Page 4 of Obsession

“No…”

“Shh, now,” Keith interrupted the frightened girl.

She was wearing a red apron and a ridiculous-looking hat with a robot hamburger printed on it. Probably a reference to Transformers.

“Don’t tell me the register’s empty. I know how much people love fries. Now put the money in the bag before I put a bullet between your eyes or something else between your legs… on the house.”

Even if you could only see his eyes thanks to the mask, it was enough to notice the cheeky wink he gave her. The drawing that covered his mask didn’t shine as brightly indoors, but he still looked like a lunatic.

We all laughed at his words. Nicky cursed in his direction for his inappropriate words, but she laughed too. Adam stayed calm, keeping watch so we didn’t get attacked and making sure I did not faint. I winked at him to reassure him, and I think he smiled because the corners of his eyes crinkled slightly. Theywere all looking at him. No doubt he was the one they feared the most.

I leaned against the counter and shook the drops of water off my jacket. Nicky kept an eye on the other girl to make sure she didn’t call the police or press some sort of panic button under the counter to alert the authorities. Although I highly doubted there was such a button in a place like this.

While my friends ran madly through the store, screaming, scaring the others, and smashing everything in their path just for fun, I couldn’t find the strength to join them. The dizziness from earlier had returned, much stronger than before, possibly exacerbated by the heat in the restaurant.

The bell above the door rang.

We all turned around in a flash and suddenly there was silence as a tall man entered. He was dressed in black and had the hood of his jacket pulled so far down over his face that you could barely see his mouth and half his nose. He had a lit cigarette between his lips and didn’t bother to stub it out when the door closed behind him.

He did not react, just walked up to one of the tables and sat down as if he hadn’t even seen us or had come in to enjoy the show. My heart began to pound in my chest, caused by the uneasy feeling in my stomach. I noticed Adam watching him the same way, then he turned to me.

“We’re playing with fire.”

The phrase played over and over in my head, and now I really believed it. The fire was starting to play with us.

“Move it!” Keith shouted at the girl when he noticed her eyes were on the stranger, as if she was silently asking him to shoot us all.

He smoked his cigarette and did nothing else, but continued to watch us.

“We have to go,” I heard Adam whisper authoritatively, while Keith and Dredd urged the girl to fill the bag faster, threatening her with their toy guns.

I wanted to agree with Adam, but the scarf suddenly suffocated me. Unable to resist any longer, I pulled it down, bent over, propped my hands on my knees and breathed frantically. It felt as if the earth’s rotation had increased to 200 miles per hour. Everything was spinning around me, including the brain in my skull, and my ears were ringing. A wave of heat ran through my body and burned my skin, then suddenly I was freezing cold. My body began to shake, and I tried to find something to hold on to.

Fucking PCP. Every time I thought I could control it; it proved me wrong.

I managed to straighten my spine and take a deep breath, not realizing that my face was exposed. My eyes found the somber stranger again. He wore a single black leather glove on the hand that held the cigarette.

The smoke he blew out camouflaged his face with a mist that foretold death.

He was watching me, I could feel it in my bones, even if I couldn’t see his eyes, then he discreetly jerked his head to the left and motioned for me to look.

Before I could assess whether his gesture was meant for me or not, sirens spread silent fear among my friends. I turned my head to the left and saw the flashing lights of the patrol cars outside the window.

Panic deepened my dizziness.

A familiar voice screamed at me, becoming frighteningly thick for a few seconds, then growing high-pitched, almost cartoonish. It was as if my brain had turned into a video editing program. I could play with the sounds and images around me without having control over them. Fear helped me stand up again relatively quickly, and I grabbed the arm of the personpulling me outside, but he let go of me as if someone had yanked him away from me.

“Kath, run,” another voice called out, which was probably Nicky’s.

The first voice was probably Adam’s, because he was standing next to me.

When I managed to get out of my head and look around, everyone was running in each and every direction. They were like ants in a nest that had been invaded by an anteater. Two police cars were parked in front of the exit.

We were kind of lucky, the cops would arrest us rather than shoot us. I had no intention of coming face to face with a gang member. The silly thought reminded me of the Grim Reaper inside the restaurant, so I looked for him, but he was nowhere to be found. Was he ever there, or was my drug-fueled brain just imagining him?

I ran out too and followed the others, even though I wasn’t really trying to escape. The cold air sobered me up for a few moments, as did the rain, which washed the sweat from my face. Someone was attacking me. My hands were pulled behind my back and my shoulder bones cracked. A scream escaped my lips as I tried to free myself, but I was hit in the back of the knee and fell to the ground. A man’s voice ordered me not to move, as if I was capable of much movement.

All hell was breaking loose around me. The others were trying to escape, chased by police officers. They screamed, jumped on cars, and fought with the pursuers. Everything blurred, the images were no longer distorted, but they became darker. My brain was now losing information, something was erasing my memory. This place had put too many images of computers and robots in my head.

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