his weight, felt the life being squeezed out of me. I couldn’t breathe, and my eyes were going to pop right out of my head. The pressure in my head was unbearable, and then, whack, there was a loud thump, and Jazza fell off me.

  Shasta had hit him with a statue of Jesus, aka the Chris Hemsworth avatar, who resided, ever present and beatific, in our living room. I looked at Jesus and his sad gaze, blood dripping down from his face onto his six-pack abs and his muscular, sculpted thighs. I took him from Shasta and set him gently in his right spot. I took the liberty of leaning on him for a moment to catch my breath, and my blood mixed with his. Oh my head. The unspeakable pain.

  Shasta was scrambling back into her clothes. I let go of Jesus and looked over at Jazza. “Is he dead?” I asked, and Shasta shrugged. What to do, oh what to do? “He’s so heavy,” I said. “We can’t get him out of here. He was going to kill us. I don’t know what to do.”