sandra

A small fiction I wrote back in July.

Basile Lebret
7 min readJan 21, 2021
A rock contains two ponds in an autumn forest.
Courtesy of TeamLamboley

what, yeah, no, I’m not following you into that dinner, man, miss, okay, whatever, no, no, I follow nobody, you hear me, no one, you sure, you’d let me take the cheesy fries and stuff, hmm ’kay, can I have some chili fries, then, you see, I had this, ahem, friend, acquaintance, I know a guy is what I’m saying, a hobo guy, always used to say : nuthin is free, you’re being given something, you take it, yeah, I’d take the french fries with that, still not sure why you being all kind and almighty but thanks, ouuuuh, that’s what you want to talk about, that ain’t a pretty subject, tho, and it was a lifetime ago, I mean, I wasn’t there when it happened is all I’m saying, ain’t sure I’m the one you should be talking to, okay, so I wasn’t on the streets back in those days, I mean those were the times before derek left or before quentin hanged hisself in his mother’s garage, still, it was after francys had died, we all knew him, y’see, small town and all, but he ain’t got no part in all of that, we were, wow, we were quite a bunch in those days, eight, I’d say, sure, sometimes we’d be joined by a partner a boyfriend a girlfriend or whatever, but most of the times there was only the eight of us, let see, there was sandra, of course, oscar, josh fo sure, and quentin riding along, add to that sammy and sophie and me and you got the whole bunch, I think, we used to hang around the spot clay had found, strong body, quiet type and now that I think of it he used to hang around with us too, it was he who had discovered the stone circle, in ma head, it was like rocky fingers coming out the ground but I guess my brain’s messy, but still, there was like this stone table we used to sit on in the middle of it, a rock sittin’ on top two small pillars, like stonehenge but smaller, see, we used to joke this shit was built for sacrifices and stuff, the slow stream which ran next to it didn’t help, though, I mean, quentin had read this book, fight club, where it says women used to make their laundry right next to sacrificial altar, which used to be build right next to small streams of water, see, back in the days, so quentin and oscar, they were pretty sure those stones had seen some shit, what, no, no, we never sprayed the damn things, there never was any art student in the crew, well, not through those times anyway, used to be a guy named sebastian, sad fucker used to talk to aliens via his phone, ended up in the loony bin, my parents, my parents, they didn’t have the money, for the internment, y’see, and they were fuckin’ tired of me stealing and, their money and shoes and perfume, to try and buy some heroin, but that ain’t the point, right, so, yeah, sandra, she used to date josh back in those days, called her rachel for some time but that nickname didn’t stick, it was a friends thing, you see, she dated him for a little over a year, a year and a half top, see, josh becoming an adult, he had begun to work, to dress sharply and shit, and the truth is, all through high school, this douche had been obsessed with sandra, I remember him, driving blind drunk during prom night, all covered in vomit, yelling and screaming that he was gonna end his fucking life ’cause sandra had gone to prom with another guy, named robert, and that the guy was surely fucking her this very night, josh’s words, not mine, dude was so obsessed but those were the days, I mean, clay had stalked a girl more than once, even quentin once stayed three nights in a row underneath his ex’s porch asking her to get him back and shit, poor fellow had to be taken in by the cops, I swear, still that’s how it was done in those days, y’see, we knew of this girl right, dora, she once sucked an entire party just to piss off her ex, stoubid shit like that, you know, but josh, josh was on another level, man, you see, sandra, she dated this guy robert all through high school but I guess something happened during the holiday or some shit, well, after that you’d turned up almost every time at sandra’s parents’ house and you’d find josh, which was kind of crazy ’cause the guy had a job at the time, still, it was as if every minute of every second off from work the guy had to be near sandra, quentin AND Oscar both complained to me about it, it was like water eroding a rock, you see, like sandra didn’t want him but he would tire her in the long run, kind of, and truth is, he eventually did, dear god were they a shitty couple, but at least with them being with us, we got to see sammy, you see, sophie, sammy’s girlfriend, she really didn’t like to hang around with us when sandra wasn’t there, I mean, I think she had a problem with quentin and josh, and I know she knew josh from before she started dating sammy, she let that slip once, at the famous blowjob party, but I guess with josh being all over sandra and shit, she kinda felt safe, I don’t know, man, I’m not a girl, y’see, truth is, those were the best days ‘fore sandra dumped him, it all went to the shitter after that, see, before that they both used to talk about sex, so much, and then yell at one another, but after that, wow, they fought, I mean really fought, at least three times, three times I saw, I mean, people used to hang around with their heads down when their love story was over, ’cause everybody knew, each evening would have its fair share of shit and yell, and scratching and stuff, but you see, sandra, I guess she took a liking to us, and to angie, she was quentin’s girlfriend at the time, and to sophie, if she ever thought josh could hurt her, no, I think not, she just liked the company, the crew, and with her problems with her mom at the time, she sure deserved a little time off, if I remember when she disappeared, sure, I even recall her mom calling me in the middle of the night, crying and shit, she found my phone number in her daughter’s jeans, thought I might help, I might, t’was clay who found the blood on the stone table, and we knew this were bad news, there, there was so much blood, you wouldn’t believe it, they didn’t find the body, you see, but blood in our usual hanging spot, and then we all got talked to by the cops, and we all searched for a body, but there was no body to be found, sandra, she had just vanished, tis all, still she had left behind this big pool of scarlet liquid, I liked her, you know, not in a romantic manner, but I still think she was a funny girl, wouldn’t hurt nobody, I didn’t find her as beautiful as josh said she was, but she kinda was family, y’know, truth is, after this shit my parents never looked at me the same and, I mean, yeah, I may have hit my little sister every once in a while but I wouldn’t hurt no girl, you know what I mean, we have to leave now, I know my fragrance tend to offend customers, you good, you’re not cold or anything, where were we, yeah, ok, see, when sandra disappeared, the cops, they would not let josh off the hook and it became worse after quentin offed himself, truth is, there was no traces of sandra in their respective cars, which, I might say, is weird, considering how much they used to fuck, with josh I mean, and then quentin hung himself just like francys had done back in the days, and I’m still sure this idiot took the idea from him, so there was no sandra, no quentin left, is all, josh never went to trial, truth, there was a problem with the paper work or I don’t know what, deputies had raided his house before they got a warrant from the prosecutor’s office or some shit, I don’t know, what I do know is that oscar started hanging with sammy and sophie way more often, and then he went on to college, they both still live here, though, if you wanna talk to ’em, they tend to get me some food every once in a while, josh, josh he someday had this big amount of money poured into his bank account or something, it was like Sandra disappeared and BAM, error of the bank in your favour, ka-ching, I take it that’s how he got a lawyer able to get him out of his shithole, I don’t know, as for the spot, well, no, I can’t show it to you, you see, they build over it, anyway someone had destroyed the altar waaay before the construction began but still, sometimes, I wonder, you know, d’you think a day will come when a dude’s gonna rock his girl a little too hard, maybe she’ll fall and hit her head on the living room table or something, right on the spot where the altar, and the blood, used to lay, d’you think this guy’s gonna escape justice, too, d’you think he’s gonna get some money out of it, maybe get lucky and some money will appear on his bank account, ka-ching, bank error in you favour, haha, I don’t know, my brain gets weird sometimes like that but still, you should talk to clay, saw him fairly recently, told me josh’s wife had those saddest eyes, you see, you should talk to him, plus, he’s the one who actually found the body is all I’m sayin’

Next week we will be talking about the survival horror game everyone forgot White Night.

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Basile Lebret

I write about the history of artmaking, I don’t do reviews.