Archive of Our Own

The girls must die. Billy doesn’t remember when the thought had first come to him, but it has been clouding his mind ever since, like a burning fever he just can’t shake. Every time they all sit together and he can’t help but watch Stu put his arms around Tatum, or play with her hair, or kiss her; every time he walks past Casey in the hallway, knowing she’d felt Stu’s hands on her waist, her breasts, her neck; Billy feels this urge rising from deep within him, twisting his insides, making him gnaw his teeth and ball his hands into fists. They have to die.

After killing Sidney’s whore mother, Billy had felt euphoric for a while. Seeing the light vanish from Maureen’s eyes made Billy feel more satisfaction than anything else ever did. Blood was pooling on her stomach, soaking into her shirt and Billy’s jeans where he was kneeling above her body, pants around his ankles. Billy was content. The satisfaction he felt compared to nothing else he’d ever experienced, and in this moment he was sure doing things to women was what made him happy.

Stu had been watching him, belt hanging from his hip and a hand down his pants. His eyes were fixed on Billy, his hand that was clutching his shirt bloody and slippery from when he’d held Maureen Prescott so Billy could stab her again and again. He was covered in blood, black in the faint moonlight, and Billy watched him as he shook and gasped and fell to the ground, exhausted but smiling. Billy had wanted to grab his hand and squeeze it.

It wasn’t much later that Billy had first brought up the idea to Stu of not stopping there. The satisfaction Billy had felt that night slowly melted away, leaving the same anger and restlessness in him that he’d felt before. Sidney didn’t help with that either, as she became more distant after her mother’s murder, more often than not refusing to let Billy touch her. Whenever they had fooled around, Billy liked to be on top, kneeling above her, a hand somewhere near her neck, and the image of Maureen dead and sliced open flashed before his eyes and all he could think about was what all the other girls would look like when they were killed by his hand, including Sidney. And a voice in his mind told him they would deserve it; they liked to play with men’s feelings and yet they had never done anything to make Billy feel good. Even his own mother had left him.

It’s a hot weekend at the end of July when Stu’s parents are out of town, giving him and Billy the opportunity to discuss their plans for Maureen’s one year death anniversary. What a celebration that would be. The sun is still out when Billy knocks at the front door, and Stu opens it with a big grin. He’s always grinning when he sees Billy, and sometimes Billy wants to cut the smile off his face, but he can never quite get himself to do it. Stu pulls him into a tight hug, one that squishes Billy against his warm chest, making him acutely aware of how unnervingly tall Stu is compared to him. He feels his big hands on his back, pressing his grey shirt against his sweaty skin. Stu smells of lavender and beer, and Billy feels dizzy.

Stu leads him to the living room, throwing him a bottle of beer from the fridge. The cold glass feels good against Billy’s fingers. Lately, he’s been feeling even more restless than usual, and it shows especially in his hands which can never stay still; he’s always pulling at the hem of his shirt or boring his nails into his palms until they hurt and leave marks. It happens mostly when he’s around Stu. The TV is quiet in the background, some boring news channel talking about some business guy’s tax fraud. Billy only cares about the murders. There haven’t been many lately, which he considers a shame.

“Have you been to Sidney again?” Stu asks, settling down on the sofa, one long, lanky leg thrown over the arm rest, the other on the floor, facing Billy so he has a full view of his crotch. Stu never sits down like a normal person. His grin hasn’t left his lips yet.

The mention of Sidney makes Billy’s stomach churn. He grabs a can opener and throws the lid across the room before he downs half of it in one go. “No, why?”

Stu shrugs. “’Cause you look like you have. All sweaty and with an even meaner face than usual.”

Stu vaguely gestures towards Billy’s face, mirroring his apparently mean face.

“Haven’t seen her all week.” It’s summer break, and Billy can’t help but admit he has been avoiding her lately. He’s been seeing Stu a lot more though.

“Does she still not let you, you know, go from PG13 to NC17?” Stu wiggles his eyebrows, taking a sip from his beer. Billy watches his Adam’s apple bop.

“Good line, Stuart, I’ll use that on her sometime,” Billy says jokingly, rolling his eyes. Stu’s dumb sense of humor has always annoyed him. “And no. Bitch still won’t spread her legs for me. But she will, just like her mommy did.”

It’s silent for a minute, before Stu clears his throat. “Right, so, the plan…”

They discuss what they want to do until it’s pitch-black outside. They talk about how they are going to kidnap Steve, slice him up and spill his insides all over Casey’s patio. About how he is then going to stab Casey and hang her from a tree for her parents to find her later, and how he is ultimately going to kill Tatum right in this house. Billy feels euphoric thinking about killing them, about how they will never be able to hurt him again, never touch or even look at Stu again. Even Sidney will be dead by the time it’s her mother’s death anniversary, and the thought of never touching her again is at the same time scary and comforting to him.

By the time their plan is more or less clear, minus some logistical details, five more beers are emptied and popcorn is littered all over the floor, the sofa and Stu, as he’d asked Billy to throw it in his mouth. Despite his massive tongue, Stu couldn’t catch most of it. Billy feels the alcohol faintly in his blood, making everything more relaxed, more calm. When he started drinking when he was thirteen, alcohol would always make him happy, would turn him into a loud, boisterous, extroverted drunk who was the life of every party. Now, getting drunk doesn’t do shit to calm his mind anymore besides the few light moments where he forgets about the impotent rage inside of him. But it’s never fully gone.

“Billy, can I ask you a question?”

Stu stretches out his leg that has been on the floor, resting it across Billy’s lap. Billy feels himself stiffen, his nails boring into the palm of his hand. Stu has his head slightly cocked to the side, like some fucking dog, and his shirt has ridden up so Billy gets a glance of his stomach. He wants to look away. He’s always wondered how Stu can stay so calm, so fearless beside him, knowing what Billy has done, what he is capable of. Even after what they did to Maureen, Stu had never stopped seeking to be close to him, both physically and mentally. Billy has thought about hurting Stu, about what he would look like with blood pooling on that very same stomach that Billy can’t stop looking at right now, but even if Stu knows, he’s not afraid. He trusts. It makes Billy feel things that make him go crazy.

“Sure.”

“Why do you want to kill Casey and Tatum?”

Billy freezes.

“Wasn’t it you who wanted to kill them? And Steve? You know, ‘cause he fucking stole your girl, and Casey is the slut who left you for him?”

Billy is the only person that Stu doesn’t lie to about who left who.

Stu nods. “Well yeah, Steve can go say bye-bye, he’s a pretentious prick anyway, and I’m still mad at Casey, but I liked her a lot, and I never said I want to kill her, or Tatum. You just decided we will.”

Billy raises an eyebrow. He’s starting to feel anxious. “So? I thought that’s what you wanted! We need more victims. I thought you would want to get rid of them for hurting you!”

“I do, but, there’s plenty of other kids who’d hurt us both, I was just curious why it would have to be all our friends.”

Suddenly, Billy feels himself overcome with the very same rage that he’d managed to forget the split-second Stu had put his leg on his lap. He throws his half empty beer bottle against the wall, hearing it shatter and the shards falling to the floor.

“THEY’RE NOT OUR FRIENDS!” Billy screams at him.

Stu looks shocked, his body frozen in place. Billy looks for any sign of fear, anger or disappointment in his face, but there is none. He swallows, closing his eyes. When he opens them again, the same curious look has returned to Stu’s face like before. Billy shoves Stu’s leg off his lap, kneeling on the sofa and leaning closer to Stu.

“They’re not… our friends,” he repeats, shaken. His voice is unsteady and has dropped to merely a whisper. “Casey is the dumb slut who left you, Steve is the jock who beat you up in middle school, Tatum just hangs with us because of Sidney and only likes you because her ex-boyfriend dumped her and she needed a quick replacement, and Sidney is the prude girl with a whore mother who is most likely going to turn out just like her and be the reason some guy’s mom leaves her kid. They’re not our friends, Stu. They never have been. We only have each other. There’s only you and me.”

Something in Billy settles as he watches Stu’s curious expression turn into a smile. That’s right, Billy is right. That’s why they need to die. Certainly not because Steve stole Casey and Casey hurt Stu and Billy can’t fucking fall asleep at night because there’s images of Tatum kissing Stu in his mind and the thoughts of touching Sidney only makes him want to throw up and–

“Okay.” Stu pushes himself upright, squeezing his leg between Billy and the backrest. “Then let’s kill them all.”

Stu’s smile turns into an awful grin, and when Billy goes to squeeze his neck Stu pushes out his tongue before emptying the rest of his beer and, with horrible aim, throwing it against something behind Billy so it crashes. Stu’s face contorts.

“Oh shit, that was my parents’ favorite vase. Mom and dad will be so mad at me for this.”

Billy scoffs. “Just buy them a new one with their money, fucking rich kid.”

“You’re just jealous you can’t put your ass to sleep on a 500 dollar mattress. Three words, my friend. Sleeping. Like a. Baby.”

“That’s four words, you fucking moron.”

Stu’s reply is to just push his tongue out at Billy again. He does it awfully often, and Billy feels the fire inside him rise every time. Billy’s hand is also still resting on Stu’s neck. He wants to take it away, but his body freezes when Stu puts a hand on his thigh. His look is open, inviting, willing, and Billy is reminded of how much Stu has done for him in the past, how far he went for him, and how much further he is willing to go for him. Unlike all his other friends in middle school, Stu didn’t look at him weirdly when Billy started to play tricks with knives, when he told him about his nightmares of hurting people, which became less and less nightmares and more and more dreams in both senses of the word. Stu didn’t judge him when he cut his own thigh just to feel the warmth of the blood run down his leg, he’d just taken the knife from him and told him he would rather see Billy hurt anyone else than himself. The thought reverberated in his mind for months, until a plan had formed in his head, and Billy had been scared of telling Stu because this was serious, he was serious, but Stu just nodded, tears in his eyes, and showed him the new bruises he had from Steve and his friends beating him up again. They were both hurting, and Stu took his pocket knife out of his jacket, let the blade snap out and grinned at him. Billy knows the things Stu would do for him, and he would do the same for him. It has only ever been the two of them against the world.

Billy feels woozy for a moment, tired by his insomnia, hurt by the memories, exhausted by spending weeks and months and years choking down words he wants to speak and shoving away thoughts he wants to make reality. When he comes to, Stu squeezes his thigh, and their heads are mere inches apart. He realizes he must be hurting Stu by pulling on his hair so hard, but Stu’s eyes are glassy, his pupils blown wide, and his lips open and almost more inviting than the thought of slicing open all the girls who ever kissed those lips before him. He knows what Stu tastes like, he knows what his skin on his stomach feels like, how his hair smells and how much he likes telling his parents that he got into a fight in school when in reality it’s Billy who likes to leave marks and bruises on his body every once in a while. This is not the first time Stu looks at him like this, but with every single day that passes Billy wishes he could make the pain go away. He hates this feeling. He hates Stu for making him feel like this, and he hates himself for not being able to feel any other way ever since the first time Stu kissed him on Billy’s old, saggy mattress.

But just like the last time, and all the times before that, Billy leans forward and kisses him anyway.

Stu’s first kisses are always soft. No matter how harshly Billy grabs his shirt, or bores his nails into his skin, or how urgently and desperate he pushes his tongue into his mouth, Stu likes to start kissing him gently, and it’s the only time Billy feels the rage and anger in him settle down, the only time the fire feels like warmth and shelter instead of destruction. Billy knows Stu is smiling against his lips, crooking his leg so he can pull Billy closer. Billy takes his hand out Stu’s hair to push him down abruptly, giving them barely a second to breathe before kissing him again. Billy is afraid of looking into Stu’s eyes when they do this, because he can’t deal with what he sees in them, the feelings Stu so clearly has and is so eager to show and give that Billy doesn’t know how to handle. Instead, he makes sure Stu will remember every single time they do this, kissing and nipping and licking his way down Stu’s neck until he latches onto the salty skin around his collarbone like a leech, pushing his shirt away and biting down so hard he hears Stu yelp and tastes iron. He licks over the open wound, before he goes back up to kiss Stu, pushing his tongue into his mouth and swallowing his moan.

Stu grabs one of Billy’s hands and puts it on his throat, gently biting Billy’s bottom lip, then licking over it as to apologize. Billy’s hand closes around Stu’s throat, but instead of pushing down at the front like he did to Maureen Prescott, he squeezes the sides of Stu’s neck until his kisses turn languid, his breathing calmer and his eyes stay closed even as Billy risks a look at his face. Stu has a light smile on his face, his lips red and puffy and slick, his chin shining wetly. Billy feels shaken, his heart beating fast, and all his blood is rushing to the center of his body. Stu’s hand is still lightly squeezing his thigh, while his other is resting on the small of his back, under his shirt. When Stu comes to, they kiss again, and Billy doesn’t stop squeezing and pulling and biting at Stu, if only to mark him up and hear Stu make noises that he keeps replaying again and again in his head when he’s alone at night.

When their lips are raw and their bodies tired, Billy slumps on top of Stu, his head resting on his chest. Blood has soaked into his shirt where Billy had bitten him, and he puts a hand on it and grips that part of his shirt tight. Stu’s hand is in his hair, threading through unkempt strands, and for a while it shrinks the fire in him to nothing more but burned-out embers. They don’t speak, and Billy is glad that despite Stu’s loud and boisterous personality, he still knows when to shut up around Billy.

Billy has almost fallen asleep listening to Stu’s even breath and the beating of his heart, before something startles him. He feels something jump on his back, then walk down over his hip and legs before laying down below his feet.

He hears Stu’s tired voice say, “Hey kitty, did you miss Billy?”

Billy moves his feet around a bit, seeing if the cat would budge, but she doesn’t. She’s old now, has been roaming around Stu’s house ever since Billy can remember, until Stu eventually asked his parents to adopt her. Apparently, she’s always had a soft spot for Billy.

“She likes you,” Stu says, and Billy just knows he has that stupid smile on his face again. Billy gives in to the cat and moves his feet out of her way. After a second, Stu adds. “She’s like me.”

Billy feels pressure behind his eyes and in his throat, and he sits up briefly to pet the cat and turn his face away from Stu. The cat purrs, rubbing her face against Billy’s hand. She doesn’t know the things this hand has done. The things it wants to do but can’t.

Stu shuffles around, ready to get some distance between them again, as they always do when the rage comes back and Billy feels like he would suffocate if he stayed close to him. But this time, he whispers, “Stay”, and Stu settles back, a hand behind his head, so Billy can lay back down on his chest. Stu’s hand comes to rest on his side, and Billy fights down the urge to throw something, or hurt Stu, or hurt himself. Everything will be different, he thinks, once they’ve killed them all, there will be no one else to pull them apart anymore. He’s doing this for them, he tells himself, and Billy falls asleep to the thoughts of Stu covered in blood and kissing him, and for the first time in years he feels something akin to hope.