Trigger warning: Domestic abuse, murder, police violence, mental illness, miscarriage
Tina believed in monsters. She’d been hunted by one and was being hunted still. His name was Johnny. A patient predator who possessed a talent for deploying psychological warfare against his prey. He was the worst type of monster, feeding off the pain and terror he inflicted. Like a cat toying with a mouse, he allowed his victim to hope, devastating their spirit when he took it away.
After five years of enduring Johnny, Tina was exhausted and her spirit hung by a thread. He was near; she felt his presence like a sixth sense. The oppressive Georgia heat felt like his hot breath on her neck and goosebumps rose on her arms. She searched the parking lot as she fumbled with the key in her vehicle’s lock.
Once locked inside the cab, she noticed the altered position of the visor. Spasms of fear shook her and she clung to the steering wheel for control. Locks couldn’t stop the monster. He left traces of his presence to taunt her. Tiny bread crumbs only she could decipher. When she shared this evidence of his stalking with friends and family members, they dismissed her proof and called her paranoid. They didn’t understand.
Before Johnny, she thought like them. She never imagined the monster’s innate ability to sniff out weakness. Despite the mask she wore to hide her mental illness and tattered self-esteem from the world after her divorce, he found her. His animal instinct drove him to her as he followed the scent of her vulnerability.
The monster was a master at camouflage. By the time she discovered his true nature, he had isolated her and begun eating away at her life. Mysterious posts on her social media caused her to lose friends. Too many mistakes and missed days led to her firing. The money in her accounts disappeared overnight. When she went to the authorities and begged for help, they judged her for letting him in and told her nothing could be done. Once the predator sunk his teeth into you, the only escape was death—yours or his.
Tina drove to her crumbling cottage and lingered in her truck. Her house reeked of him. His evil lived within its walls and clawed at her mind. He marked it as his territory soon after she made the mistake of allowing him inside. Just as he marked her. He would come here to finish what he set in motion years ago. She bolstered her courage and went inside before the light faded to night.
With a trembling hand, Tina lit a sage candle. The golden flame banished the shadows hiding in the corners and released its purifying scent. He promised to ruin her life, drive her to insanity, and make her kill herself. Her loose-fitting clothes, pale complexion, and sunken eyes were a testament to how close he was to fulfilling his vow.
Fear and starvation gnawed at her stomach. She opened the food cabinet and shrunk back in horror at the sight of the vodka bottle. “No!” She cried out and tears welled in her eyes. Her throat burned as she relived how he forced her to drink the liquid to ingest the pills, killing the tiny life inside her. Afterward, he called her unfit and drove away in her car. She snatched the bottle, ran outside, and smashed it on the drive. The bottle was a warning. He would come to kill her tonight.
Shaking, she unscrewed the cap on her last two-liter bottle of cola for some much-needed calories. It would take all the strength she could muster to stay alive. He expected her to stick to her habit of taking sleeping pills to escape from the nightmares haunting her every night. But tonight, she would fight back.
She grabbed the largest knife from the wooden block on the counter. The flickering light of the candle held the darkness at bay as she carried it along the narrow hallway to her bedroom. Tucking the knife beneath her pillow, she blew out the candle and lay motionless on her bed to wait. The odds were stacked against her, but she clung to her last fragment of hope.
How would he do it? It was less painful to be choked than when he bashed her head against the walls, and both were better than when he held her underwater in the tub. She clung to the handle of the weapon beneath her pillow like a lifeline, anxiously awaiting the monster’s arrival.
The ticking sound of her grandmother’s mantle clock counted out the minutes. For what felt like an eternity she stared into the dark abyss of night, waiting for signs of his approach. She heard his steps slow and deliberate in the hallway, accompanied by a rattling sound. Her skin tingled as he advanced and the panic engulfed her. Every fiber of her body ached to run. She bit her lip to keep from screaming and the taste of blood filled her mouth.
Fighting for control, she held her breath. The low groan of the floorboards signaled his arrival in her bedroom. His familiar stench of fried food and stale beer filled her nostrils and she feared she would wretch. The rattling ceased, replaced by an eerie silence as he stood above her.
Adrenalin coursed inside her. Tina launched herself from the covers and swung the knife across his body with the ferocity of a cornered animal. A sharp crash and a chilling scream pierced the air as he clutched his arm, dropping an object that clattered under her bed. She grasped her weapon with both hands and swung again. The blade sliced deep into his neck. He stumbled back and crumpled onto the floor.
Tina bounded across the bed and out of the room, slamming the door to trap the evil inside. She flicked on the lights, gripping the bloody knife, her eyes glued to the door because she expected him to crash through it like monsters in the movies. The house remained still. She called 911. “I have a restraining order on my ex-boyfriend, Johnny. He’s here and tried to kill me,” she said, breathless.
The metronome of the clock grew louder as she answered the operator’s many questions. No. She didn’t know if he was still in the house, but thought he was. Yes. He might be dead, but she was uncertain. When they told her to go some place safe, she cackled.
As she waited for help to arrive, a lightness filled her. She was free. Everyone must believe her now. They would know she was not delusional or paranoid. She could rebuild her life without fear. A celebration was in order.
After placing the knife on the countertop, she scrubbed her hands in the sink and splashed cold water over her face. She poured a glass of cola and used a butter knife to scoop out the last morsels of peanut butter from its container, eating it straight off the flat edge of the blade. Tina savored each bite as it melted on her tongue, a soothing answer to her dire hunger.
There was a knock at the door. Tina walked to answer it, licking the peanut butter from the utensil in her hand. When she opened the door, the police officer standing on her porch drew his weapon and shouted, “Drop the knife.”
Panic flooded over Tina, and instinct took hold. She whipped her head around to look behind her as she moved to run outside. What a fool she was to let down her guard. Bang! The sound echoed in her skull as the officer emptied his gun. Her progress stopped as blows pummeled her torso. She fell face-first onto the porch, stunned.
Pain wracked her body. The front of her shirt clung to her and felt wet. “Help, I can’t breathe,” she moaned as she tried to make sense of her situation. Sirens wailed in the distance. She closed her eyes and willed herself to hang on.
Lights blazing, Patrolman King left his vehicle next to the cruiser parked on the scene and raced to the front of the house, drawing his weapon. Officer Charles stared at the pool of blood growing around the woman’s body lying on the porch. “I had no choice. She came at me with that weapon.” He stammered, pointing to a spot near the body.
“What weapon?” King asked. He moved to the spot where Charles pointed and knelt to inspect the object. “This butter knife?” He said, his voice filled with recrimination.
Charles’s face contorted as he looked at the weapon in his hand. “That woman was crazy.”
“What about her ex? Is he gone? Did you check the house? Did you call in the shooting?” King asked.
Charles blinked at him. “I don’t know.”
“I’m going in. Try not to make things worse,” King said as he stepped over the body. He moved deliberately through the space. When he spotted a bloody knife on the counter, his pulse quickened. He moved along the hallway, confirming each space was clear before he opened the door at the end and turned on the light.
What he saw made him draw in his breath. A body was on the floor in a pool of blood surrounded by shards of broken glass. More blood spattered across the wall and rumpled bed covers. He knelt near to the body and spied a prescription bottle under the bed. The label identified the contents as prescription sleeping pills for John Allman. But when he spilled the contents into his hand, it was a lethal mix that included fentanyl. He stowed the bottle in his pocket and left.
King returned to the front entrance of the house, dangling the bloody knife between two fingertips. “We’re gaining an audience,” he said to Charles, nodding at the neighbors gathered in the street. “Get an evidence bag for this knife she attacked you with. I’ll get rid of the other one and call this in.” He nudged the woman’s bare right foot with his boot, shifting it forward past the doorway. Tina stirred when a jolt of searing pain erupted from her foot, forcing her back into consciousness. Her mouth was dry and her lips felt glued together. Two people were talking. She struggled to comprehend their words through the fog that permeated her mind. With a sudden grasp, she realized they were talking about her. The words murder and suicide by cop oozed through the haze and caused a primal scream to explode in her mind, creating a moment of clarity. Johnny had won. She surrendered to the darkness, and her last thought was death wasn’t enough to escape from monsters. She killed one, and two more took his place.
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