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He’s been different…
The first anomaly came when they were at the river. Brando had been acting weird all day, his eyes always checking if someone was there. It made Wilson sick to his stomach, every time he would look behind him like they were being followed.
He looked back a few times too, expecting to see something, anything, that normalized Brando’s strange behaviour, but he didn’t see anything or anyone.
“Are you okay?” He finally asked just before they got to the river, and Brando looked at him like he was a ghost.
“I’m fine, Wil,” He scoffed, but his hands were clenched into fists and Wilson could tell he was anything but fine.
“Are you sure—”
He stopped. “Wilson.”
Wilson shut his mouth, finding a place by the river to sit down as Bran pulled his shirt off and jumped in.
The water looked cold, Wil thought, and so even as he was pulling his shirt off, he decided not to go in.
He laid back, letting his head fall against the grass as he heard Bran swimming, closing his eyes.
Before he could drift off, he felt something cold wrap around his ankle. “What the—” He muttered before he was yanked under the water.
“Holy shit!” He screamed, his heart pounding as he felt something hold him down. “Bran!”
“Yeah, Wil?” He said, all innocent. The closeness of his voice told Wil that it was his hands holding him down.
“Brando, stop, this isn’t funny!” He could feel water seeping into his lungs. Everything in his eyesight started to darken, little bubbles of black clouds blurring everything.
He kicked and pushed until Brando let go, a look on his face that sent a shiver down Wil’s spine. “I was just making a joke, Wil,”
Wil ran out of the water, grabbing his stuff and not even bothering to get his shirt back on before he dashed off.
“Wilson!” Brando yelled. “No one’s going to believe you!”
Wil kept running until he couldn’t see the river anymore, and then he stopped to breathe. He clutched his chest and wheezed deeply, his head pounding.
He was coughing up water violently as he started to run again, tripping over himself. When he got back into the town area, he could feel people staring at him.
Someone yelled his name, maybe, but he couldn’t really hear that well. Everything sounded muffled, far away.
He finally reached his front door, unlocking it in a hurry. His mother was home, cooking something in the kitchen, and his father, sat on the couch. Both of them were completely oblivious.
Wil let his back fall against the door with a huff of breath, and his mother looked up, her eyes tracing down her disheveled son.
“Wilson? What’s wrong, love?” Her voice sounded sincere, but he still couldn’t make out most of it.
“Brando… he… he tried to—” He stammered, trying to calm himself down. “He tried to… to kill me. Drown… me.”
That’s when his father looked up, his eyebrow raised. “The Marlon boy?” He asked, folding his newspaper. Wil nodded.
“You’re serious?” His mother asked, something in her eyes telling Wilson that she didn’t believe him.
“Yeah—yes, I’m serious,” He walked into the kitchen, clutching the counter. “He said it was a joke, but I couldn’t… mom, I couldn’t breathe.”
She crossed her arms. “Honey, I’m sure this is all a big misunderstanding, Brando has been nothing but sweet to you since you met him.”
“You don’t… you don’t believe me?”
“Maybe it was just a joke,” His father added. “Just talk it out and he’ll explain.” He said, turning back to his newspaper.
His mother returned to her work in the kitchen, and Wil felt like he was drowning again.
He dragged his stuff upstairs, and fell into his bed. He tried to think about why, why Brando would do something like that.
And then it hit him.
The look in Brando’s eyes when Bryce Monroe had flirted with Wil. That look. That terrifying look, of both betrayal and planning.
There’s no way that would lead Brando to kill him, though, right?
“No one’s going to believe you!” He heard Brando say, as he was running. He was right. Why was he right? Why did that make Wil feel worse than he did when he was underwater?
He didn’t move from his bed for the next several hours, letting the dark sky suck the light from his room.
Then came the second anomaly.
The clock hit 4:35, and Wil hadn’t slept a single minute.
He shifted, his back to the wall, the window.
He closed his eyes.
And then he heard a creak. He froze, internally debating whether to fake being asleep or to shift and look at what the noise was.
He settled for faking.
He heard someone climb through the window, and his blood went cold. They shuffled in next to him, and it took everything in him not to scream. Not until he felt the blade against his arm. He scrambled out of bed onto the floor.
Looking back at him was Brando. Sweet, innocent Brando.
He shifted until his back was against his closet. “What the… fuck, Brando?”
Brando didn’t say anything, just looked at Wil with a fiery passion in his eyes, and a smile that scared the hell out of him. He sat up, the knife still secure in his hand.
He stood up, his hand against the closet holding him steady. “Get away from me. Get the fuck out of my house, Brando.”
Brando stepped off the bed, his lip curving into a smile. “… No.”
“Get the fuck out of my house, now!” He yelled, walking towards Bran, way too confidently for someone not armed. Brando didn’t move. “Bran. I’m not messing around.”
“Neither am I.”
“Get out!”
Brando stepped closer, lifting the blade up. “Wilson…” he smiled. “I’m just joking around.”
Brando raised his hand. The silver blade reflected Wil’s skin as it was lifted towards his neck. “Brando,” his voice was weaker now, apologetic. “Bran, please.”
Wil’s yelling woke up his mother, and he could hear her footsteps coming up the stairs. Brando dropped the knife with a clatter, his smile not fading as he climbed back out of the window. Just before Wil’s mother opened the door, he whispered it again. “No one’s going to believe you.”
His mother creaked open the door just as Bran dropped into the grass. “Honey, is everything alright?” She asked, her voice hoarse and tired.
Wil was standing in the middle of his room, his arm bleeding and a knife by his feet. He knew, even looking like this, that she wouldn’t believe him. “I had a nightmare,” he settled on, kicking the knife away before she could notice it.
She frowned. “Oh, honey, that sucks. Take some deep breaths and try to go back to sleep, okay?”
Deep breaths. He was almost just killed, and now he had to take some deep breaths.
He went back to his bed regardless, and she left without another word. He finally closed his eyes after a while, letting his conscience settle. He fell asleep at 6:23.
He woke up less than two hours later, the summer sun blazing through his window, bringing him nothing but a headache.
He shifted in his bed, eventually getting up after he lied on his cut arm and yelped himself awake. His room looked like it did the night before, his carpet ever so slightly out of place, the knife peeking out from under his bedside table.
There was still a little bit of blood on his bedsheets, and it felt good seeing it. Something that reminded him that he wasn’t going completely insane.
He went downstairs, and his parents were sitting together on the couch, looking like a normal family. Wil stood in the doorframe for a moment, then sat in one of the chairs near them. “Good morning, honey, did you sleep alright?”
He nodded, sinking deeper into the chair. “You should talk to Bran today, kid,” His father said. “Clear up that whole thing from yesterday, yeah?”
“Yeah, sure,” he sighed, voice cracking.
“I’m sure it was all just a misunderstanding, love. Bran loves you, and he has since you were kids,” she smiled.
Bran loves you.
That made everything feel worse. Because, despite everything, she was completely right. Brando loved him. That’s what started this whole thing. Brando loved him.
“Yeah.” He whispered, bringing his hands to his face. “I’ll head over in a bit.”
“Good,” she smiled. “You guys have been friends since forever, I always hate it when you have an argument over something silly.”
Something silly.
“Me too,” Wil pursed his lips.
Something. Silly.
“Oh, speaking of the Marlon’s,” His father started, and Wil just zoned him out. Everything was so normal. No one would’ve guessed that he was almost killed twice in the span of basically one day.
He felt normal. For some odd reason. How are you supposed to feel when your best friend tries to kill you? Is there a manual on this, or something?
An hour passed, and then two, and Wil hadn’t moved from his spot on the chair. His mother shook his shoulder softly, whispering, “Honey, do you wanna go talk to Bran now?”
His shoulders stiffened but he got up regardless, walking towards the door without a word. He laced up his shoes, and then looked back at his parents, his normal parents. “I love you,” he said, voice quiet.
His father smiled. “Love you too, Wil.” His mother just waved.
The walk to Bran’s was short. He could see it when he left his house. There was no car in the driveway, no comforting hope that Shauna Marlon was home and could stop Brando from doing anything stupid.
He pulled his sleeves with every step he took, taking slow, deliberate, deep breaths. He looked through the windows lining the streets, trying to take more time before he had to knock on Brando’s door. But all things come to an end, and he eventually came to a stop right outside Brando’s door. He knocked once, waited, then knocked once more.
Nothing.
Then came the third anomaly.
He turned the door knob, and was able to push the door open. “Bran…?” He said, only slightly yelling.
No response.
He stepped into the kitchen. “Brando? Are you home?”
The silence felt deafening. “… Bran?”
He left the kitchen and went into the living room, where the only light was shining in from the window. Wil walked towards it, glancing around the room.
He heard something scrape against the wood panels of the hallway. He, instinctively, turned towards the window again, trying his best to ignore the noise. But he couldn’t, and his head whipped around to see Brando holding a shovel in the doorframe.
“What does Bryce Monroe have that I don’t?” He asked, and it was the first normal sentence he had said in the past two days.
Wil stepped back. “Bran, he flirted with me, once. I didn’t even—I didn’t even flirt back.”
Bran stepped forward, then again, then again, until he was right in Wilson’s face. “Don’t lie to me, Westwood.”
“I’m not lying, Bran.” His breathing sped up.
Brando lifted the shovel. “You know, I really did love you, Wilson.”
“Brando, please!”
He hit the floor with a thump.
He felt something warm pool around his head, trickle into his hair.
He felt the air get colder, lighter.
He felt the pressure in his stomach release.
He felt a gentle kiss to his forehead.
And then he felt nothing at all.
Brando looked at Wil’s body, and for a moment, everything was quiet. Then, he walked into the kitchen, grabbed a knife, and swallowed every ounce of whatever it was that was telling him he would regret this.
He dipped his finger into the pool of blood. He dragged that finger across the wall, then took the knife into his ribs.
He fell, next to Wil, and he could feel everything slow down. He wondered if this is what Wil felt.
…
Wilson’s mother started to get worried, when Wil hadn’t come home for a couple of hours. At first, she figured they had just made up, and were spending time together, but something told her she was wrong.
So she walked over to the Marlon household. The door was wide open, and she hesitated going in. She went in eventually, and was met with the sharp, metallic taste of blood in the air. She froze.
The final anomaly.
“Wilson?” She called out, peeking into the kitchen.
“Wil, honey?” She called out again, louder this time, before peeking her head into the living room.
She stopped dead in the doorframe.
Her son.
His best friend.
Dead.
And writing on the wall, that read: If I can’t have you, no one can.