The loud hack of the blade separating skin and muscle, completely tearing apart his carotid and splintering his spine, rips through the air in the form of my own punishment.
My eyelids twitch, expelling drips that try to race down my cheeks. But my palm is slamming over my mouth to silence a yelp, causing the evidence of my discomfort to puddle along my finger and drain over the back of my hand.
It’s like I’ve seen this before, though. And not in a movie. I’m usually alone in my room when everyone sorts through the VHS tapes for a movie night.
It’s shocking, of course. And it twists my stomach to watch Junior’s lifeless face hang to the left with the weight of his head only being halfway attached.
But the blood that has sprayed back on Razor’s painted face is familiar.
The raw, animalistic thirst deepening his still expression is a memory.
One that I don’t have access to. Not in my own mind.
It feels like I don’t even have one right now. There are no background noises to distract me, and the spotlight is swollen against the black I’m swimming in, only allowing me to retain one thing as Razor dislodges the axe and makes one more clean strike that sends Junior’s head rolling across my stage.
And that thought isI’m in love with a monster.
“Bunny, focus on me, baby,” he growls, stiffly lowering the dripping axe to his side and hanging his head back, exposing his prominent Adam’s apple.
I am. That’s the issue I’m having. I’m not screaming and vomiting and peeling my skin up over the decapitated head or the headless body collapsing heavily by his feet.
It’s just him. The water welled in my eyes is framing him, like my body is making an extra effort to remember how he looks in this moment, how rigid his muscles are beneath the tight, black long sleeve, how the mixture of crimson and scarlet enhance the golden hue of his irises… in case I lose this, too.
“No, I’m sorry,’’ I shake my head, my words hot and muffled behind my palm.
I quickly backpedal, willing myself to turn around and run before I can catch a glimpse of the ache of my rejection in his eyes.
It’s incredibly painful watching him do something like that and not hating him for it, not being repulsed or disgusted with his psychotic barbarism.
I only feel it for myself for romanticizing him.
Fetishizing, even.
Running out of the curtains, my arm trashes back to quickly close them and I grab the A-Frame chalkboard, lifting it up and hauling it over to the entrance with a pit in my chest.
I’m a monster, too.
Instead of yelling for help, I’m diverting people from entering and walking off—as if I didn’t just officially earn the titleFinal Girlin my own horror film.
I’m sorry for crying so much. And complaining. I’m just this annoying walking dunk tank, and under the right pressure, this big crash makes me spill over.
Like… it is right now.
I wipe my face, sniffling back my sinuses, and continue a laggard walk through the chaos of entertainment.
“Roslyn…”
The deep whisper stretching through my ear furrows my brows, adrenaline spiking through my heart and dropping the temperature in my limbs. I pivot, scanning faces that are coming and going. But no one’s close enough. And no one’s paying attention to me.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
RAZOR
Iron’s staining the inside of my nose. So deep, the acrid punch is resting on my tongue and dripping down my throat, awakening an urge I keep asleep.
Heaving for air, the prominent odor amplifies. It’s flashing and flickering bright lights that tear through the black I’ve been absorbed in.
I feel myself staggering back, my weight sinking through my fucking heels and tugging my chest toward the ground, leaving my posture something inhumane, like a beast stuck in a small cage.
