CALVIN

fifty-three: the sex

"Electric chair."

"No."

"Not electric, then." pause. "Spikes."

"No."

Nikita looked flustered. He clicked the next slide on the PowerPoint, which showed a medieval drawing of a naked figure being split in half by a Spanish Donkey.

"Jesus fucking Christ, Nikita."

"Harmless suggestion!" he insisted. "We need to look at all our options."

"How is medieval torture even an option?"

"You would not last in the gulag," he muttered.

The seven of us were sitting in the house 19 living room. A "family meeting", Ehsan called it. "We need a plan to exact revenge," Nikita had said. "On Marc and Neal, those little cunts."

On the next slide was a graphic picture of a person being drawn and quartered, guts spilling out. "Nikita!"

"You're a sick man," said Jesus, shaking his head.

"Okay! Sorry! But just so you know, Elias, I know a guy from Bulgaria who has these horses - "

"Okay," fed up, Leon stood and closed Nikita's laptop for him. The projector image on the wall went blue. "I have an idea: why don't we let this thing run its course. Sound good?"

"Wait, so, Marc points a gun at Elias and all we do is let it run its course?" Nikita looked flabbergasted. "Am I the only one here putting effort into our vengeance?"

Pat grabbed his cup of oolong tea off the coffee table. "Why are you talking like a supervillain?"

"We already got vengeance," I said, to mediate. "I hospitalised Neal. Remember?"

Nikita pointed at me. "Elias is the only one here taking this seriously. I'm proud of you, my boy."

"And Marc's been keeping a disturbingly low profile," said Leon. "Viktor hasn't bought off him in weeks. Apparently he's not really selling, anymore."

"Either way," Pat sipped his tea loudly, "has it ever occurred to you guys that Marc is just a pawn in his mum's game? You guys think a seventeen-year-old kid runs that drug empire, or the club? You think it was him who bought the gun and hired the getaway driver?"

"So, what? We should pity the bastard?" - Nikita.

"Well, no. But I don't think he's the worst thing we're dealing with here. He may have pointed that gun at Elias but he didn't shoot. In fact, the more I think about it the more it seems like he saved Elias."

Nikita scoffed in denial.

"There were guys waiting in the boat. I mean, haven't any of you watched Harry Potter? When Draco couldn't kill Dumbledore it had to be Snape. What if that's what would have happened if Marc hadn't pushed you in the lake? Someone from the boat might have been aiming right at you."

I had a prickly sense of realisation. That feeling of having the carpet being pulled from under your feet. Standing on nothing but air, waiting to fall. My perspective on that particular situation shifted so drastically I had motion sickness.

Nikita crossed his arms over his chest, like a difficult toddler. "I still want him dead."

"Kill him, then," suggested Denis. "I dare you."

"Nobody is killing anybody," Leon cut in. "I just want to know what's happening to Neal. Because it's absolutely mind-blowing that he's still allowed to walk this campus freely like nothing's happened."