Crimson

Stained Red

Frederique smiled after she had fixed me. ‘See, now you look normal!’

I looked at her. ‘I don’t have eyes.’

There was an awkward silence as we both thought on this and she flushed red as I pointed it out. ‘I’m sorry about that.’

I nodded. ‘It was a long time ago.’

She shifted closer, interested. Her green eyes studied my face and the places my eyes should go. ‘How long ago?’ After a moment of unsure searching, her eyes fastened over mine and her gaze did not waver.

I shrugged in answer. ‘I don’t know. I’ve forgotten.’

‘How many people have you killed?’

I shrugged again. ‘A lot I suppose.’ My stomach panged, reminding me of the hunger I’d been supressing since I arrived in her white washed house.

‘You don’t count?’

‘Why would I want to?’

‘Pride?’

I shook my head. ‘I’m not particularly proud of killing people.’

‘Then why do you do it?’

I didn’t answer her, unwilling to scare her by telling her about the thrill I felt when I killed, or the slick sensation of blood on my hands.

She nodded slowly and brushed her hair behind her ears. ‘If you don’t want to speak about it, that’s fine…’

I nodded and groaned as I felt another hunger pang and weakness beginning to settle in my veins. ‘I have to go.’ I murmured, my hand shaking as I reached back for my mask, my vision flickered and darkened until I could see through the blackness of my vision was her bright green eyes.

‘Hey are you ok?’ I felt her hand against my shoulder and jumped, pressing my hand to my eyes.

‘I can’t see.’ I whimpered and I could sense her hesitation.

‘Well, you have no eyes? Don’t you usually not have sight?’ She framed the question awkwardly, unsure of how I felt about my eyes.

I shook my head. ‘I can see. Right now I can’t.’

‘That doesn’t make much sense.’

I grit my teeth. ‘Get me out of here. I have to go.’

‘Why can’t you see?’

‘Get me out!’ I yelled at her, pulling from her hands, my vision flickered and disappeared, revealing the door frame as I stumbled toward it, my hands tracing the smooth doorframe and guiding me through it. I could hear Frederique following.

‘Frederique, I have to go.’

‘Fred.’ She said automatically, as if it was a long suffered correction she had to make. ‘I don’t like Frederique.’

I ignored her and stumbled onward, cursing myself. I shouldn’t have let my body deteriorate this far, I should have left as soon as I felt the slightest shiver of hunger. I should have left the girl. I cursed myself again.

‘Jack, where are you going?’ Her hand slipped around my wrist, halting my awkward progress to the door and pulling me backwards, my feet slid out from under me and I was on the floor. Fred was on the floor in seconds, the feeling of crimson beneath my fingertips as I pressed my blade to her throat. She was frozen beneath me, but I could feel her rapid breath across my face and her fingernails digging into my wrist. I could almost taste her heartbeat.

‘Jack…’ She whimpered. ‘Oh god, are you going to kill me?’

I rolled off her and onto my feet, licking her blood off my hands and knife. I left her calling my name, leaping out of the window at the end of her corridor and falling a floor, feeling the glass create deep lacerations across my skin and I kept running, out of her yard and trusting my feet to guide me into the darker side of town. I hid for barely three minutes in an alley before what I believed was Anna appeared, blue eyes roaming the blackness of my vision and crimson colours whipping around her as she teleported, I saw them fade and the stench of blood hit me.