back - home - next story
Title- The Legend of Mad Bent the First. Or, How to Scare the Shit out of Zac Hanson
Pairings- None (can be read as slight Ike/OMC if you squint real hard and tilt your head really far to either side...or maybe that's just me.)
Ratings- PG-13
Warnings- Swearing.
Word Count- 1,548
When your brother suggests a trip to a private island for a week or two of relaxation, let me give you some advice: say no; especially if that brother is fond of cooking up weird experiments and asking you to be a test subject. Of course, when Ike posed the idea to me and Tay, we were all for it. We needed a vacation, and getting away from the constant media attention completely seemed like the best thing, so we didn’t question when Ike said his friend ‘Mad Bent’ could get us onto a private island for cheap.
Just the three of us for a week and a half, it sounded like paradise.
Except, it wasn’t just the three of us. Mad Bent said he had to come along or the deal wouldn’t go through. So there were four guys trying to squeeze into this tiny shack on a tiny island. Two bedrooms were not enough. I had to share with Tay and Ike was sharing with Bent (because neither Tay nor I were going to even try sleeping in the same room as that guy, he was creepier than Ike). Luckily the place had bunk beds or else there would’ve been no room in there for one person to move around let alone two.
“Can you believe this?” Tay asked, affecting his best surfer dude accent.
I rolled my eyes. “Believe what? That we’re stuck on a deserted island for a week and a half with two evil geniuses? ’Cause, uh, yeah, I can.”
“No, Zac!” Tay said, jumping up and modeling his swim trunks. “Can you believe these still fit me?” I didn’t even get a chance to answer (not that I would have, I was too busy trying not to laugh, Tay hadn’t used those trunks since he was fifteen and that was three years ago) before he ran out the door, probably trying to find Bent so he could get some surfing lessons.
For my part, I was planning on lounging around all day sipping alcoholic beverages and reading my new book of horror short stories. Mom hated me reading them, she said they would give me nightmares despite the fact that I was now seventeen and hadn’t had a nightmare since I dreamt I went on stage without any clothes on and got mauled by a crowd of fangirls, and that was back when I was twelve.
So, I grabbed my book and headed out to the main room of the cabin, only to find Ike and Mad Bent already sitting on the only available couch, which left me to choose between the gross and ratty looking armchairs. I tossed my book on the cleaner one and headed to the kitchen, pulling vodka out of the freezer and cranberry juice out of the fridge. The alcohol was courtesy of our hosts, Bent said, and apparently they didn’t care if you were underage, as long as you were careful.
That was fine by me.
I mixed my drink and headed back over to the makeshift lounge area. It wasn’t until after I’d settled down in my chair that I realized Bent had grabbed my book. He was perusing the back with an amused look on his face, as if such a piece of work were beneath him.
“Could I get that back?” I asked. Bent looked up, then tossed the book to me. I let it land on my lap, holding my glass up so it wouldn’t spill. “Thanks,” I muttered.
“No problem, Zac-Attack,” Bent said, I cringed at the nickname and was pretty sure I heard Ike trying to stifle a laugh. I glared at him as Bent kept talking. “But you don’t want to be reading stories like that. I got a much better one for you.”
“Oh really?” I asked dryly. I took a sip of my drink, then set it on the table beside me, eyeing him the entire time.
“It’s the Legend of Mad Bent.” I stared at him. “My great grandfather, Mad Bent the first. This was his house, Zac.” He nodded knowingly. “So, you wanna hear it?”
“I dunno, I was hoping to get a good chunk of this done before we had to go home.”
“We’re here for more than a week, Zac,’ Ike piped up, snatching my drink from the table and taking a sip. “Besides, this one’s a doozy, every horror lover’s gotta hear it.”
“You’re not a horror lover, Ike,” I said.
“No, but I’m friends with him,” he gestured to Bent. “And he likes to hear himself talk, so eventually I had to hear it, too.”
Bent stuck his tongue out at Ike, but quickly returned his attention to me. “Whaddya say?” he asked. I sighed and set my book aside and he took that as his go ahead. He stood up and cleared his throat as though preparing to perform. Well, he kind of is, I thought as I waited for him to start.
He looked down at me, trying and failing to look mysterious, and began his story.
“When Mad Bent the first was a young boy, much like myself,” Bent gestured to himself and I struggled not to laugh, hiding my amused grin behind my cup. Bent still glared at me. “Anyway. When Mad Bent the first was in his early twenties, his family bought this place and shipped him off here on his own. They claimed it was so he could work on his inventions in peace, but really it was because he was fucking crazy and they thought he was gonna go on a murderous rampage sometime soon.
“So, they shipped him off here to get him away from civilization. But, Mad Bent wasn’t an idiot; he knew what they were up to, so he started planning. Rumour has it that there’re still some discarded plans for torture devices hidden under the floorboards, but no one wants to look for them ‘cause they’re afraid they’ll wake up Mad Bent’s ghost.” Bent started pacing back and forth as he spoke, waving his hands for emphasis like he’d had too much coffee and it was finally catching up to him.
“Mad Bent’s parents had this schedule of when they would come to visit him, which is pretty stupid thing to give to an evil genius who has it out for you, but they were pretty stupid not to send him to psychotherapy or something anyway so what d’you expect?” Bent shrugged as if answering his own question then stopped pacing, looking straight at me with an earnest look in his eyes.
“So, when they got here, the came up to the cabin and knocked at the door and it splintered, fucking splintered and Bent’s dad had pieces of wood sticking out of him all over ‘cause he was in front and he starts pulling at these huge fucking splinters,” Bent held his fingers up to demonstrate the size, about as big as a pencap. “And he pulls them out but they hit his arteries and shit so he’s bleeding and his wife is screaming as he falls over dead on the front porch.
“And mother looks up to see her son standing in the doorway, a knife in his hand and a grin on his face and he just looks at her and says ‘Hello, Mother’ and that’s it and then there’s a knife in her chest and she’s not screaming anymore but her moth is still open like she would be if she weren’t fucking dead!” Bent shouted the last word, slamming his fists down onto the coffee table. “And that is the legend of Mad Bent the first,” he finished with a nod of his head and he sat down and started talking to Isaac like he hadn’t just tried to scare me with some stupid ass story he’d probably made up on the spot.
I shook my head, opened my book in my lap, and sipped my vodka while I read.
***
That night, I was sleeping soundly (or so I thought) on the top bunk in mine and Taylor’s room when I heard a floor board creak. I sat up, waiting for my eyes to focus in the near-pitch black room, staring straight at the door.
“Who’s there?” I whispered.
“How dare you lock me up here?” someone whispered back, voice low and shaky. “How dare you exile me?”
“I…Ike?” I stuttered, swallowing hard. “Tay?”
“Mother?” the voice said and I screamed, then the light flicked on and Mad Bent and Ike started howling with laughter where they stood in the doorway.
“What the fuck?” Tay mumbled, rolling over with a creak of the mattress as he fell immediately back to sleep.
“Very funny you guys,” I said. I threw my pillow at Bent, hitting him in the face. “Very fucking funny.”
“I’m telling mom horror stories still give you nightmares,” Ike said as he caught his breath.
“Yeah, you do that, I’m going to sleep,” I muttered, lying back down. “And I am so getting you back,” I shouted as Bent tossed my pillow back and shut off our light. “I’m getting you back so bad,” I whispered, curling up and pressing my eyes closed, hoping I’d be able to get back to sleep.