The Patron Saint of Monsters

Chapter Eight Part One

Oleander was in the middle of a bubble bath, she had begun to take them more frequently as Trent did not much care for being in the bathroom. He had once said that seeing the sink not covered with blood felt wrong, a statement that had stuck with Oleander ever since. Oleander had only ceased to take baths when she was younger because the idea of sitting in the bucket of sullied water sickened her, but now she took them after her showers, they were peaceful and she wanted time to think without being under Trent’s intense gaze. She found herself unable to sit still when she could feel his smoldering brown eyes burning her skin, the singe was almost constant.

Next to her bathtub sat a cup of tea and teacup that was transformed into an ashtray. She softly sang along to the music she was playing in the background, a mix of angry riot girls from the nineties and a more current band that was comprised entirely of sad love sick boys, one crooning over the others too loud instruments. The boy was singing about stalking a girl due to a heartbreak induced insanity, Oleander would never admit it, but the slightly unstable girl that she secretly was, lived for things like that. She wasn’t sure why, but she could not help but think that if it was not at least semi-psychotic then it wasn’t really love.

That was the problem with Ian she thought to herself. Things were easy with her and fairly pleasant but he didn’t make her heart race nor her blood boil. His kisses didn’t kill her that she ached for them too, the way she imagined Trent’s would. She shivered despite the overly warm water, she hated herself for thinking about Trent that way. She was certain that it implied all sorts of damaged things about her. She felt as though her feelings towards Trent took up so much of her body that there was barely any room for her organs to function. No space for lungs to expand with air and no place for her heart to beat.

She reached a sudsy arm out of the tub and rubbed her hand on her soft fluffy black towel, drying it off so that she could light another cigarette. She stuck the stick between her lips and leaned back with a sigh. She had two pieces of incense burning on the sink and the small window open, she only took such precautions out of habit, she now knew that her parents did not care enough to mention her deadly habit, had they noticed. She blew out a ring of smoke, watching as it quickly expanded before dissipating. Oleander thinks that there is something wrong with her, the thing that is not right with her is, thankfully, not as major as whatever wrongness in plaguing Rebecca. Oleander likes to use her time of bathtub sanctuary to think about all the things that she felt were wrong with her and her peculiar  life. When she had finished her cigarette a spider caught her eye, it was on the wall above the faucet taps. At first, she thought about raising her foot and stubbing the creature to death with her big toe but she choose to sit up instead.

She grabbed her lighter from off the top of her pack of cigarettes and flicked a flame into existence. She moved the lighter towards the spider, intent on setting it on fire. It scurried away from the heat and she hesitated, she knew what she was attempting to do was wrong and even cruel but she wanted to watch it burn. She wondered if spiders screamed, she didn’t think that they did, but she found herself hoping it would. She kept the lighter lit and continued to chase the spider with it until it became so hot that it burned her thumb. It was an interesting burn that slowly built up, and she decided that she deserved it. She scooted her foot towards her butt until her knee was raised high out of the soap and she turned the lighter over pressing it hard into her knee. She winced but refused to scream, not wanting Trent to barge in. It was her own sick version of a mea culpa.

When the lighter cooled se lifted it, the mark that had been left looked almost identical to the bic man that stood next to the logo on her lighter. She ran her finger back and forth over the tender flesh before sticking her leg back under the water. She took a deep breath and then submerged her entire body. She stayed beneath the bubbles until her cheeks were sore and she knew she needed a breath. She sat up with a gasp and then looked over to the spider. She pulled the stopper and watched the water swirl down the drain, she flicked the arachnid into the whirlpool. She took the last sip of tea while staring at the drowning creature, and wishing that she had tried to make it scream with fire.