Damaged Solace The door creaked open as all doors before it would.

The freezing cold sting of the outside rain kissing my skin goodbye falling behind, and my silent stride slipping into the house, my tangled hair amassed on my head and a smile brimming with pleasure. I could smell the fresh sheets and heard the soft sounds of a child. My tongue ran over my lips in anticipation and I ascended the stairs as I had so many times before. Fingers gripping cold copper, I twisted and soundlessly stalked in, only to find an empty room. Mirrors adorned the walls, surrounding me, my movements infinitely cast, and my eyebrows wrenched up in surprise. A small boy was sitting in the corner, muttering quietly eyes blank and desolate. I glided in, and prepared for the kill, but something about those eyes, they saw into my soul, and infected my soul like a parasite. His gaze, indirect nearly stopped me in my tracks, when suddenly he turned, and stared at me again. The mirrors began to spin, and my knife slipped out of my hands, and for the first time in my life I was scared, body tightening, my chest seemed as if it would tear itself apart. A ripping sound could be heard, and suddenly the boy was in front of me, his hand around my knife, shoved into me. I was drenched with what I could guess was blood. I dropped and the world slowly sifted into ash. Somewhere in my conscious I knew that there was something to wake up to, and my eyelids ripped open. I was half naked, clothes in tattered and my body ached and stung. I was soaked, and was freezing cold. Was that a dream? I stared at my nails in disgust, pieces of my skin stuck in the red stained cuticles. I rain a hand over my forehead and lay back down, blankly staring in the stark silence. No one was home as usual, no one ever came home anymore, I think everyone is scared of me now. My brothers, the people who enjoyed the things I did the most were scared of me, and had left me here, to rot and die. The familiar sense of hate filled me again, and I almost smiled as I realized my dream was

the same every night. Something was trying to control me, tame this malicious and evil murderer, but I didn t know what it was. Cursing, I slipped on a shirt and slipped down the fire escape, into the night world. My knees bent in the familiar shock I d felt every night. My hardened eyes scanned the street and I slipped into my car. The wet asphalt ripped backwards around me as my foot pressed harder and harder on the pedal. Streets this time of night were always empty, always a good time to disappear. My hands gripped the wheel harder and harder and I grimaced and my recent nocturnal experience. I was killer, I was the ultimate evil, the thing people watched for when they looked into the darkness, but nothing could explain why this thing, this boy with those eyes, could kill me, could always scare me when the very sight of me set the bravest men on edge. My destination was in sight, sighing an almost sigh I pulled over and exited the car. The place was deserted, dark and desolate, perfect place for a serial killer to hide his tools of torture. Grabbing whatever was left of stolen food, I mounted my car once again and was on the road again, looking for something to cut, someone to fall at my feet, someone to ask why. Temples tensed, conscious memory rewinded, and the images flooded my mind again, his little body falling before me, amber eyes dead and blank. The twisted smile about to smite me, when a sudden flash and my something was hard in my hand, and hot blood dripped down my arm. A tangle of hair lying in the corner I held it up like a trophy, a good Christian man, murdering for a murder. I refocused in time only to feel something behind me, glancing at the mirror, the only the black road entertained my paranoia. Looking back toward the blackness of night something flashed and suddenly my line of sight was thrown forward and I in only 2 seconds, I was staring at a horribly dented trashcan. Unfamiliar pain ravaged my body, my body finally registering it, and I gave a half hearted, Ow. Almost smiling I turned my head to the wreck of car I had left and the jolt of almost surprise I had felt when the night dragged me toward the earth. I looked up, a rustling deep in the void of the alley grabbing my attention.

A child s voice, smooth and innocent like the sound of bells chimed from within, speaking but with no words. A grizzled hand dropped onto the visible pavement, the nails digging into the pavement. I couldn t look away, my entire body and instincts telling me to run, but somewhere in my soul I felt almost happiness at seeing it. Bleak red eyes glared through and I knew it was him, I was seeing him again, that everything was okay. The hands dragged a half body, the legs gone his organs trailing colorfully behind him, but It was him, it was really him, my-. Thought ceased, and the void engulfed me again. Before I knew, I was staring into my own eyes, bloodshot and dilated dark bags accenting them. My face was something I didn t know well, something I rarely saw, but it was me. My sense of fear jumped at the sound of a thump in the distance, the water was running now, and something cool flashed onto my face. I suddenly closed glanced back up to my mirror and saw a streak, and stared, seeing those beautiful brown eyes when the light flickered off and before any sensation could be registered, cold metal was in my heart, my hand with something hard in it. I whispered, eyes hazy, world slipping, Goodbye.