CHAPTER TWELVE
Alex didn’t quite know what to think. He was just staring at The Gruff as he paced around the room back and forth with his little fingers curled over its chin and it looked like it was thinking an awful lot about how they were going to get out of this situation.
The Gruff didn’t look like the fact that he was real bothered him very much. He was just pacing about like an army general and it didn’t sound like he was doing much thinking. It just sounded like he was grumbling and complaining.
“Are you real?” asked Alex.
The Gruff stopped his pacing. He was still grumbling but he was looking at Alex now and he had his two arms folded and he had his chest puffed out and he was trying to puff it out even further than it already was and he was probably going to shout at any second.
“Do you know who I am? Well? Do you?” The Gruff shouted.
Alex didn’t. If he was a doll, he had never seen one before and he had never seen a doll come to life either. He must have been from somewhere different.
“Are you from Japan?”
“Do I look friggin Japanese to you? C’mon, use your head kid. Think. Who do you think I am? Who am I?” The Gruff said in a howling and growling whisper.
“I’m sorry. I really don’t know. Who are you?”
“I’m the reason you’re out of that god damn box” he snarled.
The Gruff started pacing again. He followed the walls around the room and he was looking at every inch of the floor and the roof. The room itself was empty. There was nothing except for the boxes in which they’d just escaped.
There wasn’t even a window.
“You’re welcome by the way” grumbled The Gruff.
Alex felt stupid. He didn’t say thank you. He was raised to always say thank you, even if he didn’t mean it or if he didn’t want to or even if the person didn’t deserve it. It was just the polite thing to do. But he was so caught up in the fact that The Gruff was real that he just totally forgot. And he did feel it. He did want to say it. And The Gruff, he did deserve it. It just slipped his mind.
“Thanks,” he said.
“Hey, don’t mention it, kid. I’m not in this for the acclaim.”
Alex climbed off what was left of the box and then sat cross legged on the floor by the door. He was soiled and cold. There were no other clothes in the room for him to put on. He looked around, but he couldn’t find his at all. The Man must have taken them and put them somewhere.
The Gruff stopped looking around the room. He looked at Alex now and he had his arms folded again. He gave him the same look that his teachers used to give before they’d ask him to sit in the corner or stay back after school.
“Are you going to hurt me?” asked Alex.
The Gruff laughed.
“What’s your name?”
“Alex’ he said.
“Alex, do I look like I’m going to hurt you?”
“Yes.”
“Really?”
“I dunno. I mean you look mean and that and…”
“I’m not gonna hurt you for god’s sake. But I am gonna get us the hell out of here. Somehow.”
The Gruff looked up and examined the roof. Alex looked up with him and followed where he was looking pretending he knew what he was looking for. He didn’t though. He was just so used to doing things that other people did; copying the stuff his brother used to do and having to do the stuff his mother and father wanted him to do.
There was nowhere for them to run. The only exit was through the door and that was locked. And if they did try to break out, The Man would catch them and he’d lock them up again or worse.
Alex started to cry.
“Hey, hey. What the hell did I tell you about crying?”
The Gruff hated crying. He hated the sound of it. He hated the whimpering. He hated the sound of runny noses being sniffled. He hated the appalling bawling. He hated the snorting between tear soaked explanations. He hated the sympathy that it obligated. He hated everything about it
“I hate everything about crying,” he said. “If you have to do it. Be discreet or something. You don’t vomit in front of someone while they’re having supper. Well, do you?”
Alex sniffled.
His bottom lip was trembling.
“No.”
“Of course not. So if you don’t vomit in front of someone while they’re eating supper, then why the hell do you think its hunky dory to cry in front of someone while they’re thinking happy thoughts? Now you got me thinking about my mummy and my daddy and I’m feeling sad too and I’m gonna cry and….”
The Gruff pulled his hands over his face.
“I miss my mum and dad too,” said Alex.
The Gruff laughed.
Alex cried again.
He buried his head into his hands. He thought of his mother’s face. He imagined her as he thought she would have looked as she turned the corner and found the parking lot completely empty. He imagined her opening every door in every apartment and seeing every room empty. He imagined her returning to their apartment and sitting on the edge of her bed and staring down through her empty hands at his stupid red jumper that had his smell.
“Oh don’t get so friggin sentimental. It was just a joke.”
Alex looked up. The Gruff was standing right in front of him and he still had his arms folded over his puffed out chest. He looked really angry. He didn’t at all look like he was sorry about anything. Alex lowered his head again.
“It was a friggin joke. Jesus. Lighten up would ya. God!”
The Gruff kicked the floor beside Alex’s feet. He looked like he hurt himself. He stormed off to the other side of the room and he sat down against the wall. He pulled his knees up to his sour face and he grumbled something into his legs.
The two sat there quiet for an hour or so. Alex had run out of tears and sat there waiting for them to come back so he could cry them out again.
“So you don’t like jokes. Well what do you like?” asked The Gruff.
Alex looked over to him. He didn’t have his head in his knees anymore. He was sitting with his legs out stretched, but they were crossed as well. He looked like he was waiting for a train to come.
“Stuff, I suppose.”
“What you mean stuff? Be specific. What, you like football, you like BMX, you like skateboarding, you like armies, what? It’s not Barbie is it? You don’t have… issues do you?”
The Gruff made a disgusted face.
“I mean, it’s ok if you do or if you are or… You know.”
“I don’t like that stuff” shouted Alex. “I’m not a girl.”
“Temper, temper.”
“Shut up. It’s not funny”
“You’re right, it’s not funny. Well, you wanna play a game?”
Alex looked at him funny.
“What game?”
“What about… I spy?”
“Ok.”
“Alright. I’ll go first. I love this game. Ok. I spy with my little eye” he said, winking at Alex. “Something beginning with…u”
Alex looked around the room. There was nothing here except some broken boxes and that was ‘b’ and the boxes were made of ‘w’ – wood - and the walls, they were ‘w’ and they were white too and that was it. There was a door, a handle, a couple of locks, but there was nothing that started with ‘u’, except…
Alex looked down at his stained underwear. He went red immediately. He felt so ashamed. He had never peed himself before. He had pooped his pants once by accident. His mother had taken too long in the shops and he was waiting by the car and he didn’t know when she would come back and his brother was sitting inside the car and he was pacing around outside. He really had to go to the toilet, but he didn’t know where his mother was so he kind of danced on his feet and he squeezed the cheeks of his bum together and he pressed his hand to his bum and he tried to think of something else, but he couldn’t stop it.
As soon as the first bit came out, it all just came out and pretty soon he jus
t stood there, like a little baby, and he let it fill his pants. And then he got in the car and he sat in the back seat. And when everyone got back to the car, everyone knew what had happened, but nobody said anything.
That was how he felt now.
“Urine,” he said angrily.
“What?”
“U for urine. Are you happy now?”
The Gruff looked insulted.
“I don’t get it.”
“Urine. Pee. I peed myself. There, I did it, so what?”
“Actually I was gonna say, you.”
“Me?”
“Yeah you. Starts with a friggin u.”
“But you starts with a y.”
The Gruff looked confused.
“Are you sure?”
“Dead sure.”
“Can we start again?”
“Ok.”
“I spy, with my little eye. Something beginning with… y”
“Me,” said Alex.
“No,” said The Gruff all proud.
Alex looked around. There was nothing else.
“It has to be me,” he said.
“Nope.”
“Then what is it?”
“It’s you.”
“That’s what I said. Me.”
“No, it’s not me, it’s you.”
“But that’s what I meant.”
“Yeah, but it’s not what you said.”
“You’re stupid.”
“Yeah? Well, you’re stupider” yelled The Gruff, throwing his arms in the air and kicking his legs up and down.
Alex started to laugh. The Gruff looked really mad but when he got mad, his face scrunched up and he looked like an old man sucking on a lemon. He didn’t at all look dangerous. He looked really funny.
And the angrier he got, the funnier he looked. And the funnier he looked, the louder Alex laughed and the louder Alex laughed, the angrier The Gruff got, until eventually, The Gruff sat in the far corner facing the wall with his back to Alex.
“I didn’t mean to laugh. I’m sorry” said Alex.
The Gruff said nothing.
“People laugh at me sometimes as well. Because I do things funny. And they push me” said Alex.
He was shuffling over towards The Gruff, inching himself on his bum. When he got about a meter away, he stopped. He leaned himself against the wall and he sat facing the center of the room, away from The Gruff.
He turned towards him every now and then. He gave him a little glance and then he turned back to the floor. He didn’t stare or anything. He just gave a quick glance and The Gruff knew he was looking and he knew as well that he wasn’t staring and it made him feel like he had been noticed, but that he wasn’t being watched.
Alex moved an inch forwards.
The Gruff grumbled.
Alex moved an inch back.
“You’re not stupid” said Alex. “I was just mad. I didn’t mean it.”
He inched closer again. This time The Gruff didn’t grumble. He just kind of whimpered. Alex knew a cat once and it did the same sort of thing. Whenever he would go near it and try to pick it up, it would run to a corner and it would grumble or hiss and if he called out, it would look at him funny and untrusting before it ran away. One day though, instead of just trying to pick it up, he sat down beside the cat and he didn’t do much else. He just sat there and he looked at the cat the same was he was looking at The Gruff just now. And in the end, the cat came to him.
“I kicked the ball the wrong way once.”
The Gruff said nothing.
“I was playing football. My friend was the goalie. We always played on Saturdays, me and him. He was the goalie and I had to kick the ball past him. I never did though. He was really good. We played a match once for a team and he was the goalie and I had to kick the goals. Well I got the ball and the other team, they couldn’t stop me. They didn’t try. I felt great. Like the best on the field. I ran up the pitch with the ball and the other players, they were yelling ‘pass the ball’ but I didn’t. I kept running and the other team, they moved out of my way cause I was so good or something. And I saw my friend and for the first time, I kicked a goal.”
The Gruff said nothing.
“I kicked in the wrong goal,” said Alex, a little embarrassed. “The other team, they weren’t chasing me cause I was going the wrong way. I was so used to playing with my friend on Saturdays, I forgot I was supposed to kick to the other goal.”
The Gruff chuckled.
“Everyone made fun of me. They all pointed and they laughed. The other team, my team, the coach and my friend. They said I couldn’t play for them anymore. And my friend, he stopped kicking the ball with me on Saturdays.”
The Gruff chuckled some more.
Alex inched forwards some more.
The Gruff snarled.
But not at him.
“I hate people,” he said. “Not you. But people in general. It’s like if you’re not like everyone else then you’re not allowed to be on the same shelf and then just like that, people forget that you even exist.”
“Is that what happened to you?”
“No-one wants an angry toy. They all want a toy that loves you or hugs you or builds something or fixes someone. But nobody wants the toy that tells you to go to hell.”
He was starting to get angry and his face was starting to scrunch again. Alex grew a small smirk. It slowly crept across his face until it became a smile. He liked The Gruff. When he got angry, he didn’t feel uncomfortable, not anymore. He felt safe. Like when he used to watch over his brother’s as he played hour after hour of video games.
“I think you’re funny,” said Alex.
“Yeah well, I think you’re mother hugged you too much and because of that you cry a lot and I really hate kids who cry but you’re not as bad as the other kids.”
“I like you too.”
“Was that really true, that whole kickin the ball the wrong way story?”
“Yeah, why?”
“No reason,” The Gruff said chuckling to himself.
“How long have you been here?” asked Alex.
“I don’t know. How long is a long time?”
“Is he going to hurt us?”
The Gruff said nothing. But his silence said enough.
“I want to go home,” said Alex.
He was about to cry but he looked at The Gruff who was wearing a strong stern look. His father had that look sometimes. The other night, when they passed the old man on the chair, his dad, he was scared, you could tell. But he had the same stern look. It was the kind of look that said “If you come near me, I’ll give you two good reasons to go the other way,” imagining that his father’s fists being held in the air were reasons number one and two.
“I don’t want him to hurt me,” said Alex.
“Nobody’s gonna hurt you.”
“Do you promise?”
The Gruff got to his feet. He walked over to where Alex was sitting. Alex had his legs crossed and his head was hanging low and he was looking up with his eyes. He looked really scared.
The Gruff stood in front of him. With Alex sitting, their heads were at the same level. The Gruff was really small, but he was kind of big for a toy. Whoever made him made him wrong in many ways. They made him too big. They made him too strong. They made him too ugly with all the scars they put on his face. And they made him too angry with all the hot air blowing from his ears and the colored springs for hair bouncing up and down and spitting and bad words that he said.
The Gruff put one of his hands on Alex’s shoulder. Alex didn’t look up. He felt The Gruff’s fingers closing over and a wave of shivers ran from the base of his neck down to the tips of his toes. They were the good kind of shivers. Not the ones he got when The Teacher touched him.
“I won’t let you out of my sight,” said The Gruff.
Alex felt safe. He started to close his eyes and he started to drift. He hadn’t given up on his mother or his father saving him. He would take that if it ca
me his way. But he wasn’t thinking about it. It just seemed like it probably wouldn’t happen. And it only made him sad to think of them.
Instead, he thought of The Gruff, standing over him as he fell asleep. And The Gruff would take guard and make sure nobody hurt him. Nobody at all. And he would have fallen sleep right away, were it not for the sound of a key turning inside of a lock.
His heart beat fast.
The key turned.
The lock clicked once.
The lock clicked twice.
“Don’t let him hurt me.”
The Man entered.