Sinister Obsession | ONC 2024

4| The Phantom

The truck idles softly in the background as the necklace pendulates from its place looped around my finger. A stray ray of light from the dying sun hits the amethyst at the center and it blazes with a purple glow. It's beautiful, and the sight of it draws my thoughts to Eden.

She's pulling up to her little house by now, and one glance at my phone screen confirms it. It's moments like this I thoroughly enjoy my purchase of a drone. It can stalk and spy well before I can in certain situations such as this, all from the comfort of my smartphone.

It truly is game-changing.

As much as I love the view, I prefer observing myself. But with Eden being the only person living down the right split in the road, this is the best choice. I can't have her getting too suspicious this early or all the fun will spoil, and there's nothing I hate more than a sabotaged game.

I watch Eden make her way through small puddles and into her fenced-in yard. She stops to pet an excited tri-colored pitbull and my eyes narrow. The dog poses a slight problem, but it's nothing I can't get rid of altogether if need be. It definitely wouldn't be the first time one of my target's pets suddenly disappears without warning, and it wouldn't be the last.

Just because Eden captures my interest more than anyone else has in years doesn't mean she'll be treated any different.

If anything, it'll create a whole new level. One I have yet to reach. And I can't fucking wait.

Eden makes her way up the porch steps with the pit on her heels and I watch her moves carefully. Once she’s inside her home, a cord of anticipation wraps around my insides.

Here begins Eden's living nightmare. One that will never end.

Killing the truck, I tuck both my keys and Eden's pendant into the pocket of my jeans. It’ll take me about fifteen minutes as the crow flies to trek through the woods to her cabin. Less if I hurry.

With one push of a button, the drone begins its journey back to me and I begin my own hike through the soggy woods. The blood pumping through my heart courses through my veins like a wildfire. In seconds my body is aflame with only one thing able to put it out.

Eden.

My entire being craves to have her completely helpless and at my mercy. Her pitiful pleas will fall on deaf ears, but the demons warring inside the hell of my body will eat that shit up. They'll hush once her blood is spilled and, for a brief moment in time, the darkness filling my soul will be satiated and silent.

Then the hunger will return with the drive to kill and I'm a victim to its hold once more.

I have my father to thank for that. That fucker deserved to die at my hands, even though in doing so I became infected with the same evil that eventually drove him to beat my mother to death and me, a bloody pulp.

Never again would either of us ever feel the brunt of his fists or the sharpness of his tongue. I hope he's stuck in eternal torment of the worst kind somewhere for what he did to my mama. God rest her soul.

If there even is a God up there in the cosmos looking down on this hunk of rock floating in space.

This God probably hates me anyways. I take lives, something that's deemed His job, but my mother? She was the best thing on earth, and if he would have favor toward anyone or give any human rest, it should be her.

I march on and chew the inside of my cheek. The metallic tang of blood floods my taste buds but I don't stop. My mind swirls with memories of the horror that was my childhood as the anger rises in my chest like a phoenix from the ashes.

If I could, I'd bring my sperm donor back to life just to kill him again. This time, slowly, agonizingly, drawing out his pain like he did to me for years. Once he died, I'd do it all again. For as long as possible.

You hold a lot of hatred for someone you've turned into.

I draw in a lungful and pause.

I'm not my father. I'm much worse. A wraith in the night stealing away the lives of people who have everything I don't. Things that mean nothing to me now.

The voice in my head – my conscious or whatever the hell it is – can just shut the fuck up. It knows nothing.

Moss and grass uproot from the soil as I scuff my boots against the moist ground. The muted crunch of tiny twigs mixes in as I nearly slip on a patch of slippery old leaves.

Nature is beautiful, but just like us, it hides decay beneath the surface. From face value it's enchanting and peaceful. One slip up, though, and you've found yourself lost in the rotting corpses hiding just beyond eyesight.

My phone vibrates with the notification of the drone approaching and I exit the app. The moment I swap back to Google Maps, the small device hovers to me and I pluck it from the air. It powers down almost instantly and I tuck it away into the case poking out from the back of my jeans.

According to Maps, I'm only a few more minutes away from Eden. I glance up and my pulse quickens. Through the thinning trees sits a small cabin with a wooden fence encircling the front half.

The slam of a vehicle door snaps my focus from the porch to a white car parked near Eden's. A man stands beside it for a few seconds before he walks to the fence where the pit I saw earlier greets him.

Eden has a boyfriend. How sweet.

Except it isn't sweet at all. Heat grows in my stomach and my fists clench. It shouldn't matter if she belongs to someone, but it does. And I'm not sure which I hate more, the fact she's in a relationship or that it bothers me.

Either way, Eden is going to die. I'll just add him in as a package deal of sorts. Two for the price of one, BOGO if you will.

I lick my dry lips, my tongue slowly moving over the rough patches. Things aren't going exactly as planned, but it's not too big of a deal. All I need is a bit of patience to wait this out.

Because l will have Eden to myself tonight. No matter what I have to do to make it happen.