She's a Man-Eater

3. Wednesday 13

One day passed and Jesse obsessively checked the news for any signs of a missing person.

Two days passed and Jesse, even when asleep, could not stop thinking about what she'd done.

Three days passed and she finally managed to scrub every inch of the shed free of blood.

Four days passed and the world forgot about Raymond Khalling.

There was no worried family, no missing persons report, nothing. No one cared enough about the man to notice he was gone.

Any sensible person would have been wracked with guilt. Any normal person would be unable to shake what they had done from their mind. Jesse could not, but there was no guilt on her end.

Jesse spent every waking hour thinking about how she killed Raymond Khalling. When she slept she had nightmares about how she disposed of the body. No, not nightmares. There was nothing unpleasant about them. In fact, she woke up from these dreams calm and in a relatively good mood.

Jesse stood in front of her bathroom mirror, tapping her front teeth with the nail of her index finger. She remembered dismembering the body vividly. It had only been four days, but not a single detail of the night faded from her memory. She still searched through news articles for any mention of Raymond Khalling, thought not quite as obsessively as he had the first day.

Part of her hoped someone would notice the man's disappearance, so she could be sure that it actually happened. Another part of her knew that she was better off never hearing about him again. If no one knew he was missing, no one would know she killed him.

Jesse stared blankly in the mirror. Her hair was still soaked and plastered to her face from the shower she took minutes before. She didn't bother drying it before she left the bathroom.

Oliver was sitting at the kitchen island, huddled over his laptop. He wore faded jeans and a buttoned Hawaiian over shirt. He looked out of place in the house, with its white walls and grey vinyl flooring. The house had a sterile air about it that Oliver never matched. If Jesse had any control over his wardrobe, she would have burned all of the color along with the body.

"You're up early," she said, still standing at the opposite end of the kitchen.

Oliver looked up from his laptop at her. He was chewing something and spoke with his mouth full, "Oh, morning Jess." He looked back down at his laptop and continued with whatever he was working on. "Yeah, I gotta get these pictures to my client by noon. I've been procrastinating on them for a while."

Jesse stepped around the bar to look at his laptop. He was editing wedding photos. Jesse may not have liked Oliver, but she would admit that he was an excellent photographer. She moved to the cabinets and picked a small, white coffee cup from one of the lower shelves.

"Hey, did you start a fire the other night?"

Jesse looked over her shoulder at Oliver. He wasn't facing her, the majority of his attention still focused on his laptop. "Hm?"

He broke a chunk off of what Jesse could now see was a pop-tart and tossed it in his mouth. "I just noticed there was some ash left in the fire pit."

"No, you must have left it in there the last time you started a fire."

"Damn," he said, scratching his chin, "really gotta get better about that."

Jesse hummed in agreement, making a mental note to finish cleaning out the fire pit later. If Raymond Khalling's disappearance was ever noticed, it wouldn't be a good look to have burned human remains in her fire pit. She poured a cup of coffee and glanced out the window facing their front yard. It was supposed to be a nice day, save for some light rain.