Chapter Seven - Succumbed #2
In one ravishing motion, Belinda buried her teeth into the squirrel’s stomach.
Blood began to drip down the sides of her lips, and the squirrel screeched in agony.
Belinda’s eyes had turned black again, two vast, empty voids.
She then sucked as much of the velvety, metallic-tasting fluids as she could.
Belinda loved the taste. A fresh, living organism.
“Can’t beat a la carte,” she thought to herself.
Carefully, Belinda chewed every bit of the squirrels’ insides.
The intestines were chewy, but the liver was exquisitely delicate.
Limp and lifeless, Belinda snapped the squirrels back in half and folded him.
Now looking like a hairy drumstick, she continued to gnaw at the pelt.
The hair didn’t bother her; if anything, it gave it an earthy taste as it tickled the back of her tongue.
The bones were a little too hard, but her jaw crushed each and every single bone until the whole squirrel was gone.
After feasting on her yard visitor, Belinda’s eyes returned to normal, and she made her way back into the house, where her parents waited for her in the living room.
“Honey, we are concerned about you,” Camille began right away.
“Yes, your mom and I talked, and I agree that it’s not normal for you to continue to carry your doll around,” Antonio added.
“Excuse me? What do you know about what is normal? Nothing about our family is normal!” Belinda yelled.
“Look, we want you to give us your doll. We will keep her safe. We promise. This is just for a little while,” Antonio said.
“We can give it back to you if you really want her a few weeks from now,” Camille added.
“Let me do it on my own. I will try to keep her in my room,” Belinda pleaded.
“Okay, we can try it your way first,” Antonio relented.
Belinda’s face felt flushed, and she wanted to leave that conversation. She knew she couldn’t part with her doll because there was a magnetic pull drawing them together.
Later that night, Belinda prepared the marinated pieces of Miss Nancy in a skillet with garlic and onions.
After tossing them in the heat a few times, she added them to corn tortillas and fed them to her parents.
Antonio noticed something strange about the meat’s flavor, but Belinda explained that it was rabbit meat.
They ate dinner but hoped that their daughter would not continue to cook as a hobby.
“A little less seasoning next time, okay, honey.” Antonio said.
“Sure, dad,” she replied.
A few days later, on her walk home from school. Belinda noticed police cars and other marked cars on her street from afar. She knew right away why they were there. As she continued to get closer, she could finally see that they were parked outside Miss Nancy’s house.
She felt uneasy at how quickly they found her; she thought it would take more time. She couldn’t even smell her when she walked past the house earlier that morning. Her curiosity got the best of her, and she approached one of the cops standing by his vehicle taking notes.
“Excuse me, officer, what’s happening?” Belinda asked.
“The resident of this house passed away. I can’t give out more details. I’m sorry,” the cop answered.
She slowly walked away, leaving the cop to finish his notes. He didn’t seem to pay attention to her anyway; she walked past him with ease.
At her house, her parents were staring out the window. Camille had called Antonio to leave work early; he had gotten home around noon. Camille thought it might have been a violent act. Miss Nancy was notorious for making enemies. While her assumptions were correct, Belinda couldn’t say otherwise.
Belinda went to her room, leaving her door cracked open, and dropped her backpack on her bed. She sang softly as she unpacked her homework.
“Pin Pon es un muneco,
Macabro y pálido.
Se lava su carita,
Con sangre y ácido.
Pin Pon se desgarra el pelo,
Invocando un gran llanto,
Aunque se lo arranque todo,
él no para aquí.”
Camille stood outside Belinda’s door, listening to the song. She could have sworn she had heard it before but couldn’t place where. The song made her feel uneasy. She realized that the song was in Spanish; she tried to memorize the lyrics quickly, but Belinda had already moved across the room.
Suddenly, the door swung open, and Belinda’s mother appeared, spying on her through the crack. Belinda’s face tensed with anger as she glared at her mother. Camille watched her, standing there frozen, unsure of what to do next.
“I didn’t mean to… never mind. Can you come downstairs? Your dad and I want to talk to you,” Camille said before walking back downstairs.
Moments later, Belinda made her way back downstairs and noticed her parents back on their usual spots on the couch; their routine annoyed her.
“We wanted to talk about Miss Nancy. As you already know, she passed away,” Camille said.
“How?” Belinda asked.
“Well, they don’t know. But what we do know is that no one broke into her home, and she most likely died of natural causes.
Her window was open, and well, some animals got into the house and ate a lot of the evidence.
We are not worried about someone doing things to people on our street though.
The street is still safe,” Camille continued.
“Is it though?” Belinda asked with a smirk.
“What do you mean?” Antonio asked.
“You don’t think I know about the mansion?” Belinda replied.
“Go to your room!” Antonio yelled back at her, pointing upstairs with his shaking finger.
Belinda ran upstairs, both infuriated and relieved. She wasn’t ready to get caught, not yet at least. She still needed to finish her task. She didn’t have much time.
Meanwhile, downstairs, Camille turned to Antonio to ask him about his Spanish.
“You said that you never learned Spanish, right?” Camille asked.
“Yes, you know this. Why are you asking?” he replied.
“Well, I heard Belinda singing in Spanish. I thought that maybe you might have taught her a lullaby from your childhood,”
“No, I don’t recall any songs from my mother. I was a teen when she died, and I don’t remember much of her, really. It’s been such a long time ago. Maybe she learned it at school; I wouldn’t sweat it. Kids would do anything to impress their peers. I know that too well.”
Antonio grew silent as he thought of his words and what his daughter said earlier. It burned his soul to think of what she could possibly know of his past. He had moved on, so the rest of the world should too.