Violent Delights¹︎ | D.Dixon

1.01 ➸

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CHAPTER ONE
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THE MOTEL ROOM LEONA GRIMES was staying in while she visited her brothers' family in Cynthiana, Kentucky wasn't the nicest place she'd stayed while she was in town. Usually, she opted to rent a bed and breakfast-a trend that had recently gained quite a bit of traction among smaller towns-but she found it entirely impossible to find one on such short notice. There was a full size bed in the center of the room, the head of it pressed up against the wall and it was facing a small flatscreen TV. There was a small bathroom barely big enough for both the toilet and the shower, and the light flickered erratically.

The TV shone a bright blue-ish gleam onto the otherwise plain, beige walls of the room; the news anchor on the screen talked nonsense gibberish while Leona sketched on a piece of notebook paper. Her breathing was smooth and even as her hand made small movements across her sketch, the outline she'd made of the flowers that had, for a small moment in time, looked like nothing but formless blobs, and had now begun to take form. She paid attention to the small details: the slight unevenness to the different shapes of the petals, the curve of each one, and the minute slices that scarred the leaves. The graphite had smudged on her fingers from all the blending she'd done-not that her finger worked as well as the blending stumps back at her apartment-and the combination of that and her damp hair piled into a bun on the top of her head made her look like the struggling artist she was. The tattered t-shirt covered in paint stairs and the jean shorts she wore didn't help cover it up, either.

"-and now with the latest news: over the last 72 hours, reports have become widespread across the country of a mysterious new virus spreading through our hospitals. Described by top scientists at the World Health Organization as resembling a form of wasting disease, several currently unsubstantiated reports claim that the effects of the virus only set in after the patient has died, leading to some form of reanimation within the corpse. The internet-"

Leona grabbed the remote and switched the channel off, the screen snapping to black, reflecting her in its void. The distorted image seemed to make shadows dance morbidly over her fair, freckled skin.

"I look like shit." She grumbled. "Great."

She set her pencil down on the sheet covering the mattress-the blankets had been shoved away and bunched up at the end of the bed-and glanced at the analog clock on the bedside table, the same one she'd checked the night before for a Bible, hoping to find some cash between its pages. She'd found $40, and promised herself she'd buy herself some new canvas for her and her nephew to paint together. But as she glanced at the time, she realized she was already going to be late, and she still had a run to make to the gas station down the street.

"Damn it." She shoved herself off the bed, not bothering to doll herself up before slipping on a pair of flip flops, grabbing her keys, and heading out the hotel door and into the blistering Kentucky heat.

She could've sworn the plastic of her dollar store shoes were melting into the blacktop of the cheap motel parking lot as she walked to her car. The bright red vehicle she owned was a 1987 Dodge Raider, and she loved the poor thing to death. She'd had the car since she'd graduated college nearly 7 years before, and the poor thing had gone in for repairs dozens of times since. But Leona couldn't let it go, even though it was the biggest waste of money in her life. At the age of 33, she had managed to remain unmarried and child free, because that Raider-blindingly vibrant and obnoxious in color-was the only financial burden she would ever be able to afford in this fucking economy.

She unlocked it and slid into the drivers seat, putting the key in the ignition and listened as the engine stuttered before quickly coming to life with a roar.