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Johnny felt like he was going to lose his mind. That was quite a feat considering he’d already tried strangling various forks after hearing them gossiping about him in their drawer. That had been hours ago. Every noise seemed to grate on his ears as Johnny paced back and forth in his living room. The babbling of the people on TV and the birds chirping outside sounded like high-pitched shrieking right in his ears. Even the creaking of the floor underneath his feet almost sounded like nails on a blackboard. It all just sounded like mindless noise.
If he just had something to do! There was nothing but trash on TV and even the thought of being in the same room as the scum downstairs made his skin crawl. The only thing worse than going down there right now was going outside. Even going next door to see Squeegee just seemed like too much. It would be like having swim through sewage just to get over there and be in his house.
So, he was trapped here. Trapped with that –
“GODDAMNED TV!!!”
With a growl, Johnny grabbed the snow globe on the table behind him and spun around on his heel, his arm wrenched back and ready to throw the object right at the tv and the obnoxious colors on it.
DING DONG.
Johnny paused for a moment. Who could that be? He frowned and slowly lowered the snow globe back on to the table. Maybe it was girl scouts? Well, he would be getting any more of them coming when he was through here. He stomped towards the door and wrenched it open.
To Johnny’s surprise, it wasn’t anyone going door to door selling anything. Instead, it was a man about Johnny’s height in black and white clothes that wasn’t the least bit professional since it had the word ‘FUCK’ emblazoned on it and included a hat that had little skulls all over it. But Johnny didn’t pay much attention to any of that as he eyes were practically glued to the black and white spirals that were the man’s eyes.
Johnny knew those eyes. He remembered painting them.
“D-Boy? How…”
D-boy pushed past him into the house. “Yes, I’m human now. And yes, I’ve tried to kill myself. It didn’t work. It seems that I’ve inherited your inability to die.” He glanced around Johnny’s living room. “I came here hoping that being near where my master was might change something. It doesn’t feel like it though.” He paused and sneered at the room. “You haven’t done much different with the place have you? If anything, this place appears to be an even bigger pigsty than when I left. Are you really so unable to clean after yourself?” D-boy turned around and gave Johnny a look that made him think of a parent disappointed in an extremely stupid child.
That was the last straw.
“Fuck you, D-Boy.” In a flash Johnny had taken out a knife and stabbed D-Boy right under his ribcage, angling the knife up to hit some of the vital organs there. D-Boy gasped in pain, but didn’t bother trying to put pressure on his wound or to pull the knife out or even try to push Johnny away like many other people Johnny had stabbed did. He let go of the knife and allowed D-Boy to fall to the floor. It took only another moment for him to die.
“Huh.” Johnny stared down at the body. He felt a little better now. Technically, D-boy wasn’t really another person, so it wasn’t the same as being near the people downstairs whom he still didn’t feel like being near. But now that D-Boy was dead there once again wasn’t anything to do.
After another moment of staring down at the body, Johnny left the room and went into the kitchen.
D-Boy finally groaned and opened his eyes and Johnny leaned forward in his chair, his arms on top of the back. It was about time. Johnny wasn’t sure how long D-Boy had been dead, but he was starting to get bored. He grabbed a couple of chips out of the bag and shoved them into his mouth.
D-Boy craned his head back to look at Johnny. “You’ve been watching me.”
Johnny shrugged and swallowed. “There was nothing on tv.” The tv was still on with the volume very low. He could just barely hear it in the silence as D-Boy pushed himself up and turned around to face Johnny.
“You were so bored you decided to wait for me to wake up?”
Johnny swore he could hear amusement in the other man’s voice. His eyes narrowed. “Yeah, so? There’s nothing else to do.”
D-Boy seemed to drop whatever it was that he found so funny and stood up, dusting himself off. “Well, if you’re fine with waiting for my corpse to wake up you should be fine with letting me stay here for a while.”
Of course Johnny couldn’t just trust D-Boy, but he didn’t know what he could possibly be up to. All D-Boy wanted was to be dead and Johnny didn’t care if he died. “I…I guess. As long as you don’t try to convince me to kill myself again. If you even try I’ll shove you into a coffin and pour concrete over it.”
“Fine. Fine.” D-Boy didn’t bother to look at him as he walked down the stairs to the basement.
Strangely, Johnny didn’t feel too bothered by the thought of D-Boy being around. Maybe he’d completely lost it, but the thought didn’t make him want to tear his new guest’s muscles out one by one.
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Johnny glanced into each room as he walked through his basement. In the two weeks D-Boy had been there Johnny had found him dead or waking up from being dead so many times that he was starting to get used to it.
He looked into another room. No D-Boy. The gore didn’t bother him of course, but it was a pain in the ass to clean up after him all of the time. Johnny tried to keep at least some rooms semi-clean. He’d yelled and threw things at him at least a few times when D-Boy just had to pick one of those rooms to kill himself in. Johnny did not feel upset when he walked in and found him dead on the floor. That was a fact.
The next room had water dripping out from under the door. That didn’t bode well. He opened the door and stepped in, careful not to touch the water. At the other end of the room was D-Boy standing in the water next to two wires and his hand on a large switch on the wall.
Fuck.
Before Johnny could move, D-Boy pulled down the lever, sending an electrical current through the water. His whole body went stiff and he started screaming. Johnny sprinted across the room, avoiding the water and finally got to the lever and pushed it up, stopping the current.
D-Boy collapsed onto the floor with a splash, his body twitching in the water, but still alive. Johnny circled around him. D-Boy looked pathetic. And familiar. It sort of disturbed him actually. Johnny hoped he didn’t look that pathetic when he’d committed suicide.
Suddenly, D-Boy was trying to push himself up out of the water and Johnny turned away, instead concentrating on the knife on the table before him. He didn’t want the other man knowing that seeing him dead like that kind of bothered him. Not that it really did.
“What the fuck is your problem, Nny?!” D-Boy screamed behind him.
“Shut up.”
“What did you do that for?!” D-Boy continued screaming.
Johnny’s hand twitched. He was sick of D-Boy yelling at him. As if Johnny owed him anything. “I don’t have to tell you anything.” He started to turn to leave when something wrapped around his neck.
Johnny struggled against whatever was pulling him back, but it was no use. He was pulled up against something soft and realized it was D-Boy. Of course it was. Johnny growled and reached up to pull away D-Boy’s arm around his neck. “Let go of me, you fuck!!”
D-Boy tightened his grip, crushing Johnny’s throat and suddenly Johnny was very aware of the lips near his ear. “And what are you going to do about it, Johnny-boy?” Johnny went still at the feel of D-Boy’s breath against his ear. A choked sound escaped his throat against his will. “I’ll answer for you: nothing.”
Johnny gasped breathlessly and scrabbled at D-Boy’s arm. It was no use. He couldn’t get him to budge. Johnny kicked back and forth aimlessly, desperate to get away and not even aware if he was hitting anything.
Finally, his eyes landed on the knife on the table in front of him. He stretched his arm out towards it and was just barely able to get his fingers around the handle. Johnny immediately stabbed behind him and felt the knife sink into flesh. That felt satisfying.
A grunt sounded from D-Boy and the arm finally came away from his neck. Johnny stumbled and took in a deep breath, relief flooding through his whole body. He let go of the knife, leaving it in him.
What the hell was that about? Johnny glared and turned around to ask just that. “What the fuck --” He winced at how hoarse his voice sounded. And felt.
D-boy chuckled from the floor. Blood was quickly seeping out of him and becoming diluted by the water underneath him. “...that’s what you get...for trying to stop me…” His words were low and slowed down due to his blood loss.
Johnny scowled down at him, clenching his fists. He felt like an idiot. Of course, D-boy had wanted him to stab him. He used him. Again. Johnny stalked forward, planning on making his last moments more painful. But it was already too late. D-boy’s eyes fell closed and went still, not even his chest moving.
He looked so small on the floor. It was so strange to see someone that he’d considered his friend at one point to be dead and wet on the ground. It made him uncomfortable again. Maybe it was the fact that D-boy still kind of looked like him. He was sick of looking at him. And his throat hurt.
Johnny grumbled and turned away from him. “You better fucking clean this up later,” he said, despite the pain. He kicked at the water, which was slowly becoming more red. He left, making sure to turn the light off.
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Johnny wasn’t at all surprised to walk into the bathroom one day to see a body hanging, blood dripping from the arms. “Fuck. Again?” He quickly grabbed a knife and stool and cut down the noose. D-boy fell hard onto the tile floor.
When he came back, johnny was looming over him with his hands on his hips. “Took you long enough.”
D-boy groaned and pushed himself up, onto his elbows with a hiss. “No one said you had to wait.“ His voice was rough and sounded painful, enough that anyone else would have winced in sympathy. Good. Johnny hoped it hurt.
“Just sit down before you bleed all over everything.” He motioned towards the toilet. D-boy took a moment first glancing at the toilet and then down at his arms, as if he just noticed they were still bleeding.
He pushed himself up to his feet, wincing as his arms brushed up against the fabric of his clothes. “What do you care? As if you keep this clean.” That was weak. Johnny resisted rolling his eyes and refused to move, blocking the doorway. Finally, D-boy sat down.
“Well, if you want to waste your worthless time on this, then go ahead. I’ll just do it again.” D-boy didn't look at him as he held out his arms.
Johnny didn't bother to respond to him, instead just sitting down on the stool and using a wet rag to wipe the blood off his arms, careful to avoid actually touching him. He wasn't particularly gentle, but D-boy just endured it in silence.
“Why even bother doing this? You waste all your time trying to kill yourself when you know it wont work.” D-boy gave him a look. Johnny just scowled. “First of all, a lot of that was your fault. And second, I wasn't sure if i could die or not. You’ve died over and over again and come right back. It seems pretty clear to me that it’s not working.” He put down the rag and grabbed the bottle of bactine.
“I guess you’re right. I should just give up on killing myself!” D-boy said with obviously false cheer. Johnny didn't trust that. “I know exactly what I’ll do with my time instead!” D-boy leaned forward, giving him a nasty grin. Johnny just scowled back. He really didn't trust that. “You’re disgusting. You whine about how mean and awful people are, but you’re just as bad as them. In fact, you're worse. You've done things so hideous that any sane person would vomit out of every orifice just hearing about it. Your mind is so broken that you live in this house surrounded by filth and bodily fluids despite the fact that you hate it. And yet you keep killing people and getting more and more of their fluids on you or the walls or the floor. You just can’t help yourself. You’re pathetic. You should just kil--”
Johnny poured a good portion of the bactine onto his open wounds. D-boy pulled his arms away, his face scrunched up as he hissed in pain. “Shut up. You've said this shit a million times before. It doesn't even affect me anymore.” That wasn't true. And from D-boy’s face he clearly didn't believe it either. Johnny put down the bactine and grabbed the bandages.
“It’s your fucking fault I'm like this anyway! You made me!”
“I didn't bring you to life. And I didn't decide to make you human and unable to die. Now give me your arms so i can finish.”
Reluctantly, D-boy held out his arms again. The bathroom was quiet for a moment as Johnny started to bandage him, carefully avoiding any skin contact. He didn't’ like this quiet. It gave him time to think. And he really didn't want to think about why he was helping D-boy out. He really shouldn’t be bothering.
“I understand...why you keep trying,” he finally said into the blaring silence of the room. “I mean, of course i do. But…” If he focused hard enough on the arms and blood and gauze in front of him, he could pretend that was all he was talking to. “It doesn't do shit. Dying doesn't make anything better.” Well, things had gotten better for him without the doughboys, but he still wanted to die often. It was just easier to deal with without anyone egging him on. “It’s awful, and you just want to do it again in case it will actually work this time.” Johnny realized he’d stopped and started wrapping up D-boy’s other arm. “You need to just focus on something good. Something that makes you feel just a little less awful.”
“That’s idiotic. It doesn't change anything.” Johnny scowled up at him.
“Trying not to be miserable is at least better than feeling like shit att the time.”
“Is that what you were doing when you cut that guy’s legs off and got so much blood all over you you practically scraped your skin off trying to get rid of it?”
Johnny stood up. “I’m done.” He had finished bandaging him up and that was all he needed to do to keep him from bleeding all over everything. He didn't need to stick around so D-boy could goad him into killing him again. He paused in the doorway. “I didn’t really expect you to listen to me or change, but you don’t have to be such a piece of shit all the time. Fine, go ahead and kill yourself some more. Maybe it will work the 1,537th time.” D-boy glared, but stayed silent as Johnny left him alone in the bathroom.
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It was just a Scumby re-run, the episode where he bets away all of his money and his car and his phone at a casino and has to figure out how to get back home. It wasn’t his favorite, but it would do to help him forget the shitty day he had.
Some fuckers harassed him when he was just trying to enjoy a donut. So then of course he had to knock them out and rip out their nails when he got them downstairs. And he never got to finish his donut.
“Is this the one where he tries to ride a large dog all the way home?”
Johnny frowned and looked back to see D-boy standing behind the couch. “Yeah,” he replied uncertainly.
D-boy just walked around the couch and sat down a little more than a foot away from him. “I hate that one. It's especially stupid.”
“The part with the dog is good.” D-boy had never sat down to watch something with him before. Johnny hoped this wasn’t another attempt to get him to help with his suicide.
He glanced at Johnny as he leaned back and crossed his arms. “No it isn't. You just like seeing the dog.”
Well, Johnny wasn’t going to argue with that. Aside from the dog, Johnny didn’t really have strong feeling about this episode. D-boy didn't seem to care for and answer, just turning back to the TV. Johnny did the same.
It didn’t take too long for the silence between them to calm down as they relaxed into the couch cushions and both lost themselves in the show. Usually, that was only barely better than trying to do something like making food, or drawing, or doing laundry in this empty, lonely house. But watching TV with someone, even if they were currently being quiet, was a nice departure from the norm.
Johnny smiled as Scumby started to get on top of a dog the size of a small bear to ride it miles away to his house.