*click* a blinding light flashes aggressively over what remains of a crow. It was spread out over the grassy ground, its whole-body pale and limp, feathers and blood covering it, one side of its skull freshly exposed, the other half still in its head. *click* another flash of light quickly appears and disappears over the corpse.
The light was coming from a strange girl. She had a well-used photography camera in hand, she was wearing a neutral green jacket that had buttons along both sides of the front, a black turtleneck sweater, her hair was long and dirty blond, and lastly, she was wearing a mask…
The mask…. It was white, it had this pink blush on it, no mouth, but the eyes… they were blank, almost dead… yet somehow you could see a bit of curiosity in them.
This strange girl is me. My name is… well you can just call me Post. I am a photographer, just with a bit of blood on my hands. Many do not approve of my method of photography, but the blood is necessary…
I looked at the photos on my camera that I had taken of the crow. They were all beautiful in their own way, but only one of them will help me show my message. I looked up again at the crow laying before me. Its eye socket in the skull was hallow, but the mouth had a sort of smile to it. I liked it, so I took out my knife from the holster on my leg and I began to slowly cut the skull out of the remains of the crow. Red was oozing out with each tear to its face. After a while I had gotten it out. It was cold….and peaceful. I placed it in one of my pockets.
“a nice addition.” I said to myself
I started to wander off into the forest again. There wasn’t much to do, so I decided to check out the small town nearby. I visit it almost every day, but I never actually set foot in it. Better to for me to not exist then to socialize and risk being found. The cops already are on my tail trying to find me through my posted photos.
I was on the edge of the forest. I walked around the edges of the town, trying to listen to people’s conversations so I could feel like I was talking to people. After a while I spotted a house that had a large moving truck in front of it. A girl with wavy ombre hair was moving large boxes from the back of the truck to the doorstep of the house for someone else to take. Another girl with similar hair came jogging over to the house. She stopped and glared at the girl with ombre hair.
“new in town?” she said
“yeah, I’m moving over here to live with my sister. I Just came all the way from Birmingham, So I’m looking forward to meeting everyone here.” They said with a British accent of sorts
The other girl walked toward the girl with ombre hair and smirked. “you have a name Brit?” she said
The girl with ombre hair seemed a bit taken aback by the other girl calling her a Brit, but answered non the less. “Laura.”
“well. Laura, welcome to Harrison. And just as a little word of advice: keep out of way, or else I’ll make your life a living hell.” She took a box out of the truck and stomped on it to misshapen it. The sound of something shattering came out of the box “see you in school Brit!” she turned around and jogged off into the distance.
Laura. Not really knowing how to respond just stood there for a moment before picking up the misshapen box and inspecting it to see what the other girl had broken.
“I’m already starting to think that moving here was a bad idea.” Said Laura
Thumbing sounds started coming towards Laura. She looked towards the direction and pushed the box she had been previously caring towards them. A set of hands picked it up and caried it into the house.
“Laura!” complained a voice “you’ve already broken something?”
“no. This girl came over to me and crushed the box! She was quite rude.” Laura said
“Laura that sounds pretty unlikely. Just…. Go have a look around town. There’s an ice cream parlor down the road, why don’t you go get some ice cream as you get familiar with the new place.” Said the same voice. It had come from a woman with the same wavy hair and nose as Laura. However, her eyes were very different to her.
“ok. Do you want me to get you some while I’m there?” asked Laura
“yes. Um… chocolate please.”
Laura handed the misshapen box to what seemed to be her sister. I watched her as she walked off farther into the town. “she’s beautiful.” I thought
I followed as closely as I could to Laura from the edge of the forest. She never really talked to anyone while she was walking around the town. She just walked over to the ice cream shop and ate her ice cream. Before she left, she got a chocolate ice cream like her sister wanted. I sat there next to a tree, watching. When Laura got up to leave and got an ice cream for her sister, I stepped on a dead leaf. It made an enthusiastic *crunch* sound. Laura jumped a bit and looked over at my direction. I hid behind another tree and tried my best to stay as quite as I could. She stared at my direction for a while before she continued walking. At that point I decided I would head home and later today I would see if I could get Laura to come outside at night somehow, then I would try to add some photos to my collection.
12:35pm
I was sat I my computer, with a photo editing program open on it. I looked down at the bottom right of my screen. Midnight. I grabbed the same neutral green hoodie I had worn earlier today and an old lantern. When I went off towards Laura’s house, I picked up a pack of small rocks along the way and put it in my pocket. About twelve minutes later I was at the small town. I put out the flame in the lantern and grabbed one of them. I figured Laura would still be awake because of the time difference, so I threw the rock at her window. Sure enough, she opened her curtains moments later looking for where it came from. I went along one side of the house and rang the doorbell. While she came running down to see who it was, I ran and threw another rock by a side of the house where there were no windows. She slowly crept outside towards the place I had just threw the last rock. I came behind her as quietly as I could and grabbed her. She was about to scream when I moved one of my hand on her mouth. She then started kicking and flailing, so I took out my knife and threatened it to her. In mear seconds she fell quiet and stopped kicking. I whispered in her ear: “don’t try anything or else you’re going to start seeing blood.” Laura shook her head up and down.
We went to the edge of the forest were I had put down my lantern. I let go of her for a second, so I could light the lantern, but she started to run back to her house. I bolted after her and sat on top of her. She cried out: “No!” as I turned her over and slit one of her wrists, she yelled out in pain. I put the knife back in its holder, held the lantern and grabbed Laura by the arm. She held her bleeding wrist as tears streamed down her face. I yanked her farther into the forest until we got close to my cabin. I shoved her back to the ground and took out my knife once more, I held it up, about to stab her, but I stopped. I stared at her for a moment. She looked up at me with her face pale, her hazel eyes watery, and the moon light shining on her. In that moment, for once in a long time I couldn’t kill this person, I moved back a bit and placed down the knife beside me. She looked at me still terrified, but this time a bit hopeful that she would not die. We both sat there for a moment before I sighed and stood up again.
“come on, let’s go…”
Laura did not stand up. “what are you going to do to me?” she asked
I paused for a second. “I’m not really sure yet.”
“are you still going to kill me?” she said
“no, I’ll take you back home tomorrow.” I said
I then grabbed her arm and dragged her into my cabin, were I sat her on my couch. I locked my door and went to a cabinet were I keep medical things. Soon I grabbed bandages and raped them around her cut wrist. She glared at me with a confused look on her face. I could tell she was tired from moving, having lack of sleep, and trying to escape from me. So, I put on a show for her to watch as I kept an eye on her. However, she did not really watch the show, instead she stared at me for a bit. After a while she was nodding her head, and her eyes would shut, then open. Pretty soon I was getting tired as well, so I made myself tea. Laura eventually passed out in exhaustion.
After she was asleep, I watched her a little while longer just to make sure she would not wake up. She didn’t, so I stood up and then sat back down on the other couch beside her. I looked down at the cup of tea in my hands.
“why couldn’t I kill you? What makes you different from everyone else that I’ve killed?” I asked myself out loud
In all honesty it was still a bit weird for me to have someone in my house, in fact it was even more weird for me to be talking to a person. I really haven’t talked to anyone sense my…parents….
I shook the painful memory from my head.
Anyways that’s not the important thing I need to be thinking about. I should be thinking about how I could make what Laura says about me seem like a lie. After a bit, of brainstorming I came up with dreadful another plan, I could wright a letter pretending to be a friend of Laura’s. I would place it in her mailbox saying how I enjoyed her spending a last-minute slumber party at my house and how I would love her to do it again sometime. That way her sister would see it, believe that she snuck out and that she came up with a lie as for why she was not there in the morning. After coming up with that, I spent a few minutes writing the letter.
Everything was now ready.
I looked up at some of the pictures I had taken that are now on the wall. Each one of them were pretty, but one was different. Unlike most of the pictures this one had a person in it who was alive. There was a boy in it with dirty blond hair. It was the last picture I took before I became known as Post. I stared at it for a moment. I sat there thinking about how I longed for the days before Post. It’s not that I don’t enjoy taking pictures of the things that I do, and it’s not that I don’t believe in the message I’m trying to make. It’s just that I miss how simple my life was back then.
I glanced back at Laura. And that’s when I came up with the final idea of the day. I would take one last photoshoot of a person alive. It would use the forest background to its advantage and show just how beautiful life could be…no- just how beautiful Laura could be.
She was already admittedly very pretty. Even in her messy hair and pajamas. Her hair was flowing down onto the couch and her graceful lips glinted from the moody lamp. I felt a bubbly sick feeling begin to appear in my stomach, as I gazed at the sight of her lips….
End of chapter 1
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