Take Me With You(6)

“Fuck. Shit,” I hiss. She cries harder, afraid my words signal bad news for her.

This almost happened last time. And only one thing made my dick grow so solid I could come without even entering: thinking of her. That fucking girl. The beautiful one I saw at the grocery store. The one with the little boy who she looked at lovingly. Who had the nice life with the boyfriend and the parents. I close my eyes and imagine her: her champagne-colored eyes, her smooth skin, her firm ass and pert tits.

This is our house. We have this life. For these next couple of hours. I can have it all. She'll smile at me the way she does in those pictures. I'll be in on the joke instead of part of it.

Imagining Vesper's face twisting in a mix of agony and pleasure makes my cock grow thick and firm. I thrust. And I thrust, holding her name on the tip of my tongue. I can't give anyone a reason to warn her that she's next, so it stays there, begging to be uttered.

The warm clench massaging my cock is her pussy. And if this fantasy can feel this good, I don't know how I can handle it when the real thing comes. I barely hear Connie's cries as I come, erasing the last man who was in her. She's not even there anymore, she's just a placeholder until I can get the ultimate target.

I pull out, relieved, the unrelenting fire that rages in me momentarily snuffed. I don't bother to put on my pants. This isn't over. There's so much more I have left to do. I go through their house, tossing things around, trying to remember it all. Trying to somehow live their entire lives in these two hours. Connie has a lot of medical books. But she also likes old classics: Pride and Prejudice, Anna Karenina, Les Liaisons Dangereuses.

Don likes model cars. They don't have kids, but he keeps a lot of pictures of kids who I think are his nieces and nephews. I could do this gently. I could be quiet. But I want them to hear me tear their place apart. I want to continue to control them through fear. Their terror feeds me. And as long as they can hear me raging, they won't try anything stupid.

I open the front door. “I'm not ready yet,” I hiss before closing it. It's just another red herring to make the cops look for someone who has an accomplice.

I have another go at Connie. Another reminder that Vesper is consuming my thoughts.

“Make it stop. Make it stop,” I whine during my second bout of rifling through their things. Another distraction to make them think I'm delusional. I'm not delusional. I know exactly what I am doing. I show my face in the light of day. I am your neighbor. I am your brother. I am the guy who builds you that beautiful deck or fixes your broken front door knob.

By now it's 4:15 or so and I am famished. I open up the fridge and find some leftover chicken. I eat it on their back patio, relishing in the act of eating their—my—food. Everything of theirs is mine. This is my life as long as I am here. I glow in the act of eating outside, their neighbors oblivious to the goings on just feet away.

It's so quiet at this time, you would think no one even lives in this neighborhood. This is my hour. The darkness belongs to me. They shunned me. They forgot me. But I never went away. I am here. I am their living nightmare.

Once my belly is full, I know it's time to go. I can't stay past dawn. The early risers will be up and about. I leave the carcass on the patio table and go back in. I put my pants on and sweep the house for anything I don't want to leave behind before slipping out the patio door again.

“Hey!” A man's voice shouts from the street. It's okay, these things happen. I have my mask on. I have my gloves on. I don't even look back at him. Instead, I run in the opposite direction and hop a fence, then another, and another. I run towards the vast canal system I use, like a main artery to get me from one neighborhood to the next.

I lose that guy easily. Once I am in the brush, I catch my breath, pull off the balaclava, the gloves, the black wig and mustache, and tuck them all into my pockets as securely as I can. I pull off the dark sweatshirt and throw it in the brush, revealing a white t-shirt. I brush my light brown hair back, and walk back out to the street where my car is. I pass another obnoxiously early riser out with his dog. He nods at me and I keep my chin down, so he can't make out my face in the pre-dawn light, and give him a quick wave.

It's only a few more steps before I am in my car, calmly driving away, towards the interstate and my freedom. It won't be long until I have to feed the urge again. I don't know how much longer these morsels can hold me when I have been preparing a feast.





I lounge in front of an episode of Sanford and Son, waiting on a fresh batch of popcorn. Johnny is tucked in and my mom and stepdad left for the airport a few hours ago. It's just me in this quiet house on a Saturday night. I should go out more, but I often have to watch Johnny and I am usually tired from school and work. Carter and I even had plans to go out to a fancy dinner tomorrow, but when my mom decided on her way back from the Caribbean that she was going to book a last minute trip to Egypt, I had to drop them.

Once the popping sounds from the kitchen slow from their initial burst, I run over to pull the pot off the stove and melt some butter. When I reenter the living room, hugging my bowl of warm popcorn, Sanford and Son has ended and the evening news has taken its place. On the screen is a zoomed-in black and white sketch of a man’s face, mostly obstructed by a ski mask.

“Police say the man attacked a couple in their Rancho Sol home,” a reporter says. Rancho Sol is a subdivision, not twenty minutes away from here by car.