It's a good Dae to die.
By Shamz Nelson
Josh sat on the bus embracing the only friend he had made at camp. A small, wooden, gnome sat on his lap. It's bright blue eyes stared blankly into space. A wide grin spread across his plump face, and a round pink nose sat atop it , like a cherry on a banana split. While all the other kids had been playing in the lake or catching bus, Josh had sat in the corner of the arts and crafts room carving away at his little creation. He had been forgotten, even by his camp councilor, and he could care less. Every summer for eight years, since he was six, his mother sent him to the same camp, where he found some sort of activity that he could do without other people. It was not that Josh didn't want to make friends, but it was hard for him to do so. You see, Josh could not talk, he could not utter a single sound. He had been a mute since his birth.
Josh's home life much mirrored that of his at camp. He had no friends. His father had left him and is mother last year and he still hasn't gotten over it. Many a sleepless night he lay awake wishing his dad would come back, or at least be punished for what h had done to is mother. Ever since the split up, Josh's mother had been a wreck. She worked long hours at the local supermarket. She left home before he went to school, and usually got home after he had gone to bed. Josh had a brother too. But, he wasn't on of those supportive brothers that you could get long with. He was one of those brothers you wish you were, but knew you could never be. Roy was smart, handsome, athletic, popular, and a senior, everything Josh was not.
The bus pulled up to his house and he silently dragged his stuff off, his gnome under his arm. As much as he hated camp he couldn't say e was happy to be home. He walked across the dark front yard, used his key to get in and went strait up to his room with all his stuff. He threw his clothe in the corner and sat on his bed with the gnome. 'You know who you remind me of?' he thought, 'My old dog Daedae. I think that's what I will call you.'
Just then his mother burst into the room. "What do you think you're doing, coming into the house without telling me that you ere here!? The bus was three hours late! I was worried sick about you!"
'I'm tired' he told her simply in sign-language.
"I don't care how tired you are! Are you too tired to give your old, tired, worried mother a hug?!" she yelled frantically. They stared at each other a moment.
'I'm sorry' he signed.
"Sorry! Sorry!? It's too late for sorry!" she paused a moment, "Until you learn some manner, it would be a lot easier for me if you came home strait from school, stayed in the house. And yes, that means you're grounded." She turned and walked out of the room.
'Arrrrrg!' Josh screamed in his mind, as he beat a pillow with frustration. 'Why can't she just leave me alone! Why can't she just let me be? I wish she didn't yell at me! I wish she could never yell at me ever again!' Hot tears rolled down his cheeks and his face burned with rage. He cried himself to sleep that night, and all the while Daedae sat beside him.
The next morning he awoke and rolled off his bed. Daedae was nowhere in sight. He slipped into his clothe for the first day of school and wondered where his gnome had gone. 'Mom probably took him away.' he thought angrily, as he put on his t-shirt and bulled his socks up to his knees.
Again he left without saying goodbye.
When Josh returned from his first day of school, he had forgotten about his anger. So far, he liked all his teachers, and they seemed to like him. As he approached his house he noticed his mom's car was still in the driveway. 'Maybe she took the bus' he thought curiously. When walked through the door he saw that his mom's keys were still on the counter. 'That's strange. she must have forgotten them.' Then from the kitchen he heard some strange moaning noises. 'MOM?!' As he turned the corner on the floor there sat his mom. He hands where tied behind he back and there was so much blood on her shirt that you cold not recognize that it had once been white.
But then when she turned her face to him, shock and fear hit him like a bolt of lightning, and his scream would have shattered windows, if he had been able to make any sound. Her eyes wide with fear and her face covered with blood she backed away into the corner. Her mouth had been sewn together using a thick thread, and her face had been cut up and mutilated. 'Why is she so frightened?' he wondered. He was about to sign something to her when he realized that there was something in his hand that wasn't there before. Slowly he looked down, and as he opened his palms, he suddenly understood why his mom ad backed away. In one hand he held a needle and thread, in the other a razorblade, both were covered in blood.
Josh dropped then and backed away, as if trying to escape from himself. His mind raced. 'Did I do this?! I couldn't have. I was at school all day. But, then how did those things get in my hand!? I didn't do it! But nobody would believe me, let alone understand me.' He stood there for what seemed like ages. 'Nobody can find out until I've figured this out.' he finally decided.
Knock. Knock. Knock. Somebody was at the door. "I forgot my key!" yelled Roy, "Let me in Josh!" What could he do, Roy would definitely call the police if he saw this, if not kill Josh. He had to hide his mom. He began to pull her kicking and screaming through sealed lips to the closet. "What's happening in there?" Roy asked impatiently. Josh grabbed the broom in the corner of the room and beat his mom over the head until she was unconscious.
'It's for your own good.' he thought as he dragged he limp body into the closet and locked it.
"That's it! I'm coming through the window!" his brother shouted from outside, obviously aggravated.
He had to work fast. Josh threw the key to the closet under the fridge and scooped up the "weapons" he had dropped on the floor and threw them in the sink as he turned on the water. He washed his hands, threw the things in a drawer, jumped onto the couch and turned p the T.V. up loud just as Roy got in.
"What the hell is wrong with you!? Why didn't you open the door?" Roy asked, on the verge of killing Josh.
'I couldn't hear you.' Josh signed back, trying to look surprised. Roy stared at Josh for a second and decided against beating him.
"Alright, whatever."
Josh decided to head up to his room and think. He turned into his room and closed the door. He looked at the floor and noticed what looked like tiny red footprints, starting at the beginning of his room and moving toward his bed. As he looked up his heart skipped a beat. His bed was dyed the dark crimson red of blood, and in the middle of it sat Daedae, staring happily into the distance. But something was different. He was not in the same position that he had been before. In is right hand he was grasping a white piece of paper. On it, scribbled in blood, was a message:
Now she'll never scream at
you again. No need to thank me,
that's what friends are for.
~Daedae
He dropped the note and stared at the tiny being that stood before him. It couldn't be possible. He scanned the room, half expecting to see somebody in the corner with a knife ready to kill him. Than he thought for a moment. He had never told anybody that, or tell anyone he had named his gnome Daedae. But, that could mean only one thing, the impossible, that the gnome had done this!
Josh stumbled backward until his back hit the wall. 'What should I do?!' He thought frantically. 'I cold run and tell my brother.' he considered, 'But he would only say that I was crazy, and call the police. Then again, I can't stay in here with this thing, who knows what it will do to me.'
Then all of a sudden a high pitched, shrill voiced pierced his brain like an arrow and left his eardrums ringing, 'I wont hurt you, I'm your best friend!' His eyes met Daedae's who was staring at him from across the room. As Josh crept toward the door the gnomes bright blue eyes followed him, twinkling from the light of the setting sun in the window.
'This cant be happening!' Josh thought.
'Aren't you happy?' the voiced squealed in his mind again, 'You bought me to life, I'm only trying to help my best friend.' It's smile grew even broader across it's face, to the point that if it grew anymore his face would surly burst.
'Help! Help?! How could that have helped! You mutilated her and made her think it was me! And as soon as my brother finds out he will call the police, and I will be put in jail!' By now Josh was panting for breath. He could feel his heart beating all throughout his body and the hair on the back of his neck stood brittle.
'Well then, we'll just have to make sure your brother doesn't find out.' the same eerie voice squealed inside his head, and the gnome was gone.
Complete darkness shadowed Josh's mind. All he could see was in black and white, like an old movie. Nothing was in focus and everything seemed to vibrate slightly. He himself felt light as a feather as though if he jumped he might float away and never return to earth. Josh could hear footsteps walking away from his room. Quickly he unlocked the door and looked down the hall, only to see himself, gripping a fourteen inch blade in his hand. He saw himself walk down the stairs. He knew what Daedae was doing. He was going to ill his brother and make it seem as though it were him. No! He could not let that happen!
Josh raced down the stairs in a dream. He knew he had to get to Daedae before Daedae got to his bother. He hurtled himself down the stairs, tripping, but quickly getting back to his feet. Daedae was only a few feet away from him. He lunged at the demon throwing all his weight atop it, but weight he had none. Nor mass, for he flew through his mirror image like a cool breeze.
'You can't stop me.' the familiar screech echoed through his mind, 'I know what's best for you.'
'No, you don't!' Josh screamed back at it with his mind. But Daedae walked on, ignoring him. Josh fell to the floor helplessly. He watched in horror through suppressed tears, trying to figure out what to do. But he couldn't do anything.
Daedae, in his body, walked into the kitchen where his brother was making a sandwich. "What 'cho doin'?" Roy asked who he thought was Josh. Daedae concealed the knife behind his back and walked silently forward. "What's wrong with you?" he asked indifferently and went back to making his sandwich. The creature in Josh's body walked behind Roy as if going to the refrigerator, but stopped short and turned to him instead. It brought the knife high over his head and brought it down upon Roy's upper back, making sure not to kill him, but to make him suffer.
"I'm going to f**king kill you, you bastard!" he managed to yell in between bloodcurdling screams of pain.
Daedae brought the knife back down into his back, laughing madly with pleasure. In and out, in and out he thrust the dagger into Roy. Blood sprayed everywhere with every blow. All the while Daedae was smiling with delight. Until, finally, Roy limped over on the floor, a bloody pulp of human flesh.
Josh sat there on the floor in a puddle of his own tears that he had not even noticed was there. He had gone numb with fear and disgust, hatred and sorrow. Suddenly the room around him spun and he found himself standing in his own body, a knife clutched in his hand, standing over his brother's dead body. His stomach cringed and he felt his insides turning upside down. A chucky yellow brown liquid spewed out of his mouth all over the corpse bellow him. He rushed to the faucet and washed out his mouth with water, drinking some to calm his nerves.
Josh looked over at where he had formally been sitting, and there on the floor was Daedae. 'What have you done!?' he yelled at the demonic figure.
'I just did what you sometimes wish you could.' he spoke mockingly, 'I've heard your thoughts, seen your dreams, I know you hated your brother, and so do you.'
'I never meant this to happen, never really wanted to kill him.' Josh thought, half feeling sorry for himself. 'You killed him! Not me! YOU!!!' Josh threw himself upon the statue that had given him so much grief and stabbed at it with the knife that had been in his had. 'You mutated my mother!' he yelled in his mind, ripping at its face. 'You killed my brother!' he screamed as he jammed the knife into the wooden statue. 'You! You! YOU! YOU!!!'
He lied down there on the floor and threw Daedae into a dark corner. Lied there and cried until he had no more water left in his body. Sirens wailed outside. The sound of policemen's voices on the loudspeaker echoed in his mind. He heard his door being kicked in and the sound of footsteps stopping into his house. He watched them point their gun at him and drag him away. He did not resist. He did not move. He did not care.
Six month later he sat in the corner of his padded wall room. His arms and legs bound together so it was impossible for him to escape. He sat there in a daze quietly. He heard a knock on the metal door and then heard it swing open.
"You got a present! Someone sent you this in the mail." the nice lady who had been trying to help him said. Josh didn't even look at her. "OK, well I guess I'll leave it here then." Out of the corner of his eye he saw her set something down in the opposite corner and close the door.
Suddenly, a familiar screeching echoed in his mind, ripping at his brain. 'Hey buddy! Now it's just you and me. We're gonna have lots of fun! But don't think I forgot what you did to me.'
By Shamz Nelson
Josh sat on the bus embracing the only friend he had made at camp. A small, wooden, gnome sat on his lap. It's bright blue eyes stared blankly into space. A wide grin spread across his plump face, and a round pink nose sat atop it , like a cherry on a banana split. While all the other kids had been playing in the lake or catching bus, Josh had sat in the corner of the arts and crafts room carving away at his little creation. He had been forgotten, even by his camp councilor, and he could care less. Every summer for eight years, since he was six, his mother sent him to the same camp, where he found some sort of activity that he could do without other people. It was not that Josh didn't want to make friends, but it was hard for him to do so. You see, Josh could not talk, he could not utter a single sound. He had been a mute since his birth.
Josh's home life much mirrored that of his at camp. He had no friends. His father had left him and is mother last year and he still hasn't gotten over it. Many a sleepless night he lay awake wishing his dad would come back, or at least be punished for what h had done to is mother. Ever since the split up, Josh's mother had been a wreck. She worked long hours at the local supermarket. She left home before he went to school, and usually got home after he had gone to bed. Josh had a brother too. But, he wasn't on of those supportive brothers that you could get long with. He was one of those brothers you wish you were, but knew you could never be. Roy was smart, handsome, athletic, popular, and a senior, everything Josh was not.
The bus pulled up to his house and he silently dragged his stuff off, his gnome under his arm. As much as he hated camp he couldn't say e was happy to be home. He walked across the dark front yard, used his key to get in and went strait up to his room with all his stuff. He threw his clothe in the corner and sat on his bed with the gnome. 'You know who you remind me of?' he thought, 'My old dog Daedae. I think that's what I will call you.'
Just then his mother burst into the room. "What do you think you're doing, coming into the house without telling me that you ere here!? The bus was three hours late! I was worried sick about you!"
'I'm tired' he told her simply in sign-language.
"I don't care how tired you are! Are you too tired to give your old, tired, worried mother a hug?!" she yelled frantically. They stared at each other a moment.
'I'm sorry' he signed.
"Sorry! Sorry!? It's too late for sorry!" she paused a moment, "Until you learn some manner, it would be a lot easier for me if you came home strait from school, stayed in the house. And yes, that means you're grounded." She turned and walked out of the room.
'Arrrrrg!' Josh screamed in his mind, as he beat a pillow with frustration. 'Why can't she just leave me alone! Why can't she just let me be? I wish she didn't yell at me! I wish she could never yell at me ever again!' Hot tears rolled down his cheeks and his face burned with rage. He cried himself to sleep that night, and all the while Daedae sat beside him.
The next morning he awoke and rolled off his bed. Daedae was nowhere in sight. He slipped into his clothe for the first day of school and wondered where his gnome had gone. 'Mom probably took him away.' he thought angrily, as he put on his t-shirt and bulled his socks up to his knees.
Again he left without saying goodbye.
When Josh returned from his first day of school, he had forgotten about his anger. So far, he liked all his teachers, and they seemed to like him. As he approached his house he noticed his mom's car was still in the driveway. 'Maybe she took the bus' he thought curiously. When walked through the door he saw that his mom's keys were still on the counter. 'That's strange. she must have forgotten them.' Then from the kitchen he heard some strange moaning noises. 'MOM?!' As he turned the corner on the floor there sat his mom. He hands where tied behind he back and there was so much blood on her shirt that you cold not recognize that it had once been white.
But then when she turned her face to him, shock and fear hit him like a bolt of lightning, and his scream would have shattered windows, if he had been able to make any sound. Her eyes wide with fear and her face covered with blood she backed away into the corner. Her mouth had been sewn together using a thick thread, and her face had been cut up and mutilated. 'Why is she so frightened?' he wondered. He was about to sign something to her when he realized that there was something in his hand that wasn't there before. Slowly he looked down, and as he opened his palms, he suddenly understood why his mom ad backed away. In one hand he held a needle and thread, in the other a razorblade, both were covered in blood.
Josh dropped then and backed away, as if trying to escape from himself. His mind raced. 'Did I do this?! I couldn't have. I was at school all day. But, then how did those things get in my hand!? I didn't do it! But nobody would believe me, let alone understand me.' He stood there for what seemed like ages. 'Nobody can find out until I've figured this out.' he finally decided.
Knock. Knock. Knock. Somebody was at the door. "I forgot my key!" yelled Roy, "Let me in Josh!" What could he do, Roy would definitely call the police if he saw this, if not kill Josh. He had to hide his mom. He began to pull her kicking and screaming through sealed lips to the closet. "What's happening in there?" Roy asked impatiently. Josh grabbed the broom in the corner of the room and beat his mom over the head until she was unconscious.
'It's for your own good.' he thought as he dragged he limp body into the closet and locked it.
"That's it! I'm coming through the window!" his brother shouted from outside, obviously aggravated.
He had to work fast. Josh threw the key to the closet under the fridge and scooped up the "weapons" he had dropped on the floor and threw them in the sink as he turned on the water. He washed his hands, threw the things in a drawer, jumped onto the couch and turned p the T.V. up loud just as Roy got in.
"What the hell is wrong with you!? Why didn't you open the door?" Roy asked, on the verge of killing Josh.
'I couldn't hear you.' Josh signed back, trying to look surprised. Roy stared at Josh for a second and decided against beating him.
"Alright, whatever."
Josh decided to head up to his room and think. He turned into his room and closed the door. He looked at the floor and noticed what looked like tiny red footprints, starting at the beginning of his room and moving toward his bed. As he looked up his heart skipped a beat. His bed was dyed the dark crimson red of blood, and in the middle of it sat Daedae, staring happily into the distance. But something was different. He was not in the same position that he had been before. In is right hand he was grasping a white piece of paper. On it, scribbled in blood, was a message:
Now she'll never scream at
you again. No need to thank me,
that's what friends are for.
~Daedae
He dropped the note and stared at the tiny being that stood before him. It couldn't be possible. He scanned the room, half expecting to see somebody in the corner with a knife ready to kill him. Than he thought for a moment. He had never told anybody that, or tell anyone he had named his gnome Daedae. But, that could mean only one thing, the impossible, that the gnome had done this!
Josh stumbled backward until his back hit the wall. 'What should I do?!' He thought frantically. 'I cold run and tell my brother.' he considered, 'But he would only say that I was crazy, and call the police. Then again, I can't stay in here with this thing, who knows what it will do to me.'
Then all of a sudden a high pitched, shrill voiced pierced his brain like an arrow and left his eardrums ringing, 'I wont hurt you, I'm your best friend!' His eyes met Daedae's who was staring at him from across the room. As Josh crept toward the door the gnomes bright blue eyes followed him, twinkling from the light of the setting sun in the window.
'This cant be happening!' Josh thought.
'Aren't you happy?' the voiced squealed in his mind again, 'You bought me to life, I'm only trying to help my best friend.' It's smile grew even broader across it's face, to the point that if it grew anymore his face would surly burst.
'Help! Help?! How could that have helped! You mutilated her and made her think it was me! And as soon as my brother finds out he will call the police, and I will be put in jail!' By now Josh was panting for breath. He could feel his heart beating all throughout his body and the hair on the back of his neck stood brittle.
'Well then, we'll just have to make sure your brother doesn't find out.' the same eerie voice squealed inside his head, and the gnome was gone.
Complete darkness shadowed Josh's mind. All he could see was in black and white, like an old movie. Nothing was in focus and everything seemed to vibrate slightly. He himself felt light as a feather as though if he jumped he might float away and never return to earth. Josh could hear footsteps walking away from his room. Quickly he unlocked the door and looked down the hall, only to see himself, gripping a fourteen inch blade in his hand. He saw himself walk down the stairs. He knew what Daedae was doing. He was going to ill his brother and make it seem as though it were him. No! He could not let that happen!
Josh raced down the stairs in a dream. He knew he had to get to Daedae before Daedae got to his bother. He hurtled himself down the stairs, tripping, but quickly getting back to his feet. Daedae was only a few feet away from him. He lunged at the demon throwing all his weight atop it, but weight he had none. Nor mass, for he flew through his mirror image like a cool breeze.
'You can't stop me.' the familiar screech echoed through his mind, 'I know what's best for you.'
'No, you don't!' Josh screamed back at it with his mind. But Daedae walked on, ignoring him. Josh fell to the floor helplessly. He watched in horror through suppressed tears, trying to figure out what to do. But he couldn't do anything.
Daedae, in his body, walked into the kitchen where his brother was making a sandwich. "What 'cho doin'?" Roy asked who he thought was Josh. Daedae concealed the knife behind his back and walked silently forward. "What's wrong with you?" he asked indifferently and went back to making his sandwich. The creature in Josh's body walked behind Roy as if going to the refrigerator, but stopped short and turned to him instead. It brought the knife high over his head and brought it down upon Roy's upper back, making sure not to kill him, but to make him suffer.
"I'm going to f**king kill you, you bastard!" he managed to yell in between bloodcurdling screams of pain.
Daedae brought the knife back down into his back, laughing madly with pleasure. In and out, in and out he thrust the dagger into Roy. Blood sprayed everywhere with every blow. All the while Daedae was smiling with delight. Until, finally, Roy limped over on the floor, a bloody pulp of human flesh.
Josh sat there on the floor in a puddle of his own tears that he had not even noticed was there. He had gone numb with fear and disgust, hatred and sorrow. Suddenly the room around him spun and he found himself standing in his own body, a knife clutched in his hand, standing over his brother's dead body. His stomach cringed and he felt his insides turning upside down. A chucky yellow brown liquid spewed out of his mouth all over the corpse bellow him. He rushed to the faucet and washed out his mouth with water, drinking some to calm his nerves.
Josh looked over at where he had formally been sitting, and there on the floor was Daedae. 'What have you done!?' he yelled at the demonic figure.
'I just did what you sometimes wish you could.' he spoke mockingly, 'I've heard your thoughts, seen your dreams, I know you hated your brother, and so do you.'
'I never meant this to happen, never really wanted to kill him.' Josh thought, half feeling sorry for himself. 'You killed him! Not me! YOU!!!' Josh threw himself upon the statue that had given him so much grief and stabbed at it with the knife that had been in his had. 'You mutated my mother!' he yelled in his mind, ripping at its face. 'You killed my brother!' he screamed as he jammed the knife into the wooden statue. 'You! You! YOU! YOU!!!'
He lied down there on the floor and threw Daedae into a dark corner. Lied there and cried until he had no more water left in his body. Sirens wailed outside. The sound of policemen's voices on the loudspeaker echoed in his mind. He heard his door being kicked in and the sound of footsteps stopping into his house. He watched them point their gun at him and drag him away. He did not resist. He did not move. He did not care.
Six month later he sat in the corner of his padded wall room. His arms and legs bound together so it was impossible for him to escape. He sat there in a daze quietly. He heard a knock on the metal door and then heard it swing open.
"You got a present! Someone sent you this in the mail." the nice lady who had been trying to help him said. Josh didn't even look at her. "OK, well I guess I'll leave it here then." Out of the corner of his eye he saw her set something down in the opposite corner and close the door.
Suddenly, a familiar screeching echoed in his mind, ripping at his brain. 'Hey buddy! Now it's just you and me. We're gonna have lots of fun! But don't think I forgot what you did to me.'