Ten Little Bohos
9. Frizzle
Ten little Bohos went out to dine;
One choked his little self and then there were nine.
Nine little Bohos sat up very late;
One overslept himself and then there were eight.
Eight little Bohos traveling in Devon;
One said he'd stay there and then there were seven.
Seven little Bohos chopping up sticks;
One chopped himself in halves and then there were six.
Six little Bohos playing with a hive;
A bumblebee stung one and then there were five.
Five little Bohos going in for law,
One got in Chancery and then there were four.
Four little Bohos going out to sea;
A red herring swallowed one and then there were three.
Three little Bohos walking in the zoo;
A big bear hugged one and then there were two.
Two little Bohos sitting in the sun;
One got frizzled up and then there was one.
One little Boho left all alone;
He went and hanged himself and then there were none.
Mark had never seen a man in so much agony.
Sure, when April died, Roger had been sad. Well, depressed. Yes, depressed was a better word for what Roger was for about a year after April died. But none of his friends were really sure—or, er, had been sure—if it was April he was missing, or if it was the drugs, or even if it was the fact that someone loved him back.
But what he and Mimi had had was real; there was nobody who could deny that. And Mark knew that Mimi wasn't supposed to be murdered. She was supposed to die in a hospital because of AIDS, with all of her friends before her, crying and wishing her luck wherever she was headed, and her sister should've been there, and her mother.
She was not supposed to die based on a poem.
She was not supposed to die third to last.
She was not supposed to be killed by Roger Davis.
Mark's throat tightened. Could the man who was now crying into his shoulder possibly have killed his significant other? He'd looked so long for this moment, nearly lost her, and he went and killed her? That wasn't right. How could Roger be the murderer?
Not really able to hold himself up, Mark reread the note several times. Who wrote like that? Who had penmanship like that? None of the girls, it was more of a manly scrawl. That was surely not Collins' writing, not his own, definitely not Roger's, and it looked nothing like Benny's. So how many people did that rule out?
Mark scratched his head, frustrated. All of them.
"Mark... Mimi... she's..." Roger attempted speaking but then broke off, falling into Mark's shoulder again. "Oh, my God, Mark, it's our fault. It's our fault, we were supposed to stay awake... I'm always going to live with this guilt of killing my love! I KILLED MIMI MARQUEZ!" he shouted, wailed... his voice was so full of emotion that Mark's heart took a nosedive.
"Roger, Roger, shh, it's okay, it's okay, come on—let's get you—let's go—... let's go downstairs in the other Meeting Room, okay?" Mark's voice wavered, and he hated himself for being weak at this point. Roger needed him. He needed to be strong. For Roger. For himself. There was nothing left to be but strong. Strong and numb.
Helping Roger to his feet, the two of them made the long travel to the elevator. In his hand Mark clutched the book. The moment they got into the extra Meeting Room, Roger covered his face with a pillow and lay down. "Ro—" Mark began, but he didn't get the whole statement out before Roger shouted, "Leave me the fuck alone," in a strangled sob.
— — — —
"No fucking sense," Mark muttered to himself seven hours later, still hunched over the same book. "That's what this makes; no fucking god damn shit sense." He shook his head and skimmed page 104. How many times had he tried to read this exact page? He'd lost count.
Roger sat up behind him, but Mark didn't turn around to look. He shifted in the bed, sitting up against the backboard, and then didn't speak, didn't cry, didn't make any sign of life. Mark exhaled and got back to work, his hands stained with the blood of one of his friends, not caring if he got AIDS or not at this point. You guys made a big mistake coming here with me. You won't be needing that ferry, Mimi, Roger, and Mark.
Fuck, what did that mean?
"Did you find anything out yet?" Roger asked in a hoarse, calm voice, but Mark could hear the devastation behind it.
"Um, almost," Mark lied. Anything to soothe this man's pain. He was starting to think... well, maybe Roger didn't do it. Maybe it was himself. Maybe he was a fucking psychopath and he'd killed them. Or maybe they were all doing it. Maybe he was going to kill Roger. Or Roger was going to kill him. Or something.
"Fucking liar," Roger tried to retort happily, but his voice cracked and he choked down a sob.
Mark's heart tore again. This poor damn man. So fucking tortured. He'd already lost April. Why had someone taken Mimi away from him as well?
"I'm going to bed," Mark announced suddenly, and flung back his chair so hard that it went crashing into the bedpost behind him. From there, he collapsed into a chair in the corner of the bedroom, pulling a blanket that had been folded neatly on the arm of it. "It's been a long day."
Even though Roger knew he wasn't asleep, he didn't speak to him.
What he did was run through possibilities. It was the only way to keep Mimi off his mind. Tomorrow, he and Mark would search every room in the place very carefully and see if they found anything suspicious. Right now, Roger wasn't concerned about Mark. He was concerned about somebody out in the woods.
It was funny how Roger didn't blame Mark whatsoever. As far as he knew, Mark would not and could not kill his friends. That was just his style. He could never do it.
And it was funny how Mark knew Roger couldn't deal with death, and yet he blamed him for every single bit of it.
Friendship works in nifty ways these days.
Mark thought about staying awake all night, he seriously did, but then he thought about it. Let Roger kill him. How could he possibly care? All of his friends were dead. And so, with that thought on his mind, Mark fell asleep.
— — — —
When Roger woke up, he was on the floor.
Why was that?
He jumped up, first doing a complete three sixty to make sure there was no one with a weapon around him, and then doing another one to make sure Mark was still alive. And there he was, laying on the bed, breathing up and down, normally. Good. That was good. They'd both survived the night.
Suddenly, Mark shot up as well, his glasses askew, face confused. "What happened?"
"I just woke up—hey, I think I'm gonna go take a shower, we have electricity now," he motioned to the overhead light that they'd turned on last night, only to find the electricity still off. Now it was illuminating the room.
Mark nodded. "Okay."
Without even grabbing another set of clothes, Roger walked into the adjoining bathroom and quickly stripped down. When he stepped into the shower and turned on the warm water, he practically melted. He could've stayed there all day. All night. Forever. He could've lived in that shower for the rest of his—
Why was there blood coming out of the drain?
Roger jumped back so far that his head knocked into a long line of flowery-smelling shampoos, pushing each of the bottles to the floor of the tub with a loud thunk. Then, he slipped, falling as well and twisting his ankle. He landed on top of one of the shampoo bottles and both of his shins were now splattered with blood... he withheld the urge to wretch.
"Roger?" Mark's call was panicked. "Roger, are you okay?"
"Y—SHIT!" Roger's words were cut off by the loud smacking of an axe, and then a violent pain in his wrist. Where the hell had that come from? He had tried to pull back the shower curtain and the butt end of an axe had just landed on his wrist. "FUCK!" Now he was bleeding, and his wrist hurt so bad, and there was someone in the bathroom, he could hear it—
The power cut.
The shower stopped.
The lights went out.
The only sound was Roger's blood; dripping from his wrist and onto the floor. Someone was dumping something outside of the curtain. Closing his eyes, he took the bloody axe, pulled open the curtain, and then hummed it into the dark bathroom. Someone screamed and then there was clattering, and somebody scrambled somewhere. Roger was becoming confused, the room spinning.
And then there was a brilliant light.
Gasoline.
Somebody had poured gasoline on the floor.
And thrown a match down.
"FUCK!" he shouted, his voice several octaves higher than normal. "FUCK, FUCK, FUCK!" He tried to turn on the water, but it was out. Thinking fast, he emptied each of the shampoo bottles on it, and tried to scoop up water that was still in the tub section. However, the fire was still growing, and Roger was still getting woozy.
There was another flash of light, and the door was kicked open, but Roger could see no more—he was swirling through darkness.
— — — —
Roger awoke to shuffling papers.
He turned over in his bed, but a bruise in his back made him twist back. The shuffling stopped, but Roger didn't want to open his eyes, he was so comfortable. "Roger, are you okay?" Mark asked, his tone deadly serious, and so Roger decided to open them. "Thank God, Christ—somebody tried to burn the bathroom down, tried to kill you."
"Yeah, I was there," Roger replied.
Mark's face didn't move. "Someone tried to kill you," he said again, only this time, his voice was comprehension. This meant... Roger wasn't the killer! "You aren't the killer!" Mark exclaimed.
Roger winced as he looked at the bandages Mark had crudely put on his cut. "No shit, Sherlock."
Mark sighed. This was going to be a long day.
— — — —
"What's this room?"
Mark and Roger had just finished checking up every single room on the first through fourth floors, and now were on their final room on the fifth. They hadn't found anything that looked mildly dangerous... but who knew. They had to look in the last room just to say they'd searched the whole building. Maybe they'd get a prize.
And boy, did they.
Roger pushed open the door, and what they saw was equipment.
Cameras. Monitors. Wires.
The two boys gasped at the same time.
The first thing Roger did was pivot and proceed to smash his fist into the wall. "FUCK!"
"That's not cool," Mark said in a hypnotized voice. "That sucks."
"They've been watching us," Roger exhaled.
"No shit, Sherlock."
He shot Mark the bird.
Damn, they were delirious.
They quickly began to examine the equipment, but there was no evidence as to who it was.
But then—
"Lock down is now deactivated."
Suddenly, sunlight was streaming in from windows, and the lights that had returned while Roger was sleeping were no longer needed. Sunlight. The lock down was deactivated. They could go outside.
They ran out of that bedroom as fast as they could and basically tripped down the stairs. When they made it to the front door, they split paths, Mark going directly toward the water, and Roger going somewhere in the woods. "FRESH AIR!" Roger was shouting, and Mark wanted nothing but to see the ocean sparkle before him.
When he got there, he didn't care—he stripped down to his boxers, took of his glasses, and dove in. It felt so good to have the warm water around him, and the warm sun beating down on him, and the nature, trees, the oxygen, the life.
But something was out of place.
The fire.
Where Roger had gone.
Mark ran out of the water as fast as he could and fell into his jeans.
As far as he knew, he was slow, but his feet took him there as fast as he could. Running, running, running. Roger couldn't be dying. Not Roger. Anyone but Roger. Roger could not die. That was impossible.
"ROGER!" he shouted, already sobbing, already knowing what was coming. "ROGER?!" his voice was high. "ROGER!"
If anyone could've heard this screaming, they would be crying with him, on their knees, holding their hearts. "ROGER!" he shouted again, sounding like a small child lost in Disney World. His heart was now nearly failing, his breath was coming in short intervals, and all he wanted was to hug his best friend at least once more. He was going to. No matter how bloodied Roger was, Mark was going to wrap his arms around him.
"ROGER!" he shouted, and he ran right past the flames, stopping when he discovered something.
There was a chain.
A silver chain, glistening in a pile of ashes.
Ashes that had once been Roger.
"NO!" Mark howled, screaming, crying, clawing at the ground. "NO, NO, NO! ROGER!" he tore at the grass, looking for Roger, Roger had to be here, Roger couldn't be dead, Roger was here, he was his best friend, Roger Davis was NOT dead. "ROGER, NO! ROGER!" his heart ripped. "ROGER!" he choked.
There was a piece of paper wrapped around the chain, and it unrolled in a breeze and flew into Mark's face.
Two little Bohos sitting in the sun / one got frizzled up and then there was one.
"Roger," Mark whispered, and then he lay down in his best friend's ashes. He cried himself to sleep. Everything was peaceful there.
Frizzle.
A/N: WHY DID I HAVE TO KILL ROGER?
This is depressing. I can't live with myself.
Arie, please don't kill me.
AHHHH ROGER IS DEAD. ):
Chapters start getting shorter from here on in! There really wasn't much to put in here, except Roger angst, and so it's only like six or seven pages long as opposed to like, what, ten pages? Oh well, I'm the author, I call the shots. (:
So I heard lovelive22 has a sick new story out called "Boho Days"... everybody read it or die.
Thanks! (;
Oh, and I have a boyfriend now... yay! (:
–Steph.
PS: Why were people pissed that I killed Mimi? They'll all be dead when I'm done with them.
ROGER IS DEAAAAD.