At first glance you could tell this kid was something of an odd duck. I’m trying to be polite to his unique circumstances of course, everyone in my school can be a little weird, or a little dense, but we all have an unwritten and unsaid agreement to be nice to Jeremy.
It can be a little infuriating when that empathy doesn’t extend to the rest of us. I don’t want to be the first asshole to break that agreement, but Jesus Christ this kid snuck into the girls bathroom and licked the toilet seats. The bottom of the toilet seats.
In the same week he somehow caught a baby bird during break, and then stuffed it in his underwear. I’m guilty of getting a sort of a twisted little kick out of some of his antics, but he kept it there for two hours, and he started moaning at his desk so loud the teacher decided to cancel class for all of us.
I was standing at the urinal one time pissing, and from the stall beside me I heard him mutter out “Ew, it’s on my finger.”
Now I can surmise what in fact was on his finger, but what made it worse is while I was telling my friends at lunch that day, we watched in awe as he ate a tub of peanut butter with his bare hands in the cafeteria.
He wore socks on his hands for an entire calendar month. Genuinely from the first of May to the thirty first of May, as though he meticulously planned it.
“I’m Theodore McSock, nice to feet you.” He’d say religiously to every person who passed by.
I don’t fucking get it. Well, I suppose we all understand the bit, but what the fuck could he have been thinking?
I don’t want to keep dogging on the guy, but I feel as though you need some insight into the lunacy that was Jeremy ‘Doo Doo Butt’ McGilvary. Even his nickname was laughably idiotic, but I guess that one is on the rest of us.
We have kids in our grade who are on the spectrum, some have learning disabilities, but Jeremy apparently didn’t have anything like that. His grades were some of the highest in the school, and his parents were some of the most compassionate and well respected people in our community.
It was a long weekend coming up, and we had been planning to spend our Saturday night playing video games and drinking beer at our friends house.
Our friend has a younger set of parents who were wheatgrass eating hippy types, and firm believers that kids are going to drink and do drugs anyway, so they might as well let it happen in the safety of their home under light adult supervision. Worked for me.
There were seven of us going. Everybody played it down, but I could tell we were all looking forward to it because it was all we could talk about for the entire week leading up to it.
On the Friday before, my best friend in the group invited Jeremy. I shook my head desperately as he was doing it, but he ignored my cue and told him to show up about an hour after the rest of us were supposed to.
“Hey, why did you just invite Doo Doo Butt to come over tomorrow? Last time we hung out with him outside of school he tried to eat a fucking fork, his mom came to pick him up and started crying while she apologized to us.” I said to him, trying to plead to his rational side.
“I was there champ. Why are you coming up to me like that? That’s some real bullshit. You’re acting like a little exclusionary twelve year old, and it genuinely disappoints me. Plus Jeremy is pretty funny.”
Like I said earlier, we were all a little weird. I was best friends with him because he held me accountable for each word that I’d speak. He was best friends with me because…actually I’m not sure.
He had convinced me though. Not from what he said, definitely not from what he said, but because he was one of the most compassionate and intelligent friends you could ask for, and we all learned to just trust him on his shit.
Saturday rolled around, and seven of us were there, just hanging out in the basement trying to make eachother laugh. I actually loved this guy’s house, it smelled like vinegar often, and the furniture was homemade, not to mention the television was a little small.
Okay his house was kind of shit, but his parents would buy us two cases of beer, and then dip out to the garage where they were most certainly smoking weed or doing mushrooms.
Sure enough the doorbell rings, and shortly after, walking downstairs holding hands for some reason was the mom who owned the house, her eyes bright red and her knees unsteady, and Jeremy ‘Doo Doo Butt’ McGilvary dressed in a beige suit that looked like it was tailored for a man twice his size.
“Okay boys, just tell me if you need anything, I’ll be in the garage.” His mom slurred out, before slowly turning around and crawling up the stairs on her hands and feet.
It was silent for a minute, everyone was just staring at him in anticipation. I wasn’t sure if everyone was waiting until the mom was out of earshot, or if they were feeling as awkward and uncomfortable with Jeremy’s presence as I was. Then Jeremy gave a grin so toothy his eyes sealed shut.
“Who wants to play secret viagra?” He belted out in a sing-songy voice.
Every started laughing and fucking snorting. I gave a polite smile, but in my head I just kept thinking about what that game could possibly be. He pulled out two little blue pills from his inside jacket pocket, and asked someone to get him eight cups of water. I was beginning to understand the premise, but what I didn’t expect was for my shit-head friends to indulge him.
The thing about Jeremy’s games is, they’re always rigged for him to lose, or rigged for him to win in his own mind. He put eight cups of water on the table, grabbed one of them, drank all of it, and then told everyone to pick a cup. I felt confident going second, and as everyone else picked their cup and drank it back, I couldn’t help but laugh along with them.
I knew we had a little time before Jeremy starting doing gay shit, so I asked if anyone wanted to play videogames.
“What do you think Jeremy?” One of the guys asked.
That pissed me off. I could understand the interest that Jeremy garnered, he constantly did wild things that appealed to the parts of us that never grew out of random humor, and usually he was right at the butt end of his own antics, but it could be a little exhausting especially since taking things to far was part of the gimmick.
Every last one of us would do bits like that, anything to make the boys laugh, but when Jeremy was around, the whole night revolved around him.
“Yeah for sure, that would be dope.” Jeremy said with a smirk.
Something didn’t seem right, I don’t think I’ve ever heard him say anything normal. It’s exactly what we did though. The eight of us took turns playing video games together, it was pretty standard stuff too. The two losers would pass it on, we were talking trash, joking around, playing sweaty near the end of games.
Everybody was drinking and laughing the whole time. When you didn’t have a controller, you’d just talk with people or watch the game. I even got a chance to chat with Jeremy for a bit.
“Bro, were you at the basketball game on thursday?” He asked me.
“What? I was playing in the game.”
“Right, right, my bad.” His voice was a little bashful.
“Did you see that guy try to-”
“Grab the rim and fall straight on his fucking back” He interjected.
We both started laughing super hard as we replayed it in our heads over and over. It really wasn’t that funny, but the kid who fell was the other team’s best player, a real ego tripping asshole, so it felt quite earned.
“My parents started laughing at the man, and I’m pretty sure it was his mom who turned around and gave us the dirtiest look.” Jeremy explained with a charisma that he had never shown before.
“I brought it up to him during the game and he got so pissed at me.”
He didn’t respond, instead he hunched over and started groaning like he was in pain.
“Are you alright?” I asked him.
He dropped off the couch and crawled in front of the television. My friends paused the game and stood up. We looked around at each other and everyone was either concerned or confused. Everyone except my best friend, he remained seated with his hands over his eyes.
Jeremy started making what I would call sad puppy noises, and then he bolted to his feet blurting out “I’m Theodore McCock, nice to fuck you.”
Now I am going to be sparse with the details here. Some things are just not meant to be retold. Imagine one of those springy door stops being slapped back and forth furiously. A tent was pitched. People were chased around.
Overall it was one of the most vile and disturbing things to occur, and yet he got a rise out of everyone, whether it was a nervous laugh or a genuine one.
Sure it was unexpected at first, but after about an hour of jokes revolving around someone’s erect penis, nobody could even bring themselves to laugh anymore. I wish that would have stopped him from trying, but it didn’t. It never did with him. We couldn’t even play video games anymore, not unless we felt like washing the controller first.
“Okay boys, I gotta go beat this thing into submission. Where’s the bathroom?” Jeremy asked while holding his…
Everyone pointed at the same time, and then he started crab walking to the bathroom. He flicked the light on, and closed the door behind him.
“Guys. This might be a bit much for me.” One of my friends said quietly.
We all shook our heads in agreement as we slowly formed a circle so we wouldn’t have to talk too loudly.
“Honestly some of the shit he does is pretty funny, but when he can’t turn it off or tone it down, it gets way out of hand really fast. I don’t want one of my parents to come down and see this shit, there is no explaining any of this.”
“It seems like he isn’t even in on his own jokes at times, and you can only laugh at someone for so long before you start feeling like a prick.” I added.
Everyone looked towards my best friend for moral guidance. He was in fact the one who invited him. He leaned in a little bit, everyone started holding their breath and craning their necks forward waiting for him to speak. He cleared his throat with a forceful grunt.
“Don’t make me say it.”
None of us understood, and I think he sensed that. He put his arms around the people on either side of him, and we all did the same.
“Nobody, under any circumstance, can say anything mean to Jeremy.” His voice was so incredibly soft and quiet, we all instinctively tilted our dominant ear towards his lips.
“What are you guys doing?”
We all jumped back, the huddle breaking up in an instant as everyone assumed the most unnatural, natural body language imaginable. Jeremy was standing right behind me.
“Nothing, just game planning our next move. You got any ideas Doo Doo Butt?” My best friend said with perfect poise.
“Check this out.” Jeremy said with that same toothy grin.
Again, some things are not worth telling, but as we watched him perform a shameful, and seemingly very painful act. I could see that all of my friends were starting to get back into it. They were giving nervous giggles at first, but eventually I could see all of the tension ease from their faces.
I couldn’t do it any longer. I just couldn’t.
“Jeremy pull your fucking pants up, seriously what the fuck is wrong with you? What the fuck is wrong with all of us?” My voice boomed in my own head, so I could imagine what it was like for everyone else to hear.
My hands were contorted, my shoulders tense. I had been channeling pure rage, but I couldn’t rationalize where it came from. I could barely look at anyone after I said that, I wanted to turn around and run, but I knew I had to apologize.
I raised my eyes up from the ground, in my peripheral vision I could see my friends staring at me with mouths slightly ajar, but right in front of me, Jeremy had an ice cold expression.
“Look Jeremy. I don’t know what-”
“No, no, no. Save your breath. I’m the one who should be sorry.” Jeremy was using that same charisma from earlier, but his expression seemed disconnected from his tone.
“I may have gone a little too far tonight. If I’m being honest, I thought you guys liked me best when I was doing weird shit. I just wanted to make you guys laugh, but I understand if things got out of hand.” His voice was soft and disarming, he had his palms exposed to us, and his head was swaying left and right with every syllable.
“Hey it’s okay man.” Every said some slight variation of that in unison.
Everyone except my best friend. In the midst of me trying to apologize, he had left the room unnoticed.
“I’ll cool it down for the night. Why don’t we just keep playing video games and have a good rest of our night? Can someone actually grab me a beer please?” Jeremy gave a dubious smirk.
The friend who lived in this house obliged like a happy little puppy. He pranced over to the case sitting on the table, picked one up, pranced back over to Jeremy, and extended it to him as if it was a sacred gift.
“Here you go buddy.”
Grateful that this awkward chapter of an overall absurd night was coming to a close, we didn’t even notice that Jeremy had firmly locked his hand around our friend’s wrist instead of grabbing the drink.
“Take it easy, what the fu-”
Jeremy’s other hand shot directly into his mouth in a quick spearing motion, causing him to gag and attempt to pull away. He locked tighter around his wrist.
Before the can in his hand could even fall and hit the ground, Jeremy began pushing his neck back. He hooked his fingers on the backside of his bottom teeth, and yanked down ferociously, all in one clean motion. It tore his jaw nearly clean off, his flesh was the only thing keeping it from hitting the floor too.
Thud. Beer sprays on all of us, but we never wake from our state of shock. Everyone watches in horror as our friend stumbles in place, gurgling on his own blood, trying to lift his jaw back in place.
Thud. His limbs crumpled unnaturally to the side as his center of mass dropped straight down.
Jeremy starts coughing out a high pitched laugh, it stops in an instant and he looks up at us with his lips pursed as if he’s preparing to speak.
“You know…you guys are allowed to scream.” His voice reeks of condescension.
Thud. The base of one of our friends’ skulls connects with the corner of the table as he faints backwards.
The silent screams of unadulterated fear and anguish people often have in their worst nightmares, if they were real, if they made noise, they still wouldn’t be able to compare to the sounds heard in that basement.
I now know that when confronted with unimaginable trauma, I freeze in place. While it may be true that I freeze, I definitely don’t forget.
I watched as my bravest friend dove head first at him in an attempt to tackle him to the ground. As fluid and effortless as water flowing downhill, Jeremy was able to evade with a step to the side.
He put one hand on the guy’s outside thigh as he soared horizontally through the air, his other hand found the back of his neck, and just as gravity began pulling him down, Jeremy twisted his weight out and down, building immense momentum and directing his face at the corner between the floor and the baseboard.
The loud crunch, and the way he became inanimate instead of twitching or writhing, extinguished all hope in my soul.
Jeremy turned back around and stared deeply into my eyes. He paid no attention to my other two friends who desperately sprinted up the stairs. I wish I could say he had a cold expression, even a smile would have been better, but instead he fluttered his eyelashes and bit his bottom lip. It felt as if the blood in my body stopped moving.
“Remember when we all played kiss tag last week?” He looked down at the ground, and then back at my eyes.
“I’m it.” He started walking towards me whilst letting his blazer slide off his shoulders.
I closed my eyes. I think my brain was proactively shutting down, but a splurt of warm liquid drenching my chest turned it back on.
I opened my eyes to see Jeremy’s lifeless eyes twitch erratically before freezing completely. The tip of a knife protruded from his forehead, and as he collapsed in front of me I could see the handle sticking out of the back of his head.
My best friend stood behind him with a look of disappointment on his face.
“I told you not to be fucking mean to Jeremy.” I could hear the tremble of shock and anger in his tone.
I’m pretty sure I’m going to jail for this. It was clearly self defense, right? Well in the horrifying aftermath I tried explaining exactly what happened to the police. Every disgusting detail.
Everyone came to Jeremy’s defense though. There were endless posts online about how fantastic he was. My friends refused to say anything, my best friend essentially took a vow of silence. He at least admitted to being the one who killed him, but I think we’re all facing consequences.
There have been countless memorials in his honor, every kid at school is acting like he was their best friend. Nobody has muttered a word about any of his fucked up antics.
I fear what will happen if anyone finds out about this post, but I had to say something.
Please don’t be mean to Jeremy.