I needed money.
So I did what people do when survival demands compliance—I looked for work. I had credentials, education, proof of intelligence. What I lacked was ease. Interviews exposed me. My words came out wrong, my silences too long. I could feel employers recoil, not from incompetence, but from something less definable. Discomfort recognizes its own.
In the end, I was hired by an old woman who owned a tiny grocery store near my apartment. She could no longer stand all day, so she needed someone young and functional. I worked afternoons in a place that smelled of rot and detergent, selling expired goods to people who pretended not to notice.
The shop was barely larger than a closet. Narrow aisles. Dust-coated shelves. Products whose best days were long behind them. The air was thick with decay, organic and chemical at once. It wasn't pleasant, but it was honest. I needed money. That was enough.
At first, things were manageable. Customers annoyed me. Some deserved to be slammed against the wall. I didn't do it. Restraint is easier when you're being paid.
Then one day, a young man walked in.
He was handsome in a soft, unthreatening way. Clean. Polite. He smiled like someone who expected the world to respond kindly.
"Hello," he said. "My name is Adrien Windsong. I'm new to the neighborhood."
Kindness immediately triggered suspicion. Men never want nothing. If it isn't sex, it's something worse. I studied him, searching for the angle.
"My name is Arabella," I said. "What do you want?"
"Apples. Milk. Cookies. Breakfast tomorrow."
His eyes stayed on mine. Calm. Curious.
"What are you having for dinner?" I asked.
He hesitated. Blushed.
"A restaurant nearby," he said.
"Come to my house."
The words left my mouth before I examined them.
His surprise was genuine. That made it better.
"Are you sure?" he asked. "I don't want to—"
"Yes," I said. "I have food. I want you to eat it."
He followed me.
My apartment sat on the third floor of an old brick building in Dublin's bohemian quarter. The first floor belonged to an elderly woman who had watched my father too closely and said nothing. The second housed a young couple who were never home. I lived above them all, where silence collected.
The stairwell creaked as we climbed. Adrien's eyes kept moving, measuring exits, shadows, angles. Instinct recognized danger even when the mind resisted it.
Inside, the apartment swallowed sound. High ceilings. Peeling wallpaper. Furniture worn thin by years of neglect. A single lamp flickered, offering just enough light to see decay without warmth.
He hesitated in the doorway.
I smiled.
For once, I was not the one being evaluated.
"Welcome to my world," I said.
I served rice and mushrooms. It wasn't elegant, but it was edible. We ate in silence.
"You live alone?" he asked.
"Yes."
"I work in a computer store," he offered, as if that explained him.
It didn't.
He was nervous. I liked that. Men are predators, or they pretend not to be. Either way, they want. I had learned that giving first was a form of control.
When dinner ended, tension thickened the room. He fidgeted. Avoided my eyes. That contradiction—bold enough to approach me, too gentle to dominate—made something inside me sharpen.
The darkness stirred.
Destroy him.
I touched his face. Felt his breath hitch. Fear and desire tangled in his expression, inseparable. Power hummed under my skin.
"What are you doing?" he asked.
"Kiss me."
He hesitated. Then complied.
What followed was clumsy, intense, human. He was happy. I was satisfied. But satisfaction fades. Hunger does not.
When it was over, he lay relaxed on the kitchen floor, unaware that relaxation is an invitation.
I stood. Took a knife from the table.
I cut his shoulder.
Blood bloomed. Bright. Alive.
"What are you doing?" he shouted, grabbing my arm.
I dropped the knife and pressed my mouth to the wound. His blood tasted thin, panicked, human. Not like the angel's. Not enough.
He shoved me away.
"You're insane!"
He fled. Down the stairs. Out of my life.
I lay there, breathless, smiling.
It hadn't worked. Not properly. But failure is educational.
I had learned something important.
Kindness does not make good prey.
And next time, I would choose better.
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THE MONSTER INSIDE ME (#ONC2024)
Horror#ONC2024 Round two Ambassadors' pick. :D SHORTLIST ONC 2024 My prompt is number 3: Your greatest fear is monsters in the dark. The last thing you expect is to become the monster in the dark. Arabella Dagon was always afraid of the dark. In the dar...
