I rummaged through every wooden cupboard. There wasn’t even a crumb left! So I closed my eyes and tried to retrace my steps.
That’s when I saw it.
The victims, the blood, the last breath each took. Jeff’s face writhing in pain, beads of red liquid dribbling down his neck. His body hitting the floor… Ryan’s body hitting the floor... It was a cacophony of thuds as each scene played like a scratched record in my mind.
When the torture ceased, more images came. Like viewing my life in fast-forward, the visions ran past me consuming the pie, up until I was cleaning the house. Then, the giant lump of dairy was being carried to the shed. A shed I never knew we had, until now.
That’s it!
Shaking off the murder visions that still plagued my thoughts, I sprinted for the shed. Sure enough, when I got there, the cheese was taking up most of the room. I tried to pick it up, but it was far too heavy. So instead, I pulled out the cheese knife I had grown so attached to and plunged it into the cheese.
The blade had an intricate design of lightning and thunder storms and on the handle; my mother had carved a smiley face. At least that is what my father had said. I like to think that she had a sense of humour. Even after a bottle of Absinthe was let loose in her brain, she still smiled.
With a heavy sigh, I put a reasonable amount of cheese in my pocket and headed for Emily’s house.
^^^^^^^
My fist halted as I reached the door. Would she want to see me?
So I did the manly thing and peered through the kitchen window. But instead of finding Emily, I found Luce. Her innocent, pre-teenage figure was shaking with tears from each sound that was made in the next door room.
To my horror, I knew exactly how she felt.
An egg timer beeped. A startled Luce brushed away her tears and straightened her spine. A door then opened and a boy was hauled out of the house.
A sharp whistle from Emily made him turn around.
“Where is my payment, Ben?”
“Payment?” he replied, trying to act innocent.
“The $200 you owe me for tonight”
“Oh right,” he fumbled through his pockets and handed the harlot four $50 notes “There you are, whore”.
The young man can’t have been more than sixteen and he was treating my Emily this way? He was going to pay.
Emily ignored Ben’s last comment and even flashed him a sarcastic grin.
I waited for the arsehole to stroll into the forest before I let my anger take over. The cheese had barely slipped down my oesophagus before I pounced on him and broke his neck.
I hoped to hell that this was the last one of Emily’s “customers”.
However, on my return, I saw a similar scene as the one before. Luce was now clutching her knees in the corner as if praying it would stop. The egg timer had nine minutes left before this would end. Nine minutes of torture.
Why would Emily do this? Does she have no respect for herself? What about her daughter? Then, a horrible thought came upon me.
What if I had caused her to be like this?
Those nine minutes were the longest in my life. When, finally, the timer rang, I stood up ready to chase the fool.
Seeing Emily kiss him as he walked out of the door, I felt a wave of jealousy run through me. This is unbearable!
“Goodnight Shay, thanks for the payment.” She said huskily.
“Thank you for a wonderful night, Miss Spears” he replied, with an air of ultimate cockiness.
The door slammed in his face. Luce then turned to her mother, who was now breathing shakily.
“That is the last one now, Darling. Now we can buy you a nice new dolly” She cooed at her daughter.
“I don’t want this Mother! I never have!” She stormed upstairs like a hailstorm in the middle of winter, leaving a trail of sobs behind her.
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