‘It changes if it’s above the knee.’

Eugene listened to his cousin John explain.

‘It changes!’ John insisted loudly, waving the messy papers in front of his face. ‘It’s different. They pay more if it’s all of the leg. Up to here.’ And he hit the highest part of his thigh with his wrist.

Eugene was quiet, his wide blank eyes peering through the thick, scratched lenses of his horn rimmed spectacles. His cousin sprang up and ushered him to follow him out of the barn. They crossed the field by the chicken coop and entered the tool shed.

‘This was bloody expensive,’ John muttered in his hoarse voice, as he pulled out a brand new chain saw from a black bag, knocking down a load of rusty tools as he did so. Eugene observed him without uttering a word, in his usual blank expression.

As John fiddled with the pull handle and throttle control, Eugene dared a sentence in his faint high pitched voice.

‘Are we going to talk to the group about this?’

His cousin lashed out, ‘I don’t want to tell them anything! They all think they’re so good at everything. Then they don’t dare do anything.’

Eugene thought up a reply, but he didn’t say it out loud.

He wanted to remind his cousin why they had started the group, but then he just kept quiet and stared at the floor. He would just ignore all of their calls from now on. His cousin rarely changed his mind. That was the end of that. He wouldn’t go to the next meeting.

‘I’m working Friday night at the disco, so we do this on Saturday.’

The plastic kitchen table wobbled. John showed Eugene the insurance policy contract and beat his finger repeatedly on the paragraphs written in very small print. Eugene squinted, he could hardly make out the words.

‘I’m the one who worked for an insurance. They have no idea how these things go. I do.’

Then he showed him pictures of prosthetics from a handful of brochures. Eugene observed the ancient looking apparatus. Metal, mechanical legs with plastic parts fitted according to the kind of wound. ‘These ones cost a bit less and are easier to use,’ he said pointing at one of the models.

One hundred thousand euros, Eugene thought to himself. And John wouldn’t have to share any of it with the others. It was fair, I mean, in the end it was his leg. And he had bought the saw. His cousin was doing things. The others never did anything. All they did was complain. They just made lists of problems or of things that were impossible because of this, because of that, and for this reason you couldn’t do this, or you shouldn’t do that. Useless. He wished he had never called on the group. He would help his cousin by himself. His cousin deserved his help. And the others would be kept out of this. John worked hard at the disco pub at the doors. Every Friday. Dealing with dodgy, pushy people all the time. Good thing he was so tall.

On that Saturday Eugene came to the barn. John had a fat rope with him and showed him an empty bottle of a liquor he said he had taken from the bar the previous night. ‘I had breakfast with this,’ he laughed, throwing the bottle behind the guardrail. Then he handed the big heavy bag to Eugene and disappeared in the barn.

A massive thud and the crashing of a bunch of objects on the floor. As he overturned some of the vases and shelves he called to Eugene, ‘it needs to look like they came in and made a mess of things!’

After a couple of minutes they drove off to the furthest field in Eugene’s rickety car.

‘When we’ve finished, you leave the car here and go away on foot, then you throw the saw in the river, next to the pilons.’

‘That’s a pity,’ Eugene thought. ‘It’s brand new.’

John told him how to park the car, perpendicular to the dirt road. He insisted he leave the doors open. Then the two moved into the orchard.

In the central clearing, out of sight, John sat on the floor and began tying the rope around his thigh. ‘This needs to be tight,’ he said.

‘By the way, do you have your phone with you?’ Eugene asked him.

‘Of course I have my phone,’ John exclaimed, irritated.

Then he extended his leg and pushed Eugene’s knee onto his shin. The latter held the chain saw in his arms, in a slightly awkward position. His lean body clasping the huge device, next to his cousin’s corpulent form, an almost comical contrast. Eugene realized he had never used one of those before, and held it as if it was an infant he was trying to calm down.

‘Are you going to keep your jeans on?’ he then said, hesitating.

‘Of course! I can’t put them back on afterwards...’

‘Ok, are you ready?’

The sound of the chain saw motor ripped through the air like a massive wave engulfing the whole valley in an instant.

Eugene knew the jeans were not a good idea. He knew it. Why would his cousin never listen? He never ever took him seriously. But he should. The fabric of the jeans made a huge mess. The saw had trouble cutting through them and got stuck. Eugene had a hard time and he kept having to stop and start, as the mangled flesh kept twisting and tying itself back into the filaments of fabric.

After a minute or so Eugene caught sight of John’s face. It was twisted into such a grimace he could barely recognize him. He couldn’t hear any other sound but the motor screaming in his ears, disintegrating his ear drums. John’s tongue sticked out of his mouth like a strange eyeless fish, almost white, his teeth digging into it, almost cutting it clean off. Eugene thought it was quite an amusing expression. Though he could barely see, his glasses were covered in a dark reddish slime.

Getting through the bone and keeping John’s leg still at the same time was the difficult part. The saw kept getting stuck again and he had to give repeated blows. Eventually he managed to cut through the whole thigh, the leg wobbled and assumed an unnatural position and Eugene knew it was done.

John’s huge body was twisted into a knot now. A croaking sound emanated from his throat and he was drooling a brownish substance. Eugene got up quickly the moment he noticed John’s hand clasping his phone. His cousin would soon call the police. That was the idea. And he would tell them someone had attacked him. Perfect.

He gave him a quick wave and rushed off as fast as he could through the fields. Not easy walking through the fallow field, it took him way more than he expected. His feet kept sank into the ground, the saw was heavy, and he kept on scratching his ankles against the lumps of dried soil.

Eventually, he reached the nearby asphalt road. Cars slowed down when passing him. He was covered from head to toe in a brownish black sticky membrane, a mixture of dirt, blood, sweat, bits of skin and flesh which had dried up on his skin in the sun. He must be looking very bizarre, he thought to himself, with a smile.

At the pilons, after a moment’s hesitation, he chucked the saw in the river. As it disappeared in the mud he felt relieved. Everything had worked. Things were good. He was proud he had helped his cousin. Not like the ridiculous secret club members who were always undermining.

‘There,’ he thought as he heard the sirens in the distance, ’John has called them, they’re going to pick him up and take him to the hospital.’ He smiled to himself thinking of the one hundred thousand from the insurance.

John died a few minutes later from massive hemorrhages from the femoral artery. His cousin was arrested and shortly after, imprisoned.