Day 6: May 1st, StADa in May or How I learned to love the short story.

So, for the remainder of May I am going to use my blog as the launching post for a brand new challenge. You get to be along for the ride and see how things turn out. I am technically writing this post (and subsequent story) on May 2nd (not May 1st) but I worked my job for 12 hours. So... sue me. Usually when I write stories (see Day 4) I'm someone who needs to explore who my characters are and what they're doing in the rough draft. Rarely would a writer of any repute use most of my exposition in a "real" story, but that's just how I write. I have to know where I'm going through exploration. I don't like being told where to go no more than I like planning where I'm going early on. So, in the next month you'll have to forgive me while I flood this place with fiction.

I won't apologize for it though.

Finding her was the easy part. She had left a trail for me, so long and narrow that I almost believed I was being lead to her. Perhaps this is an intensely clever trap, I thought. Looking at it now, I realized that a thousand thoughts like that doesn't prepare you for the truth. I had that inkling in the back in my brain: that tiny voice that makes you freeze in place for just a single moment. But I went and killed her, regardless. Anyway, where was I? Oh right. Finding her.

I found her on a wet April morning. The sky was grey, it was raining in a dreary sorta way. The kind of rain that makes you want to sleep for another five minutes instead of wake up for work. But up I got. I went to the coffee shop she worked at. I frequented the place about four to five times a week for a month. Today was no different from the last visits. I walked to her counter, hearing the snippets of conversation that hung around the deep smell of ground coffee beans, sugary syrups and whip cream. Every now and then a piece would float by with the steam of a cup.

"Oh he's just waiting for the right moment to break up with his girlfriend, and then we'll be..."

"Did you hear about the new movie coming out? Ah, bro, it's gonna be awesome. I hear that in this one there's a nude scene of..."

"Does this coffee taste off to you?"

"I think it tastes fine."

"I guess I'm just used to the other shop down the road. They know how I like it."

The counter was covered in a smooth plastic that cracked when I leaned on it. It felt like freezer bags stretched out across hard wood.

"The usual?"

"Of course." The crunching plastic objected to my leaning as I moved in closer to her. "So, is there any way I can get you alone for lunch?"

"I'm here until six."

I know. "Late dinner then?"

"I don't know..."

"Come on... what's the worse that could happen?"

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I'm in a dark alley way. I'm holding a knife. The blade is long, but curved in a wicked manner. It's folded steel, like how a katana is made. There are runes up and down the blade but I can't read them. I was given this knife by the client. He had said to make sure it plunged into her heart. I had to make double sure. It needs the blood. I remembered him saying, whispering to his counter parts. Straight from the heart, no other source will do.

She's unconscious at my feet. I remember using my stun gun on her. I remember watching her lie on the ground. I remember getting antsy.

"This is too easy. If she's ex MI6 then I'm the God damn Black Ops." I held the knife to my side, patting my thigh with the flat of the blade. "Job's a job, right." The point was hovering inches above her heart. I thought about it long enough for the blade to start to get heavy in my grip. I didn't hear her starting to stir, but she awoke all the same.

In that moment between her gasping in air as hard as she could, and the moment when she would expel it all into a scream that would break the stillness and molecules of crap would be sent flying around her mouth, I brought the knife to slide into her chest. Even that was easy on my hands. The blade was sharp as a motherfucker and went in smooth. My other hand jolted to her mouth and smoothed any hope of a scream ever escaping.

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I'm in a park. There are children who are playing. They have parents not too far from them. There's a single mom, she's been showing up to this park everyday for the last two months. Her kid loves the swings. She usually can't be bothered with pushing him. Typing away at some phone or tablet or whatever device is popular right now.

Her... I hear beating like a bass drum struck one time. I need her blood. It's become a beat now, like the start of a song. It's low, and slow moving. Soon the guitar will kick in. My blood will start swirling in my mind and the knife is going to start the vocals. She's moving to the restroom structure now, leaving her son unattended. If I go quickly, she'll be dead before the chorus starts.

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I tried to rebel. I left the knife behind. I went to the back yard of the hotel I was staying at and I buried the knife in the ground. I don't remember the last time I was in a safe place. Police are after me constantly. I can't sleep, but I don't feel tired. I eat sometimes, but it's tough to know when the last time was. I've done this at every new place I stay at, at every safe house I visit. I think, That's the last time I'll ever see her. And then the police or the national guard find it. They say a case is being put together. I wake up and she's there. She's standing over me. She's made of purest metal forged into beauty incarnate. She's whispering to me again. I'm hungry. Could you go pick me up something to eat? 

I remember saying no at first. I remember thinking of it as a thing. I remember her so much differently than she is now. She's getting stronger by the day. Sometimes when she thinks I sleep, I see runes forming across her face. One of them looked like an eye imprinted and etched on the metal, then blood oozed out of it like a wound. It poured until it reached her chest, then it rose back up and reformed. The blood became an eye, a red pulsing eye. For a moment, I thought I saw delight in it. She put a hand on my head, it was as cold as the steal it was made from, and she cooed softly. Don't fret, my love. We're almost there.

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She can't be stopped now. I can feel her with me always. Sometimes she's the knife and she drinks, even though she doesn't have to be the knife anymore. She says she does it for sentimental reasons. I believe her. Usually she'll run around a town and create chaos where she goes. I'd use the phrase "paint the town red" if I thought the phrase even gave her enough credit. She paints things that don't have a God damn reason to be red, red. She makes the air a fine red mist. She puts the skin of her victims back inside out. The live like that, bleeding everywhere for a few minutes.

She's so very skilled at cutting. The one who calls me her love, is so exceptionally good at cutting. I stay alive and well, if well is something I could pretend to be. She's nearly bloody from head to toe now. Each new appendage grows from the blood she eats. She lays next to me, snuggling to me as a lover might and sighs content. Do I feel better now, with my warm new skin? I hear her slip into my mind. Somehow it has all the seductive nature of a mating call. I hug her close out of fear.

Fear and a slight attraction. She's so strong, and powerful and graceful. The one who I call my love in the deepest cover of isolation. She's tells me soon our souls will be bound together. That her master will ensure our union before the end comes. I tell her that's lovely.

She kisses me good night, and I can hear the screams of thousands. The heat from so many people, killed in gruesome ways. I taste them on her lips.

I taste them in her blood.