2. Kennedy #2
Obviously not suggesting you go and hook up with a real-life serial killer, or anything like that.
Always be safe! But yeah, I really think exploring your fantasies could help you deal with the shame.
It really is an absolute scourge on your mental state, and it might never go away, but it can definitely lessen.
Velvet_Thread: Shame often lies to you. It tells you you’re broken when you’re actually adapting. If your thoughts were hurting other people, that would be one thing… but they’re just thoughts. Let them be. Don’t fight them so hard. You’re not defined by them.
FlorenceAtNight: You’re carrying guilt that doesn’t belong to you. You didn’t choose what happened to your father. You didn’t choose how your brain coped with it. But you are choosing to look at it with honesty. I think that’s brave. Keep doing that. It will help. Avoidance never helped anyone!
Curiosity tugged at me, and I clicked on Timtam77’s username. There was a short bio : Trauma survivor. Writer of morally gray filth. Fan of scream queens, knives, and complicated catharsis.
And beneath that: links.
I hesitated, then clicked the one labeled ‘My Scream-Inspired Fics (NSFW AF)’.
My pulse raced as I scrolled through the summaries of the stories. Some were short, teasing, just a line or two. Some were tagged with warnings. Others had huge comment sections with replies like ‘this is sick and I fucking love it’ or ‘why is this actually so hot?’
I finally opened one called ‘ The Masked One ’; a story told from the perspective of a girl being stalked and toyed with by a Ghostface-type killer.
I started reading… and then I couldn’t stop. It was twisted and erotic in the most horrifying, pulse-spiking way.
My breath went shallow, and something coiled low in my belly, hot and sick and unbearable. My legs tensed. My skin prickled. Then the familiar old voice in my head started up. What the hell is wrong with you? Why are you enjoying this?
Then I remembered what Timtam77 said. Lean into it. Accept and embrace it.
So I didn’t close the tab or force myself to stop. Instead, I leaned into it and let the shame wash over me like hot rain. Let the arousal settle into my skin instead of shoving it down and pretending it wasn’t there.
It didn’t make the guilt vanish, but it loosened its grip a little.
I kept reading.
She hears him before she sees him. A soft, deliberate breath through the modulator. Somewhere behind her. Or above.
“I know you’re awake, sweetheart,” the voice purrs through the darkness. “You always hold your breath when you’re scared.”
She doesn’t move. Can’t. The blanket is a useless shield, but she clutches it anyway, heart hammering like it wants out of her chest.
A floorboard creaks. Then fingers—gloved, confident—wrap around her ankle and drag her away.
She gasps, thrashes, but he’s so much faster. So much stronger. Her body flips easily, dragged down the bed, pinned by the weight of his. The cold press of plastic kisses her cheek as he leans in, mask to skin.
“Don’t pretend you don’t love this, baby girl,” he whispers. “Your body’s been telling me otherwise for days.”
A hand slips under her shirt, slow and possessive. She hates him. She wants him to stop. She also wants him to keep going.
My pulse was racing faster now. When the masked man grabbed the girl’s ankle in the story, I felt like it was actually happening to me. Shame was still rocketing up my spine, but arousal was chasing it, and I was too slow to stop either of them.
By the time the masked man’s hand slid down the girl’s underwear, my own hand was hovering at the waistband of my jeans, fingers trembling.
“No, I can’t do this,” I muttered, finally letting the shame win out again. I yanked my hand away from my pants and closed the laptop.
I waited a beat and took a deep breath. Then I opened it again, unable to resist.
The story hadn’t gone anywhere, and neither had the heat burning low inside me. My heart was still racing, too, and my mouth had gone dry. I pressed the heel of my palm hard against it, like I could smother the desperate need if I physically pushed it down.
Nope. I couldn’t. I liked it way too much.
I curled my knees to my chest and buried my face in them, trying to ignore the insistent throb between my thighs. This was ridiculous. I shouldn’t be feeling like this. Not from something like that . But my body clearly didn’t care about shouldn’t, because I was already soaked.
A shaky breath escaped my lips as I slid my hand beneath the waistband of my pants. I hesitated, just for a second, before my fingers slipped under the lace of my underwear and found the slick heat waiting for them.
God.
I let out a broken gasp and leaned back against the pillows, legs parting instinctively. My middle finger circled my clit, slow and trembling, and images from the story flared behind my closed eyes.
This time, I wasn’t just reading Timtam’s story. I was in it.
I was the one pinned to the wall by the masked killer, his gloved hand wrapped tightly around my throat as he told me how sweet I tasted and how good I looked begging him not to hurt me…
only to moan when he did. He didn’t stop.
He didn’t even slow down. He knew exactly what I needed, even if I was too afraid to admit it.
Even if I was still pretending I hated it.
His knife scraped down my chest, the threat of it a dark tease. Then he shoved my panties to the side, not even bothering to take them off as he fucked me against the cold wall, brutal and unrelenting.
“You love being used by the villain, don’t you, baby girl?” he snarled against my ear. “You love knowing he could kill you, but he won’t. Not yet. Not until he’s ruined you.”
I whimpered as my fingers worked faster, chasing the edge. Shame surged up again, hot and punishing, but I didn’t push it away this time. I let it live in me; let it twist into pleasure.
When I came, it was sudden and violent, a wave crashing through me so hard I had to bite the inside of my cheek to stop myself from screaming and freaking out my neighbors.
I lay there for a moment, dazed and panting, one arm thrown over my eyes. Then I finally sat up and closed my laptop. My heart was still racing, and my skin was still tingling, but the shame hadn’t settled quite as deep this time. It was still there, but something was a little different now.
Maybe it was the way Timtam77 had framed her advice. Maybe it was the fact that I knew I wasn’t alone now; that there were a lot of people out there who truly got it. People who didn’t recoil from my story or judge me for it.
I still wasn’t fixed, if that was even possible, but for the first time in what seemed like forever, I felt a flicker of relief.
I glanced at the clock. 9:03 PM.
Shit. Freya.
I grabbed my phone and hit dial on FaceTime, and she picked up right away. “Ken! I was just about to call you,” she said, excitement bubbling in her voice. “I’ve got some amazing news about the show!”
I straightened up, trying to match her energy even though a knot was tightening in my stomach. “That’s awesome,” I said, forcing a smile. “But… I was actually calling because I might have some bad news about it. So I guess we’re balancing each other out.”
“Okay, you go first, then. Get the bad news out of the way.”
“I got an email from a detective called Malachi Sieger. He wants me to see him on Monday to discuss our podcast.”
“Sieger… that name sounds really familiar,” Freya mused. “Did he work on your dad’s case?”
“No, apparently he’s new in town.”
“Oh! I know why the name’s so familiar. Remember my parents’ old house on Monterrey Drive?”
“Yup.”
“The old couple who lived next door were called the Siegers,” she said. She paused, letting out a short sigh. “God, I always felt so sorry for them.”
“How come?”
“Their daughter and her husband died in some sort of accident years ago, and she was their only child. I’ve always thought it’s so sad to outlive your own kid,” she said.
She blew out another sigh and went on. “Anyway, sorry for the totally morbid tangent. This detective… did he say anything else in the email? Like, why he wants to talk about the podcast?”
“No, he was very vague.”
Freya was silent for a few seconds. “Well… it might not be a bad thing,” she finally said, though her tentative tone gave away her concern. “I’ve triple-checked everything, and in the episodes we’ve recorded so far, we haven’t said anything that could get us in trouble.”
I nodded slowly. “I’m really hoping it’s nothing. But yeah, I figured I needed to tell you ASAP just in case.”
“I’m sure it’ll be fine.” She sounded a little brighter now. “Anyway… my news is seriously amazing.”
“What is it?”
“The teaser episode we put out… it’s blowing up. Like, full-on viral, even though we haven’t released any proper episodes yet.”
I blinked. “Wait… what? How?”
“Reddit, babe,” she said. “TrueCrimeJunkie subreddit. A popular user posted a link, and now people are talking, commenting, and sharing like crazy.”
“How viral are we talking?”
“Like… top of the subreddit. Hundreds of thousands of upvotes. And get this. I’ve already gotten three emails about advertising spots,” she said.
“I know you aren’t big on the monetization idea because you think it feels exploitative, but let’s face it: you still haven’t found a new job because this economy fucking sucks , my job also sucks, and we still owe Dana for letting us use her studio and equipment.
And I know my cousin said he didn’t mind designing and maintaining our website for us for free, but with all the attention we’re getting now, I feel like we should pay him something for his services. ”
I nodded slowly. “That’s a fair point.”
“But anyway… we might not even need the ads in the end.”
“Why not?”
“Because,” Freya said, drawing the word out with dramatic flair, “we also got a sponsorship offer.”
My brows rose. “What?”