Adrian placed his hands on his laps, tapping rhythmically on them and humming a song he happened to remember at the time. The six year old was too short to see over the dashboard without straining and had decided to sit back and enjoy the ride instead.
"What are you doing, my man?" Larger hands covered his right hand and he looked up towards the driver, greeted by his father's warm smile.
"It's the song I want to sing for Mom tonight," he smiled. "I want to sing her to sleep."
"What about me?" His father asked.
"No way!" He laughed. "You'll have to bribe me first."
"A bribe... ?" He trailed off, rubbing his chin slowly with the hand he had placed on Adrian's lap. "What do you want?"
"Let me see..." Adrian looked out the window, pretending to think even though he knew exactly what he wanted as a bribe.
"I know, I want a roaming robot!"
"What's that?" He asked, sparing him a glance.
"It's a small robot that can move around on its own. It could come in form of any animal, it could also come as a human. It's neither too big nor too small, so it wouldn't disturb you much. I'm not sure if it has a remote control. But it's cool, I like it."
Adrian crossed his fingers after telling that to his father, wishing that the next words out of his mouth wouldn't be him declining his request. He had wanted the roaming robot since the first time he saw it with Elijah, his classmate. Elijah had a rich dad, Adrian didn't. He had meticulously planned his approach, knowing how hard it must be for his father to say no to him every single time he asked for a toy.
"Hm..."
Adrian noticed the shift in his father's mood. He was no longer smiling as brightly as he had when they had started the ride. His eyes bore the all too familiar far away look they had whenever he was going to say no. He sank into his chair, taking that as his answer.
"How much does it cost?"
He leaned out of his chair in a flash. "It's just-"
"My life?"
When he turned his head, the person sitting in the driver's seat was no longer his father. It was a dead man. His eyes were open, the eyeballs popping out and hanging by what looked like veins that could barely hold anything.
Adrian shifted in his chair, moving towards the direction of the door.
"Dad... ?"
"You killed me, A. It was you, it was all you!"
His father's mouth tore all the way to the back of his head as he screamed, his jaw falling to join the rest of his decomposing body.
The scenery seemed to have changed. They were no longer in the car, instead they were in a dark space with light shining on both of them, they were still seated in car seats with their seatbelts tightly fastened.
Adrian began to release himself, but the more he unfastened the belt, the tighter it became, until he could no longer move and was stuck in place.
He had begun to sweat, his heart hammering heavily inside his chest. This is not happening, he thought. It was a dream, but why wasn't he waking up?
His father's body suddenly began to swell. Then it burst, the gross remains falling all over Adrian's body.
It took him a second to come back from his initial shock , and when he did, he screamed.