Let’s see how he likes it when I direct.
9
Agatha
There’ssomething perfect about the first moment I step into the old barn.
The air is cold, stagnant. Not musty like I expected, but sterile in a way that makes me think it used to hold something more clinical than animals. Though splintered in areas, the wood beams along the ceiling are still strong. The meat hooks hanging from the rafters glint when the light hits just right. Chains dangle from a few, still slick with a grease that refuses to dry. It smells faintly like iron and mold. Like history and rot.Perfect.
I breathe in deep, holding it in my lungs, letting it take root inside me. This is where I’ll do it. This is where I’ll bait the hook.
Kira found the place through one of her tattoo clients. It used to be a butcher shop back in the fifties, shut down after a series of health code violations that no one bothered to clean up. The town forgot about it, let the vines take the siding and the wind strip the paint. But the bones remain, and that’s all I need.
I spend the next hour walking the perimeter, mentally sketching the angles, the shots, the transitions. I record voice notes on my phone, talking through every detail while the scene starts to form in my brain.
"Wide pan here. Chains swaying in the foreground. Lights flicker. We open on a heartbeat sound effect. One red stiletto hits the floor. Cut to blood dripping from a bone saw."
I feel like I’m high. Not from drugs. From the thrill of control.
This time, I’ll be the one behind the mask.
The rush follows me out of the barn, buzzing under my skin like static. I feel lit up, not the way I do after a good show or toe-curling orgasm, but more intense. Like I’ve tapped into something feral and crazy.
By the time I get home, the sun has dropped low enough to set my living room aglow in shadowy hues of orange. I don’t even take off my coat. I head straight to the closet, dragging out the storage bins I haven’t opened in a while. One by one, I flip them open, peeling back layers of plastic and old packing paper. The scent hits me first; latex, dust, and the faintest trace of fake blood that never quite washes out. I breathe it in like it’s incense.
I start laying everything out on the floor. The latex hearts from that zombie short I shot three months ago still hold their shape. The blood packs are a little sticky around the edges, but intact. I find a coil of rusted chain leftover from another project; a bondage shoot I did in an abandoned textile mill. I spread it all before me, fingers twitching with the need to begin.
I strip off my coat and move to sit cross-legged in the middle of the chaos, pulling out a ceramic bowl and a wooden stirrer. I mix the glycerin first, slow and steady, then add deep red food coloring and a dab of blue to kill the brightness. Cocoa powder goes in next, for texture, for realism. I stir until it thickens, until it clings to the spoon like fresh blood. I test a drip down the side of one heart, watching the way it slides, catches, pools.
Perfect.
Outside, the sky darkens to bruised purple, but I don’t reach for the light switch. I flick on my ring light instead. It halos the mess in front of me, casting long shadows across the floor that make the scene look like a crime already in progress.
I stare at what I’ve created, what I’m still creating. And for a second, I feel like a damn artist.
Texas Chainsaw Massacre is the theme.
A few more little details and we’ll be good to go. I soak cheesecloth in blood and string it from the shower curtain to mimic flayed skin. Then I dig out the old bone saw from the Halloween box and check the fake edge, before coating it with the tacky red mixture for more theatrical attention.
I step outside, crouch low to the ground, and set the camera on the edge of the stoop. The wind smells like rain and car exhaust. I test the shot with a few practice clicks. The blade scrapes against the sidewalk just right.
The camera clicks on.
I drag the saw slowly across the pavement, leaving behind a thick trail of red that creeps into the cracks. My fingers glisten, wet and sticky, and when I lift one to my mouth and suck it clean, I catch sight of movement in a window across the street.
I giggle under my breath.
If anyone’s watching, I hope they’re horrified. Or maybe intrigued. Either way, they’re getting a show.
I cut the footage and step back inside, the blood drying tacky on my fingers. It’s sticky, twisted, but beautiful.
The mask arrivesin the mail two days later. It’s grotesque and human-like. Faux flesh stretched over molded latex, with jagged stitching along the jaw and an uneven patchwork of skin tones. The eye holes are wide and empty, cut just enough to show a glint of what's beneath. It’s a replica of the original Leatherface look, down to the crude texture and the way it slumps slightly, like it’s too heavy for the face it’s meant to cover.
I slip it on in front of the mirror and watch myself disappear.
I don’t speak.
I don’t have to.
