Mindf**k by Fanie Viljoen Page B

house suddenly felt like a cocoon, warm and suffocatingly dense with the silk threads closing in tighter around me.
    I tried not to move my head too much. Perhaps it would help to get rid of the headache, I thought. I knocked back a few pain pills. Don’t know how many. I just tipped the bottle in my mouth and swallowed. When they didn’t all want to go down at once, I drank more water straight from the tap.
    A pain was now burning in my stomach. But it was okay. At least now I knew what I had to do.
    Why I had to do it.
    I wondered if the car I’d stolen was still at the garage. Fuck, I hope nobody found it there.
    ‘Chris.’ It was Kelly. ‘Are you going somewhere?’
    ‘It’s got nothing to do with you.’
    ‘Chris, look at me.’ I heard her gasping. ‘What’s wrong? You look like you came back from the dead.’
    No shit, hey.
    ‘Are you feeling okay?’
    ‘Yeah, I’ll be fine.’
    Something inside me wanted to laugh at those words. I’ll be fine. Damn, when? And will I? Will things turn around?
    ‘Tell mom I left. I’m not coming back. She needn’t worry. And tell dad that I’msorry about mom and the other guy.’
    ‘What?’
    ‘Kelly, I can’t talk to you right now. I’m in a hurry, okay?’
    She grabbed me by my sleeve, pulling me back.
    ‘You’re going nowhere. Look at you. You’re soaked, Chris.’
    ‘Could be from the pills.’
    ‘Which pills did you take?’
    ‘Headache pills.’
    ‘Bullshit, headache pills don’t make you sweat.’
    ‘Perhaps a few of them would.’
    ‘How much did you take?’
    ‘Dunno. Just leave me alone now, willyou? I have to get away. Kerbs and Sky are on their way. They …’ No, wait, I shouldn’t tell her.
    ‘Kerbs and Sky? Who are they?’
    ‘You know.’
    ‘No, I don’t know. What the hell is going on with you?’
    ‘They were my buddies.’
    ‘Chris, you don’t have buddies.’
    ‘Yes, I do. Had. Kerbs and Sky …’
    ‘Damn, it’s happening again. We have to get Mom.’ Kelly’s face looked scared.
    ‘Leave Mom out of this.’
    ‘No, Chris, Mom has to come and help.’
    ‘No!’ I shouted. My head ached.
    ‘Chris, calm down. It’s happeningagain.’
    ‘What? What the fuck is happening again?’
    ‘The things you see, Chris.’ Her voice softened, eyes wide. ‘You know … like last time.’
    I kept staring at her, then she said: ‘Kerbs and Sky don’t exist, Chris. You don’t have buddies. Remember? Everyone at school … they’re afraid of you, Chris. Because you were in that hospital.’
    ‘Hospital?’
    ‘The fucking loony bin, Chris!’
    The words struck me like a deadly blow, slamming me back against the wall.

TRACK 31
Proof
    No, no, no. It couldn’t be. Kerbs and Sky did exist. They were real people. Just like me. Just like Kelly.
    I tried to understand what she said, but the puzzle pieces in my mind didn’t fit together, as if they were jammed into the wrong spaces, jutting out angularly and skew. Making up a senseless picture of a life in turmoil.
    ‘Chris?’ said Kelly. Far off. ‘Chris?’
    ‘I don’t believe you.’ The saliva formed webs in my mouth. I swallowed it down. The pain still throbbed in my temples.
    ‘I’ll show you,’ said Kelly.
    I raised my head. She was scared too.
    ‘Let’s go look them up. We’ll take my bike.’
    I straightened up. Yes, I’d show her. Then she’d see. Kerbs and Sky were real people.
    We had barely got on the scooter that Kelly called a bike, when I suddenly realised that I couldn’t go with her. I leaped off the bike.
    ‘Now what?’ Kelly’s voice was irritated.
    ‘I can’t go.’
    ‘Damn, Chris, get on!’
    ‘They’re going to kill me, Kelly! I can’t.’ I screamed at her: ‘That’s why I need to fucking get away! They’re going to kill me!’
    ‘I want to help you, Chris. Trust me.’
    ‘No.’
    ‘Trust me.’ Her eyes stared at me, pleadingly. ‘You don’t have to go in, you can stay outside. I’ll go in and look.’
    Trust me, trust me,