Liu Woods was a good boy. He always did as he was told, got good grades, tried to keep his younger brother out of trouble, and he had a passion for art and poetry.
Good boys don't end up where he had been but he had volunteered himself because he loved his brother Jeff to much to let him go in his place. It had been a lonely and terrifying experience.
Now it had been week since Liu had been released from that horrible place, only to see his little brother in such a delicate state. He visited as often as he could after school. Jeff couldn't speak, but that didn't stop Liu from trying to keep his brother entertained.
He told him about mundane things like what he had for lunch, how he still hadn't made any friends, this one boy kept calling him prison reject, and how he was saving up to buy a new game for Jeff.
All liu could think about at school was his brother, stuck in the hospital. Jeff did have a roommate, but Liu had a feeling it was just as lonely for Jeff as it was for Liu when he was in that joke of a correction facility.
Time passed quickly enough though, and the doctor was ready to release Jeff. Lui felt nervous as the bandages were slowly removed. He had to remind himself that no matter what his brother looked like now, he was still the boy who would play fight with him, play video games with him, and relied on him as a role-model.
The cloth was removed and his mother's scream told him what he was seeing wasn't an illusion. He swallowed back the feeling of his lunch rising in his throat and told his brother, "it's not that bad," his first lie to his brother.
Jeff's reply and laughter only made the hair stand up on the back of his neck.
That night, Lui fell asleep after some thought. He was sure he had already gotten used to Jeff's face, he was still his brother after all, no matter what he looked like.
He woke up to the sound of a thud. There was a bad feeling in his stomach, informing him something was not right but he ignored it and tried to go back to sleep. He had no such luck, and looked up again.
A hand covered his mouth making him lash out until he was pushed over onto his bed, his attacker pinning him down. Some kind of liquid hit his forehead, and he realized two things: the person above him was Jeff and he was bleeding from freshly made gouges in his checks.
The kitchen knife reflected in the dim moonlight coming from the window as Liu thrashed, trying to scream under the hand. "Shhhhhhhh," his younger sibling cooed softly, "Go to Sleep."
The knife digging into his chest lightly, was painful. The cut that followed to his abdomen was the worst kind of pain he had ever felt. Not even the time he had cut himself deeply with a knife compared to this sharp, burning pain. The blade slid across his belly increasing the pain and the amount of blood on his sheets.
Jeff seemed to have given up on keeping him silent, moving his hand to Liu's abdomen. The older boy was still screaming his head off as the lunatic stuck his hand inside the incision and gripped something tightly.
My organs... Liu thought in horror, as the world blurred and finally went dark.
He wasn't sure if he heard Jeff say "Goodnight brother" or not, before passing out.
Liu's eyes fluttered, his thoughts too scattered for anything coherent. "Oh good, he's awake," a female voice stated.
Everything was blurry and out of focus as a shadowy blob passed over him. "Hey kid, take it easy. I know everything has been rough on you but don't worry, you're safe now. He won't be able to touch you here.
He? Liu thought, He who? Who's he? Where am I? Oh god it hurts-
"Calm down kid. You're going to drive the heart monitor crazy." A soft pressure gripped his hand and Liu closed his eyes, trying to relax. "I'll tell the doctor to up your dosage. You're a lucky kid, that psycho bastard killed quite a few people. He looks like a demon or something in the police sketches. I wouldn't want to run into him in an alley at night.
Liu frowned, He,he-oh right, Jeff. His brother has said goodnight to him after finally coming home- wait did she just call his brother a demon?
His eyes snapped wide open. It was only then that he noticed the loud, rapid beeping of the heart monitor as he caught sight of the nurse at his bedside.
He hadn't even realized he had started to sit up until she pushed him down gently. Liu's eyes trailed to her tools by his side.
Kill her, a voice insisted.
"Wow, you're really rowdy. Please, try and calm down before I have to get the- she didn't finish as Liu grabbed the scissors from her tray and jabbed them into her eye.
"Shut up, he said lowly, shut up shut up shut up!" His voice picked up as pulled back, stabbing her again to the lullaby of her screams.
And again, and a fourth time. He lost track after she had already fallen to the floor, her good eye staring up at him blankly and his hands covered in her blood. Dead.
Get out of here.
Liu didn't think twice. He got up stumbling his way to the chair that had fresh clothes on it. There was a little card that said, "Get well soon" - Billy. He threw it aside and quickly got dressed, hissing when he tried to bend the wrong way and pulled his stitches. One look in the mirror revealed his body was riddled with stitches. "Those are new," he thought as he made his way back to the corpse. "You're so goddamn annoying and my brother is not a bastard or a demon.
I'd beg to differ, but whatever.
The voice was ignored as he shoved the body under the bed and used paper towels from the bathroom connected to his room to try and clean up the blood as much as possible. Hopefully, that would buy him time as he left the room and slowly navigated the hospital, looking for the exit.
Every once in a while, his stomach flared in a painful protest, but Liu knew he couldn't turn back now.
Jeffery Woods was a murderer.
Liu Woods was too.
