Everybody in this town feared the lady in black. Wearing nothing but black, she was said to wander around the streets starting 6 P.M. until the sun rises the next morning. She was said to be a myth by outsiders but the town knew better not to question the lady's existence.
Her appearance has three different versions and varies to who you asked her about. The first one, she would always be seen wearing a black hood. She was swift as well as you could only see her pass by you like a blur.
The second one, she was said to be a beautiful, young lady who likes wearing a long black gown and a pair of high heels. When a person hears a sudden click-clacking of heels out of nowhere, it is said to be a signal that the lady in black is within the area.
The third and final variation was like a mixture of the first two versions. The lady in black wears a black hood and underneath it, she'll be wearing a black gown. The presence of her heels is also said in this version. She's also described as a beautiful, young girl.
Despite the three variations of her appearance, it is said that they all have three things in common: she likes wearing black, she likes killing people who show up wearing vivid colors, and she likes applying lipstick after killing her victims.
About the reason why she does this, folks say that she was once a kind person with a heart full of purity and innocence. That was until several people accused her of being a witch due to her beauty. She was said to be aging backwards and due to that, people began speculating about her true nature. They said she was only putting up a façade of kindness and had different selfish intentions to her victims.
The lady in black was ostracized at the town. Everybody was scared of her. She was vicious, cunning, selfish, and merciless. That was what they said she was according to firsthand reports of her supposed-to-be victims.
One said that they were just walking home after a tiring day from work. He wore a vibrant blue shirt and was whistling happily as he passed by an alley. He saw a swift movement from his left but shrugged it off, thinking it was just an illusion and it was just a result of being tired. But it happened again, and this time, the movement was from his right. He stopped walking and looked in front of him. He saw the lady in black, full of beauty but with a menacing and sadistic smile on her lips as she held a knife with her hands. The man described her eyes as dull and almost lifeless.
He ran away from her as fast as his feet could run the moment he set his eyes on her. The good thing about this encounter was that the lady in black didn't bother chasing him at all.
Many encounters resurfaced after that. Others were real and others were just made up. Nobody knew what was real anymore with the encounters. People had a hard time knowing the difference between the real encounters and the fake ones. But one thing remained true for them.
The lady in black was, indeed, real.
Little did people know though, I knew the lady in black.
She was beautiful but she despised her features. People did call her beautiful, but her family called her ugly. She was a lonely person, being first avoided by her family because they believed she was insane for liking lipsticks and applying them everyday.
She wasn't insane. She just needed help and was afraid to ask because people were already starting to refer her as "crazy." She had no one with her, not even a friend nor a sibling. She didn't know how to express her emotions because people would call her different names. She knew better that rumors spread like wildfire over the whole town.
When she was ostracized by everyone, she started to cover herself with black, not because she liked it, but because she tried to cover the scars she made herself. For every wound on every part of her body lies every night and day that she was haunted by the monsters that accompanied her instead. Those monsters that she wanted to leave her alone but didn't.
Because of the things that were happening to her, she started feeling like she was slowly going insane. She started to develop weird habits to prevent her from going completely crazy like applying lipstick every minute. She would often catch herself laughing sadistically at her reflection at the mirror. She would also feel herself staring into space.
She never left her secluded place in the town. The claims of her being seen were not true and were just people creating more and more stories about her. When would people stop doing this? she once thought. But reality was cruel because people would never. People liked doing this. They were the vicious, cunning, selfish, and merciless. They killed her. They killed her once colored life. They turned her whole world into a monotone world of insanity.
They drove her mad.
Pitiful. Afraid. Anguished. Helpless. Alone. That's the real lady in black.
Now that I've told you her story, please dear traveller, excuse me for I have to go. I need to apply my red lipstick again. Talking has made my lips dry and maybe it has turned it pale!
Why do I know all of this? Oh, haven't you realized yet? Oh, no worries! You aren't the only one! I know you wouldn't believe me as well!
But this I ask you, remember me and my story, dear traveler. The next time someone asked you about me and the insanity I'm going through tell them one thing.
They drove me mad.
