Page 67 of Apathy
But where? There were no houses next to ours, and I knew that running away wasn’t an option anymore. Instead, that same anger that took a hold of me before I attacked Lilly reappeared, igniting the blood in my veins, leading me where I needed to go.
His footsteps thundered behind me as I rounded the corner and started running down the stairs, but stopping wasn’t an option, even though my heart threatened to jump out of my chest. Even though the tears continued streaming down my cheeks, I didn’t stop when I jumped from the second stair to the ground and headed toward the kitchen.
I didn’t stop when I heard him coming closer, closer, so close that if he just took a few more steps, he would be able to catch me.
But I had to survive. I wanted to survive. All that talk about wanting to die, wanting to disappear, and now when I was faced with the situation that would give me an easy way out, I couldn’t bear the thought of dying. At least, not like this.
If my death was inevitable, I wanted to be the one to decide how and when, not some deranged monster cutting girls left and right, fixating on me.
My foot slipped on the tiles in the kitchen, but I managed to straighten myself up, reaching toward the knives placed on the counter. But before I could grasp one of them, a strong set of hands lifted me from the ground and pulled me backward, slamming me into the opposite wall.
“No!” I screamed, scrambling to get away from him. Before I could run outside of the kitchen, he managed to get a hold of me again, pressing his chest to my back, caging me in his embrace.
“Please,” I cried. “Please don’t hurt me.”
I couldn’t see his face, but I could hear his labored breathing as he lowered his head to my neck, scenting me, sending shock waves through my body as fear gripped my insides.
“Please,” I begged, whimpering in his arms, but he didn’t budge even when I started thrashing in his arms. If anything, his grip tightened, and one of his hands sneaked toward my throat, pressing soft touches, caressing me.
“I’ll do anything,” I pleaded, but he didn’t answer. Instead, he turned me around, pulling another scream from me at the sight in front of my eyes.
A mask covered his face, hiding his eyes, hiding his entire identity. Its golden hue shone underneath the moonlight peeking in through the windows. I didn’t dare move. I almost didn’t dare to breathe as this stranger perused my face, his hand still wrapped around my throat, the hidden warning cloaked by the soft caresses he kept inflicting on my skin.
I pressed my hands on his chest, feeling the strong muscles beneath my fingers, but he stopped me from going any further when I tried sneaking my hands around his neck, trying to pull off the hood hiding his hair. Tilting his head to the side, he started walking forward, pushing me out of the kitchen, all the way to the foyer area where a chair stood right in front of the door.
My whimpers, my pleading, it all fell on deaf ears as he sat me down, pressing harder against my throat. As a warning, as foreplay, I didn’t know anymore. He didn’t kill me—yet—but that didn’t mean he wouldn’t hurt me.
“Are you going to kill me?” I asked as he pulled out the rope from a pocket in his cloak and bound my wrists to the arms of the chair. I wanted to hear him talk. I wanted to learn anything that could give me an advantage over this person. “Why aren’t you talking?” I tried softening my voice, because if he was truly obsessed with me, then maybe he didn’t want to harm me more than he thought was necessary.
But there was no answer. Nothing but the rustling of his clothes and our breathing.
“Did you kill those girls?” I braved to ask—the wrong thing to ask—because in a second, he gripped the back of my neck and pulled my hair, exposing my throat to him. Trailing a path with his gloved finger over my skin, he went over my chin all the way to my lips, stopping just below my lower lip. “Did you?” I croaked, because dying and not knowing who he was, was unbearable.
I could’ve missed it, almost did, when he nodded slowly, before he pressed his thumb into my lower lip, moving his finger from one side of my mouth to the other. He leaned down, his face inches away from mine, and I closed my eyes, knowing that this night wasn’t going to end up well for me.
“Why can’t you let me go?” I cried. “Why are you doing this?” I asked as I opened my eyes, realizing that he’d moved back. But my momentary relief was short-lived when I saw the knife in his hand.
“No, please!” I started pushing against the chair, but it was futile fighting against the ropes he tightened around my arms. “I’m begging you,” I pleaded as he took a step closer, turning the knife to the side, looking first at it then at me.
“You don’t have to do this. Please don’t do this.”
But the faceless man continued to be quiet, staring at me, and when he took the final step, standing right next to me, he lifted his other hand, pressing his finger against his lips.
“I’m not gonna keep quiet, damn you!” I screamed. “They’re gonna find you. My brother is going to find you!”
But even I knew that these were empty threats, my last attempt to stall him, to stop him. No one would hear me. Nobody was coming to save me.
I was alone.
All fucking alone, and I was going to die tonight.
I flinched as his hand shot out, but instead of hitting me, he gently moved the hair from my face, putting it behind my ear.
My stomach lurched, because how could somebody behave like this? Both a killer and a gentle man? I thought that he would’ve killed me by now. I kept staring at his face when he pressed the tip of his knife to my arm, pulling another shriek from me.
“Noooo!”
But he kept going, carving and carving and carving, while pain kept ricocheting through my arm, through my body.
