Susceptible

Chapter five

I retreat to my room where I stay only coming out when Alex says there is food.

I fall into a pattern of this where I stay in my room sleeping or reading books I swiped off the shelves in the living room.

After about a week of this pattern I start to grow weary of it and the lack of human contact. Alex had been trying to talk to me, but I would just stare at him in silence.

Alex often disappeared during the day for a few hours. When he came home he spent a lot of time in his office. I snooped in there a few times but there wasn't much to find. There was no file titled MASTER EVIL PLAN across the front just laying around. There was just a television on the wall, and a computer on his desk. I figured he did everything electronically, whatever it was he was doing, and the computer had a password I once again couldn't figure out.

To pass time I watched the TV in the living room. It only had a couple of channels which I found strange, and the news channel was not one of them which I found even stranger. I wanted the news to try to catch a glimpse of Sam and what he was up to as The Midnight Hour.

I was watching one of the few channels the TV did have when Alex came home looking exhausted. He plopped on the couch adjacent of me. I glanced at him, but he was staring at the TV, so I continued to watch. It was an old TV show, in black and white, but was actually a good comedy.

Every time something funny happened on the show Alex laughed out loud. His laugh was charming and sounded so genuine. It amazed me; I didn't know what I expected, maybe for him to still kill me while torturing puppies?

But I watched as his face light up and how he beamed brightness from everywhere, that it felt for a moment that we were just friends hanging out. He looked so pure as he wished me a good night still smiling as he disappeared into his room that I couldn't imagine him as The Machiavellian.

That thought stuck with me over the next couple of days. As I observed Alex, this bright spirit who hummed every morning while serving breakfast, always left me lunch in the fridge, and was home to make dinner everyday, what bad things had he really done? The Machiavellian hadn't really done anything major.

Of course he had threatened to kill all those people on the bus, but would he had gone through with it? Or did he know what The Midnight Hour would choose?

I thought back on that day though in the park, it had only been about two weeks ago now. I thought of The Machiavellian, how terrifying he sounded, It didn't remind me at all of Alex. I had been so scared, and I had no doubt in that moment he would have killed everyone on that bus without hesitation.

It made me wonder who he really was. Did he put on a persona in his suit, or around me? I figured I needed to know a little more than just what he was like at mealtimes to find out.

The next morning I left my room earlier than usual. Once I had changed clothes and brushed my hair I wandered out into the kitchen. I was met with a scene I didn't expect. Alex was flipping pancakes dressed only in flannel pajama bottoms.

But what was really funny was he was singing Madonna. Awfully. His voice was so off key I couldn't help but to laugh. I stood in the doorway actually laughing for the first time in forever as Alex jumped and quickly turned the music off. I stepped into the kitchen still trying to stop the laughter I could feel bubbling up from his ridiculous state. Alex grinned at me.

"That's the first sound I've heard out of you in days. Good to know your not actually a zombie." Alex said

"Hmm." I hummed in response. He went back to the pancakes starting to stack the done ones on two plates.