Page 80 of Unholy Masks

“I worry about you. I always will. You’re all I have now.”

“I promise I’m alright, but yes… I’ll sleep in your room. I'll take the couch.”

“No, you take the bed. I’ll be fine on the couch.”

Sighing, I followed him to his room.

I closed my eyes with a sigh.

“Hey…” he said after a while. “Are you asleep?”

“No.”

“Is it your mother?” he asked. He knew about my nightmares, but only about them. The other side of me… I kept it away from him. He was normal, and normal people didn’t understand the weird that slept within me.

I knew it would break him if he found that side of me. Destroy him. I wasn’t ready to lose the only one I cared about. My only family.

“Yes.”

“Do you… If you want, I will book an appointment with your old therapist. You need help. You can’t keep wandering in the middle of the night.”

“No,” I said quickly. “I don’t. I’ll be fine.”

I will never be fine.

Therapies wouldn’t cure me, cure the darkness lingering in my head, the voices screaming for release. I tried therapies. I tried the little pills.

Nothing helped. Nothing stopped the need.

Only killing my mother would do.

Stopping her was the only way to stop the voice, stop the nightmare, stop the grief, pain, and suffering.

“Why not?” he asked, stretching on his couch.

“I hate Doctor Richard.”

“Then we find someone else. Someone you don’t hate,” he said.

I grunted.

“No.”

“Why the fuck not?”

“Look at me and tell me. Do you think talking to a therapist will help me?” I asked with a wry smile. Somewhere deep inside, I had a feeling he knew.

“Okay, but if you ever need help, you’ll tell me, won’t you?” he asked. “I want to help you.”

“I will.”

I won’t.

I just needed to kill again, and I would be alright after that. It would quieten my mother’s voice for a while.

But Valentina was not an option anymore. It made me angry. Why would the cops mess it up for me? It took me months to vet her. To find her age. To know and understand her. To remember her routines.

Now, I had to find another. I had to do everything from the beginning.