Chapter Eight #3
His eyes are broad, so round that I can see the bright whites and red blood vessels. He doesn’t blink. He doesn’t move. Tears gather, knowing his life is over, and the mourning drips down his cheeks.
“Let me see what you fear, Ricky.”
He shakes his head, his subconscious begging to be freed. He is now in the shackles of my evil, and he will never have the privilege to feel a woman’s softness again.
Even a monster like me, brutal and unrelenting, appreciates the delicate skin of a woman.
The room darkens with the nightmare leaving my body, eating away all traces of light that slip through any nooks and crannies of the house, sinking us into a void he will never escape from.
The only brightness left to see is the whites of those eyes I’m about to invade. Prying his mouth open with a root, the shadow slips down his throat as if he is about to be possessed by a demon.
For all I know, he is. I don’t know what I am. I can only define myself by what I see in the mirror and how I feel. I don’t know what actually created me. Yes, DNA, but where was this DNA taken?
I don’t know, and I don’t care to know.
I am who I am, regardless of the origin where I was created.
The moons of his eyes drift to an endless, empty galaxy, one where stars can’t be born or seen. Ill intent begins to drip down his cheeks, unknowingly getting lost in the part of his mind that will lead to his death.
Falling into his mind, the roots crack and crinkle around me from reality, sinking their way into the nightmare.
I land in the middle of an old home, one that reeks of nostalgia paired with bad memories and infrequent laughter.
Everything seems still. No one is home. Dust drifts in the air, swaying through the rays of light pouring in the windows.
I drag my finger across the old box TV, layers of embedded memories sticking to my skin.
I can almost taste the hatred that was born in this house.
Taking a step forward, something crunches under my boot, shattering easily under my weight. Grunting, I bend down and pick up a broken picture frame. Ricky is in this photo, surrounded by two people who should have loved him more than anything in the world.
They didn’t.
And neither parent is smiling. I know all too well what life with abusive parents is like—was like.
Staring at the photo again, I analyze it like a story. I’ve never been too smart. I dropped out of community college, uncaring about the words in books, but I’ve always been great at reading a room or a person.
The mother looks tired and afraid with dark circles under her eyes. The father is stern, eyes tightened into slits with anger and annoyance. One of his hands is clutched on his wife’s shoulder while the other is on the child—Ricky. The man’s knuckles are white from the grip.
I can sense the evil, nearly tasting it from how it births itself from the walls. My veins awaken, the roots swirling along my limbs as if they recognize the sinister being that was once here.
Likeness knows likeness.
This house has been frozen in time, an icy tundra abandoned and left to be forgotten, like bad memories that taint the soul.
Two mugs sit on the coffee table, more dust building around them. One has a light pink shade of lipstick on the rim, while the other is nestled by a newspaper.
Whimpers come from down the hall that has me turning my head, my eyes narrowing down the darkened tunnel. My claws lengthen, dragging across the leather of the recliner.
Peeking into the kitchen, dishes fill the sink while drops of blood are on the floor. Falling to all fours, I scurry to the red dots, close my eyes, and inhale the scent. Evil lives within these blood drops.
I growl, loving how good it smells. My nightmare is happy being surrounded by darkness and pure violence.
Opening my eyes, there’s a larger puddle of blood under the dining room chair. A man sits in that chair. I can tell by the loose fit of his pants and the laced boots on his feet. Pushing myself onto my feet, I cock my head, trying to understand what I’m seeing.
It’s the same man from the photo. His head is jerked back, his hands on either side of an empty plate. Blurring to him, my fingers trace the bullet wound between his eyes.
The sound of whimpers catches my attention again, and I follow them out of the kitchen. I stand at the beginning of the hallway, eyeing four doors that are closed.
“Ricky, Ricky, Ricky,” I tsk with annoyance.
I dislike it when nightmares get too complicated. They are supposed to be simple. A simple tactic to instill fear, but it seems Ricky is a complicated case.
Sighing in boredom, I swing the first door on the left open, seeing a woman sobbing in a rocking chair in the corner. She’s holding a shotgun. in her hands, her mascara stains black lines down her face as she sobs.
Ricky can’t be more than fifteen as he screams at her, sobbing to the point that drool drips down his chin as he is handcuffed to the radiator. He’s too skinny, and he has two black eyes with handprint bruises on his throat.
“I’m sorry, Ricky.”
It’s the last thing she says before placing the barrel under her chin and pulling the trigger. Her brains splatter against the wall, painting it as if it were an empty canvas.
Closing the door, I eye the room across the hall, excited to see what waits for me. The nightmare within me screeches with joy, soaking in all the pain and suffering that is held within this home.
Such a sweet little treat for a wicked monster.
Grabbing the doorknob, I swing the door open to see Ricky being suffocated by his father. Two hands are wrapped around his throat while his father screams and yells at him.
“I’ll skin you! Do you hear me? I’ll skin you and hang you up like a piece of fucking meat if you ever talk back to me again. Your mother is mine to do with as I please. She’s my wife. Do you understand me?”
I close the door, getting bored with how long it is taking to get to adult Ricky. I have a mate to be infinitely curious about, following her, learning all of her moves, the way she walks and talks.
My everlasting obsession starts and begins with her.
Speeding to another door, I pause when it begins to snow again, something I find curious. Opening my palm, I’m mesmerized by how softly it drifts into my massive palm. It stays for a moment, the chill momentary before it melts into a droplet of water.
Another falls, then another, cascading to the floor until it begins to stick. With each caress of a snowflake upon my skin, split seconds of laughter, sobs, screams, pain, and glass shattering, tease my ears.
Reaching for the third doorknob, snow is piled on the curve of the metal. Curling my lip in annoyance, I bend my head down and ram my horn through the door.
Adult Ricky is hanging by his shirt, lifted onto a hook just like his father promised. Ricky, the rapist, is crying, hands and feet bound, and the ghost of his father stands in front of him.
I step in, the man who caused Ricky to turn into a monster of his own, turns to look at me before vanishing into thin air.
A blade is left on the top of the dresser, a hint of blood on the silver. Staring at Ricky’s arms, I see his father has already started to deliver on the promise he made.
Pieces of skin are on the floor, blood running down his slender arms.
“Please,” Ricky begs like the others I’ve killed.
I bet he hopes to reach compassion or the humanity inside me, not knowing that the only humanity I hold is for Lula.
Everyone else can be damned for all I care. The world could burn, and souls could scream, people could reach for me to save them, but I’d step on their hands and break their bones to save Lula. Every person is a stepping stone to get to her, nothing more.
Their lives are useless to me. Nothing but an annoyance for me to scare so I can feed myself. They are food, and Lula is water, the liquid I need to wash them down with.
“Please, get me down. He’ll be back.”
Turning my head, I look at him like a confused animal, trying my best to understand why he thinks I care, when I remember he thinks there are others out there who do care to save his life.
He doesn’t remember that I am in control of his next heartbeat, and he will hang on the hook his father placed him on until his body rots and his bones clatter to the floor.
“He won’t be back,” I state, ignoring the blade that only a weaker man has to use.
I drag my claws across the dresser as I step closer to Ricky, his shirt soaked in sweat and tears.
His gaze finally looks up at me from focusing on the floor, eyes widening when he sees the monster that I am.
“No. No. Get me down! Get me down! Oh, god. I’m sorry. Please, don’t kill me.”
Digging all five nails into his chest, I rip his skin, growling in pleasure when his screams cause my ears to ring.
“Being skinned alive is your worst fear because your daddy threatened you?”
He continues to scream at the top of his lungs as I use his body like pottery being sculpted. Digging my claw under his skin, I cut away at the tissue between the muscle and flesh.
I peel away the first layer of skin, dropping it onto the floor by my feet, and it lands with a splat.
“You have no idea what I went through in this house!” he roars, struggling against his restraints.
Wrapping a hand around his throat to keep him still, I lean forward until our noses touch.
“I don’t care what you went through in this house.
Your memories of being a disappointed and hurt boy do not hurt me.
I do not feel sympathy for you. I might be a monster, but you are an untamed animal who needs to be put down.
My violence”—I roar, slashing my claws across his stomach, then begin to cut away at his body again—“has rules.”
His eyes burn with malice, even in the hands of death, his father shines in his irises.
“I’d do it all over again,” he seethes. “I regret nothing. They deserved every bit of what I gave them.”
I know I’m a beast built to spill blood. I know what I do to Lula people would question, but they need to mind their fucking business because they don’t know that she fucking loves what I do to her—what I will do.
“And you deserve every moment of your skin being cut from your body.” I slice him again, peeling the biggest piece of flesh off his stomach.
He lurches, puking all over my boots.
I liked these boots.
Locking eyes with him before they roll to the back of his head in unconsciousness, I demand, “No matter the pain, you are not allowed to pass out.”
“What are you doing to me?”
A dark chuckle echoes in the chamber of his mind.
“I think the question is, what won’t I do to you?” I toss another flap of flesh by my feet, relishing in the beauty of the muscular skeletal system peeking through the vulnerable raw spots on his body.
Sinking my claws into high thigh, I snarl, “Scream for me.”
The pitches range from high to low, an orchestra of pain just for me.
So beautiful.
So terrible.
So remarkable how death can have a song of its own.
And it’s all my doing.