The Suicidal Stoplight

Alright so I know I haven't been on in a while but I have been writing a bit and I have a bunch of ideas! This was one I had when I was thinking of an essay that I edited for a friend of mine! So here is "The Suicidal Stoplight"!



Red green yellow. Red green yellow. That's my life. Make the people go, make them slow down, make them stop. That's all I do everyday. Who is that over there, you ask? That's Steve. He is the opposite of me. When he stops, I go. When he goes, I stop. I have to pay close attention to his moves so I know when to make my moves. If I go at the wrong time, those people down there get hurt. I also have to be sure that I don't go even when he is yellow. I have to be sure to wait because those people seem to speed up when either of us is yellow so that's when we have to be extra careful. It is my job to make sure nothing gets hurt. Lately, though, I haven been growing tired of my job. People sit in their machines and yell at me when I take too long to turn green or they yell at me if I turn red too quickly. I don't know what to do to make these people happy. I try to make the red shorter or the green longer, but then Steve gets angry because I'm not following the schedule. We have to go at specific times to stick to the schedule; there is a traffic schedule and a no-traffic schedule. It's different for every hour of every day. Even with this difference it gets tedious with just red green yellow... Red green yellow. With people making those faces. How can I make everyone happy? I just can't do it! Even Steve gets angry with me. What do these people want from me? Can't everyone just be happy? I can't deal with this anymore. I want to go on my own schedule, I don't have to listen to Steve! Green! Red! Now yellow! Now I'm just going to stay yellow for 5 minutes, see what that does! Now red again! Ha take that! Look at those two suckers crash into each other. That's what they get for looking at me with their ugly faces! For being angry with me all the time. It isn't my fault if you are late or in a bad mood so don't take it out on me! Screw you guys. I can't take this anymore! That's it... Red green red green red green red green red green. Ahhh finally a machine oming straight for me... This should end me once and for all. Yes he hit me with the side of his car! Perfect! Oh I think I'm falling over...over.. And I'm down! I feel my mind slowly shutting down, my lights turning off for the last time... I'm... Going....... Good bye all you ugly peop.... Gone.


A month later

Ahhh good morning world! Wait... Steve? Is that Steve? No... Why am I here? I died... my brain turned off, I fell over... I was done with this life! Why me....? Why.....? Red... Green... Yellow...

Getting Fired

So this was another thing I wrote in the "642 things to write about" book, that I had fun writing! The prompt was, "Write a scene in which a woman is fired after only a week on the job. Just a week earlier, the same person who is now firing her was very persuasive in convincing her to take the job", and I wasn't sure I would like writing it. But then an idea came and I enjoyed it very much! Though I am sure the publishers of this book didn't have these types of scenarios in mind, I really love writing about all these prompts!

                                                            Getting Fired
"I'm sorry to be the one to tell you this, Shelly, but we are going to have to let you go. I thought... I thought you were much smarter then you have proven yourself to be. You... just... can't do anything, you can't learn anything... In your interview you seemed perfect! You are a really great liar I guess. I thought you were genuine, I thought you were exactly what you told me. But... I just don't get it. I have told you the same thing four times in a row and yet you still don't get it. Are you an actress or something? Is that how you get these jobs that you listed on your resume?"

Simon continued to rattle on like the asshole he was. This douche-bag had begged me... begged me! To take this job. I didn't trick him or lie to him in any way. He knows everything about my past and he still begged me to take this job. Told me I was perfect for it, that I would fit right in. He obviously just wanted to get into my pants and nothing more. Ugh, what a pig. He never even trained me, hell I haven't even seen him since I started. He has no idea how I am doing here and is just firing me because I won't sleep with him.

Shelly stared at the letter opener on Simon's desk while thinking these thoughts. Before she knew what was happening, she grabbed the letter opener and shoved it into Simon's right eye. A smirk lit up her face as the word "bitch" followed her out the door.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MARK!!!!!!!! Also-ST Chapter 7!

Yay! Personalized bday post for Mark.. haha I hope you have a great bday! =)

But here is the next Chapter! Woo! I think I am close to be doing with ST.. Though I love it so and it was going to be a longer novel, the more I think about it the more I see it is meant to be a shorter story.. so we will see! I love my characters, and I do know what the next book is going to be about so who knows! Anyways, enjoy!

            Priscilla led me out of the store, the other people following to go to their separate homes. Before the boy and his sister left, I felt him tug at my sleeve. “Hey mister… my name is Matthew, and this is my sister Jessica. Hope you like it here!” With that he ran off, trying to catch up with his bigger sister with the longer steps. I smirked, already liking this town. Priscilla showed me an empty apartment, which I rented out right away. I could definitely live her for a long time. It was a simple town with simple people and I knew they would leave me alone if I wanted them to, despite how small it was. I was able to blend in quite easily, disguising my feedings as hunting trips, as the men in Tramden were want to do. In order to satisfy my hunger, I would leave for three days at a time, getting as much deer as I possibly could to hold me off until my next three day trek. I would tell people, if they asked, that I was just going on a short hunting trip, and as long as I brought back a carcass every now and again, no one asked questions. I was even able to buy myself a set of new knives, having lost my previous set in the last town, claiming they were for hunting when in fact they were my weapon of choice in a fight. I never knew if Valentine would come for me or if he would send some of his lackey’s, I wasn’t that great in hand to hand combat, but I was decent with a knife. .

            I had been in Tramden for about a year when everything started to change. I didn’t even notice it at first; I had gotten so comfortable in the town that I had let myself go. I could no longer hone my sense as well as I used to be able to and I was barely able to read anyone’s mind anymore. Because I grew comfortable, my power grew weaker, as a human body grow weaker without exercise. I had made a few friends in Tramden, people I was on a “Hi, how is your day going?” basis; Matthew being my constant companion. He was always coming over showing me the latest toy his grandma had gotten him, trailing me wherever I went, offering to help and chatting away on whatever topic he could think of. When I found out it was Valentine that had killed his parent’s, my hatred for Valentine only grew. If I had only known what he was going to do, I would have left this town and Matthew behind. Unfortunately, with me not using any of my skills, I didn’t even notice when Valentine starting coming back to town. I never saw him physically and even though my mind wasn’t shielded, his was. I had grown way to weak to even notice someone prying into my thoughts. I started noticing the changes when I was coming back from a hunting trip one day. I was walking through town, which was surprisingly empty, when I felt something hit the back of my head. “What the…”I turned quickly around, but didn’t see anything. I looked down and saw a rock by my feet. Had someone just thrown a rock at me? I thought it must have been a mistake and made my way back to my apartment, the incident leaving my mind.

            The next evening, a similar incident happened. I was walking to one of the stores in a once again empty town, when something large hit my back. I spun around, trying to see who had done it, but again saw nothing, my movements to slow. This time on the floor at my feet was a two-by-four. “What the hell is going on?” I tried looking through the shadows, but couldn’t hone my sight enough to discern anything but more shadows. I turned away from the store and headed home instead, sticking to darker shadows, blending with them so I wouldn’t stand out; at least I could still do that much. As I got closer to my home a realization hit; I was losing my power. It was fading from me because I had let myself get too comfortable. I needed to get back into shape, I needed to be ready at all times.

            I stayed in my apartment the rest of that night and well into the next day. I didn’t want to go out anymore and definitely not during the middle of the day when I would be at my weakest. I finally was able to fall asleep somewhere around noon, my body taking over because it needed the rest. A few hours later, I was woken by a loud pounding on my door. I sat up in bed, shook my head and squinted towards the door. It wasn’t someone knocking on it, it was someone throwing things at it. I could hear the murmur of a crown outside and I tried to focus my mind on the murmurs, but all I got was the color red. “Shit”, I thought, that meant all they had was death and murder on their minds; this was not a good sign. I got up, dressed and went to the door. The pounding had stopped; it was as if they knew I was going to come out. I opened the door and on the ground in front of my building stood every person who lived in Tramden. They all looked at me with death on their minds and fear in their eyes and yet I had no idea what was going on. I heard a loud, shrill scream come from the back of the crowd and the people parted, letting Priscilla through. She was covered in blood and holding something in her hands, crying and screaming at the same time. As a creature losing his power, I knew it would be a bad idea to get cornered by this crowd, so I walked downstairs, Priscilla and the mob in front of my, the empty town behind me.

           

            “How… could you? How could you? Howcouldyou howcouldyou howcouldyou…” Priscilla was repeating that over and over in that high voice of hers, screaming in between each question. She continued to walk towards me with the thing in her hands; the thing that was dripping blood onto the dirt. When she got close enough I could finally see what it was. I gasped, trying to comprehend. No… it couldn’t be… it just couldn’t be… would he really stoop to this level? Just to torture me? I reached out to touch him, to touch Matthew, a kid so young he didn’t know better but to befriend a monster like me, a monster that led to his undoing. I felt sick as I noticed his face was grinning, as if Valentine had pushed the corners of Matthew’s mouth into a smile just to mock me. Both of Matthew’s eyes were gone, Valentine enjoying a snack it seemed, making the smile even more gruesome. As one last “gift” to me, Valentine had slit his throat. Instead of drinking all the blood and saving Matthew from a horrible death, Valentine had let him bleed out, making him suffer. I fell to my knees in front of them, red tears running down my cheeks. I had never meant for this…

            “You were his son? And you said you didn’t even know him? How could you betray us? How could you do this to Matthew? Now his sister has no one!” She threw his corpse at my feet and I reached out to stroke Matthew’s cold cheek, not sure what my next move was. The mob then all started screaming at me, calling me names, threatening me, raising clubs and bats in my direction. The anger that hit me was instantaneous. I didn’t fucking do all this, how dare they blame me. I would never hurt anyone let alone a child. A child I called my friend and bought toys for.  It was only monsters like Valentine who would do that. I could feel my fangs grow and I knew my pupils had gone completely black. My veins were pulsing with the anger running through me. I had a thought then. An evil thought. Valentine had made me like him so that I didn’t have to put up with shit like this, so I didn’t have to deal with humans and have their emotions. I stood up, my heart racing from the anger in my blood. Without even looking, I shoved my hand into the chest of the person closest to me and ripped out their heart. At least I had my strength, no matter how relaxed I had become. I looked at who it was; oh… John. He had always been a pleasant fellow. Well… not anymore. He had comical look of surprise on his face as he fell backwards. No one tried to catch him. The mob got quiet then, terrified of me as I brought the heart to my mouth, ready to finally have my first taste of human blood. I felt the red drain out of their minds and heard the laughter in mine. I knew you had it in you. Now finish them all off.

            I snapped out of my anger as soon as I heard his voice in my head. I shook my head, as if waking from a dream. I looked at the heart in my hand in horror. ‘Oh God… what have I done’. Had Valentine made me do this?  I looked back to the mob, now just a crowd of scared people more than a mob. Red tears ran down my cheeks again as I dropped the heart; I heard an audible ‘plop’ as it hit the dirt. Someone in the crowd started to cry; probably John’s wife. I looked around at the people again, the people who had trusted me, who I had grown fond of.

            “I never meant for any of this to happen…” I whispered this, but I thrust the thought in everyone’s mind so they heard it clearly. I stepped back a few paces, took a couple running steps then leaped over the crowd, the people gasping as I cleared their heads. “Please believe me when I say that…” with that last comment I turned and ran out of Tramden, Valentine’s laughter never leaving my head.

The Ransom Note

Actually, instead of Chapter 7, I am posting this! I got "642 things to write about" for Christmas (from my fiance! yay!) And I just wrote this little story and I thought it was fun, so I am posting it here! yay! ha

The Ransom Note

I picked up the envelope, the front just saying “Stan”, on it. I opened it, my mouth gaping in horror as I read what appeared to be a ransom note. “I have your wife and kids. This is what you get for working so many hours and never being home. Be at this address in exactly two hours or I torture and kill your family.”

I let out a strangled cry, the tears already flowing, and looked at the address. It was in San Diego, about two hours away. No time to call the cops, I just had to get there. I could do this on my own, I could save my family.

I jumped in my car and started driving, calling my wife’s cell phone every ten minutes, trying to get a hold of somebody, anybody. After an hour and a half, a deep voice answered my wife’s phone; “Only thirty minutes left”, it said mocking me, then hung out.

I threw the phone angrily across the car and sped up just a little bit.

Finally, I arrived at the address. It was an old, dark restaurant in the Gas Lamp District. I cautiously opened the door, spitting out a quiet “hello?” before being blinded by a million light bulbs and a crowd of people laughing and screaming “Surprise!” into my face. Oh… I am going to kill my wife for this…

ST Chapter 6 (and other stuff)

Sorry Mark, you were taking too long to read chapter 5, so I am posting chapter 6! ha I might even do chapter 7 today as well.. I really like chapter 7... heh

On another note, I don't know how much longer I can have two jobs.. I really am on the verge of just up and quitting my second job (despite the good reading/writing time I get in..heh), though sadly I don't think I would ever be that irresponsible.. sigh to being an adult.. But my cracks are starting to show at my first job, which I like a million times more, but I am not hitting my numbers, or barely hitting them.. I am so tired that I just don't care and just want to help the customer get on their way... Just a couple more days and I can talk to the store manager.. though the position that opened has already been filled from another store.. so stupid.. me and the other person are way more qualified, and why the f would you look at another store first?! makes me so angry!! So we will see if he has a time-frame... if it is longer then a month or so, then bye bye first job.. =( I just can't do two jobs anymore.. it is wearing me thin and I don't like not hitting my goals.. I am stressed to the point that I cry at everything.. sigh..

anyways.. on to chapter 6!

            As soon as I entered the trees, I felt the weight lift from my mind. Gone… he was finally gone. I found the nearest fern and started to dig a shallow grave underneath it. The bush was big enough to block from the sun when it rose, but the grave was just in case. I was exhausted once I had dug the grave so I lied down, covered as much of myself with dirt as possible and immediately fell asleep. I knew my body would wake me up when it needed to feed and when it was dark enough for me to be able to walk around.

            Twelve hours later I came out of my coma-like sleep. I was extremely weak and needed to feed, needing the strength to get me to the next town. First, though, I wanted to see where I was. I dug myself out of the dirt and walked for about a mile until I came to the tallest redwood in the area. I scaled the tree, as quickly as my weakened body would let me and soon came to the very top. I balanced on the tip of the tree and looked around me, realizing I had just come west of Tamrack. With some relief I saw I had not gone too far out of my way, I just had to make my way back east a little then head south so that I could get to Tramden. Even though I knew this was still fairly close, I needed somewhere to stay until I could regain my strength. I thought (wrongly) that Valentine would leave me alone since he had destroyed the last place I had been at.

            I jumped down, branch to branch until I reached the ground. Once there, I dampened all my other senses so that I could focus on the smells around me; it was time to feed. I started walking at a low crouch, not wanting to startle any prey. My favorites were the young deers; they were very easy to capture and they tasted so delicious, full of youth and energy. Finally, after walking for another mile, I smelled a young deer, two miles to my right. I turned walked silently in the direction of my prey. My throat clenched as I got closer, the thought of the taste of the young deer exciting me greatly. I had the deer in my sights after another minute and crouched even lower to the ground; I couldn’t  run the risk of the deer getting away. I walked as close to the deer as I could, but my excitement for my food made me forget to keep silent. The deer heard me and looked around, trying to spot me. I saw a split second before she even knew what she was going to do, that she was going to bolt. Before her front legs even had a chance to leave the ground, I was on her, digging in, tooth and nail (as the saying goes). Her life began to flow out of her and into my mouth as she tried once, weakly, to throw me and then completely stopped moving; I had drained her dry. That deer had given her life to give me my strength back and I now knew that I could make it to Tramden with no problems.

            I still kept to the trees for my trek to Tramden; I didn’t want to give Valentine easy access to me in case he came looking for me. I got to Tramden in just under a few hours, with the sun just barely starting to set. This was a town that reminded me of Tombstone; with stores to the left and right of one wide road down the middle, with everyone living in little apartments above the stores. I expected to see a lot of people milling about; this time of day being the busiest in towns like these, but it was completely empty and silent. It was a little eerie, but I didn’t want to go anywhere else, so I took my chances. I walked slowly down the middle of town, the sun hurting after just a few seconds. I didn’t want to run the risk of burning right in the middle of town, so I went into the first store I saw with an open door. I stood in the shade, letting my skin heal while I looked around the store. “Hello?” I heard their thoughts, but didn’t see any actual people. I heard some shuffling behind the counter in front of me, so I walked over to see about ten people huddling together, hiding behind it.

            “Um… hello? Are you guys OK? I was just passing through, needed a place to stay…”

            “Are you… him? The evil one?” A little boy asked, with tears running down his cheeks. A young girl, whom I knew was his sister after hearing her thoughts, grabbed him and frantically pulled him besides her, covering his mouth and looking at me with pure terror in her eyes.

            “The evil one? What’s that?” I could almost guess who it was, but I had to make sure they never found out that I knew. The group sighed audibly and I heard a jumble of their thoughts go through my head; thoughts of this “evil one” and of wondering who I was. An older woman pushed her way to the front of the crowd, and I knew that she was the important person in town.

            “The evil one… is a man we think. He has been comin’ to town these past 80 years. Ever since I was a little girl he has been terrorizin’ us, eatin’ our people right in front of us, showin’ his so called power to us. He even had his ‘protégé; come and select a few of us ‘lucky ones’ out for his taking. In fact…” She started to scrutinize my face so I clouded her mind, making me look different in her eyes. She shook her head, “Nah… nevahmin’. He was just here, threatin’ us, talkin’ ‘bout killin’ us and drinkin’ our blood or somethin’ like that. Thas why we’re all here, hidin’ from him. He hadn’t done nothin’ yet, just went on and on ‘bout what he could do to us, so we all ran. We heard ‘im talkin’ out there for a while, but no screams or nothin’ so I guess this time was all talk. And I guess he is gone now if he didn’t do nothin’ to you…” I shrugged and shook my head. “I didn’t see anything when I got here, the town was completely empty.”

The old woman grinned then, the frightening grin of an evil clown. I wasn’t about this little town, but I needed a day or two to rest up before I moved on. “Well then… name’s Priscilla. I run this town, if you wanna be stayin’ here, you go through me. How did you end up here anyways? And how come you ain’t got any stuff?”

            I realized with a start that I, in fact, didn’t have any stuff. I had left it all in Tamrack trying so desperately to get away from Valentine. “Oh… um… I am just a hunter and I move where the game is, so I go from town to town. I was out hunting a day ago; when I came back to my tent all my stuff was gone. Seems I got robbed.” I shrugged, “Luckily, I was close to this town so I walked about a mile to get here. I always keep my money in my pocket, so if I need money to rent a room, I have that.”  I nudged each of their minds so that they would believe me without question.

            The old woman still eyed me suspiciously, hesitating, as if she could feel my prying in her mind. All of a sudden the little boy spoke up; “He ain’t the evil one grandma! Let him stay!” The boy’s sister grabbed him again, angrily telling him to be quiet, that grandma would figure it out. The boy was staring at me so I winked at him and smiled. His face broke out into a huge grin and he giggled; his sister shushing him once more. Priscilla finally spoke; “Alright, you can stay.” I reached over to shake her hand, cringing as a sun ray hit my skin. I saw the little boy notice a trail of smoke raise from my hand where the sun hit, his eyes going wide, but I shook my head and winked again, hoping he wouldn’t speak up. Luckily for me, he kept quiet, winking back at me and I knew it was our little secret. I hoped for this boy’s sake, that Valentine would leave me and the town alone.

Sweet Torture- Chapter 5

I didn't like this chapter that much when I first wrote it, but now I kind of like it.. ha I am so weird.. anyways, enjoy! =)

CHAPTER 5

“Every once in a while, he’ll come into town and people’ll start disappearing. Everyone is too scared to do anything about it anymore; he has killed a few of us in broad daylight to prove his power, so we stay scared of him.” I blinked slowly, feeling as if I had just come out of a dream. I had been living with Valentine during this time and never even knew what had transpired. I remember now there was a time when he had been gone at night more than usual, but it never crossed my mind that he had found a lover; besides he was usually more into boys than girls; the proof in his blood room. What an interesting story that bartender had just told me, and I told him so. “Why don’t you guys just… I don’t know, gang up on him? Go to his place during the day and kill him? Chop off his head or something?” I saw the scared look in the bartender’s eyes at the very thought of this town standing up for themselves.

             “We have no idea how powerful this monster is, and we are a simple town and we don’t want any more problems than we already have. We might as well let him do his thing. What he did to Elianore… he could turn any one of us into one of his monsters and no one wants that. Valentine doesn’t seem to be picky, so everyone tries to stay out of his notice so he will leave them alone and hopefully just go for the bums. I know that sounds harsh, but if you were us, wouldn’t you think the same thing??” I shrugged then shook my head as I stood up; I couldn’t believe these people were so scared of him. I knew how powerful he was, however, so what they did was smart so they could stay alive. “Well thanks for the story my friend. At least now I know what I’m up against.” I finished the last of my beer and walked out of the bar. As I left, I heard the bartender tell the guy next to him, “That guy is crazy. We’ll probably never see him alive again. He is going to his death and he doesn’t even believe us.”

I heard the disappointment in his voice, but once again I pretended not to hear. The story kept running through my mind and I didn’t think I needed to hear anything from anyone else. My hotel was my destination now, wanting to get used to my surroundings. This wasn’t the best place, but it was a place I would stay for a while, as long as the people got used to me and didn’t notice that I only came out at night. I got to my room, and instead of coming with a plan, immediately fell asleep. Apparently being on the run is a tiring life.

            I woke up with fear in my mind, my dream of Valentine burning the bar down and killing everyone inside still haunting me. A shudder ran through me as I woke up, the burning smell not quite leaving my nose. I stretched and got out of bed, figured that I could go to the bar again and see if anyone else had any stories. I looked out my window and saw that the sun was setting, so it would be safe for me to leave the room. As soon as I stepped outside, the burning smell became ever more intense. It was like someone had shoved my face directly into a fire. I started choking on the smell, stumbling out of the doorway of the hotel. I saw a huge fireball coming from the bar I had been at the past two nights in a row. I started to run towards the bar, hoping that the people had at least been spared, that the dream wasn’t completely true. When I got there, I could still hear screaming from inside the fireball. I saw that the door had been barricaded and I could see the bartender’s hand trying to get free. His hand was scratching the wood even as his fleshed burned off and dripped to the ground. The scratching was driving nails into my brain but finally, as all the flesh dripped off and it was just the skeleton, the scratching stopped. The hand dropped the bartended finally dead. He had burned as he tried to escape, his hand the only thing that felt freedom. As I stood there, stunned, not sure what I could do, the screaming slowly got quieter and quieter, and then finally stopped. Everyone was dead. The smell of burning flesh engulfed me and as I began backing away from the smell, I heard his laughter in my head.

            “This is just the beginning, Drake…”  I felt Valentine in my head like a huge weight pressing down on my. My head felt like it was going to split in two. I was too weak to even think of fighting him and Elianore slipped my mind, his pressure not letting me think of anything else. I couldn’t stand him, I couldn’t stand what had just happened. All I wanted to do was get away and all I could think of to do was run; run away from Tamrack, into the trees, get as far away from there as possible so more people wouldn’t die because of me.

Sweet Torture- Chapter 4

I like this chapter because you learn a little more about Valentine and he is my favorite character.. ha

CHAPTER 4

            The sun on my face jerked me awake from my dreamless sleep. I can normally stay in the sun for about an hour, but when it was at its peak like this, that hour was cut in half. I got up and  stood in the ray of sunshine that fell through the window in my room, almost immediately feeling the pins and needles. What normal people feel when their limbs “fall asleep”, I feel every time I am in the sun, the main reason creatures like me can’t stay in the sun for very long. That feeling intensifies the longer we stay in the sun and eventually it becomes painful and we are rendered useless. Then, because we are helpless to the heat, our skin starts to boil, the boils eventually bursting, the skin melting off the bones, leaving us just a worthless skeleton. Then the skeleton turns to ash and blows away. I saw Valentine torture a fellow “monster” this way and it was not a pretty sight. I already knew my limit when it came to the sun, so I decided to stay indoors until it went down. I also wanted to find out as much as I could about Valentine, assuming the people here knew anything more about him, other then the fact he was a “monster”. Anything I could use against him I wanted to make sure I knew, just in case we ran into each other. Unfortunately, that running in was going to happen a lot sooner than I thought.

            When the sun had finally set, I ventured into town to find out what I wanted to find out. I had no idea where to start, but I thought the bar I had been at the night before would be the best place, since the bartender had been the one warning me against the “monster”. I figured he would have more of a story to tell then anyone else. And I was right. It was pretty easy to get him to talk too. One would think he had been dying to tell this story for years, and now finally someone was here to listen to it. All it took was one simple question; “So, this “monster” of yours… do you know anything else about it?” And the floodgates opened.

Well we think it is this creature by the name of Valentine. Every time he came to town, there seemed to be a lot of people dying, they looked to be either butchered or sucked dry. This big story was, that years ago, this Valentine character started coming here and around that same time, people started disappearing. We all thought it was the strangest thing because he never came during the day, only at night. Eventually, we noticed he started visiting one person in particular, Elianore. She was always a bizarre person, only wearing white, moping around town never talking to anyone. Never went farther than a few blocks away from her house and never went shopping anywhere. Her father was very protective, and his protectiveness seemed to turn Elianore into a waif of some sort. People eventually started whispering that she was a witch because late at night, her room light would be on and people could hear chanting come from her room. Some people even said they would see her, standing by her window, just staring out, her lips moving but no sound coming out. She wouldn’t even acknowledge people if they walked by her window and said “Hi”.

            Of course, this is all just hearsay, and it could have been a prayer she was chanting but who knows. As I said, she was a strange one. Anyways, Valentine took a liking to her and started going over to her place a night. For a while, people stopped disappearing, it was just animals that were disappearing, and everyone was OK with that. Animals are not as important as people, so we eventually forgot about Valentine and his nightly visits to Elianore. Then, people started whispering about Elianore again, saying how pale she was getting, how she never left her house anymore. She was listless and lethargic and didn’t want to do anything. People only saw her at night and they said she looked scary and a little more crazy that usual. The rumor came again that she was some sort of witch and that her and Valentine were sacrificing small animals to keep their youth. So this one night, Bill Jacobs, her neighbor, was walking home from work when he heard a noise, he said it sounded like dogs eating, in the alley running besides her house. He peered into the alley, thinking he should go home but curiosity got the best of him. He took a few steps, straining to see what it was that was going on. He let out a gasp because he had just seen what looked like two eyes, peering back at him. “Hello? Is someone there?” He heard a growl and thought that perhaps it was a dog, so he thought he should just leave. As he was getting ready to turn around, he saw a flash of a white garment. He thought that maybe this dog had attacked a child, so Bill walked deeper into the alley, thinking he could help. As he got closer, though he realized it was two people in the alley, with one person crouched over the other. “Hello? Do you guys need help?” The one on top looked up and Bill gasped again, this time in recognition; it was Elianore’s eyes staring back at him, a huge grin on her face and covered in blood. “Elianore?! What’s going on here?” Bill froze, not knowing if he should try and stop her, but afraid her hunger would turn on him. Elianore growled at Bill, leaping over Bill’s hand to land behind him and ran off leaving Bill in a daze. He walked slowly over to the other body, felt for a pulse and found none. He stared at the blood on his hand. “Poor John Stunf. He was only 17 and he was infatuated with that girl.” Still staring at his hand, Bill started walking towards the bar, unsure of what else to do or where else to go. He knew he had to tell someone and the first place he thought of was the bar.

            We didn’t believe him, at first. Elianore? Kill someone? There was no way. But we searched high and low for her and finally found her at her house, covered in blood and we could only assume it was John’s… who else’s would it be? She didn’t deny it when we accused her, which was consent in our eyes. Her parents resisted us, saying she was fine that nothing needed to be done; that she was just going through a phase. But we knew her parent’s were wrong, that something did need to be done to stop her. We couldn’t stand by while Elianore killed more people. We knocked her parents out and locked them in one of the rooms then when for Elianore. She didn’t even resist us when we grabbed her and tied her up; it was like she wanted us to kill her. We argued a bit over what should be done to her, but since everyone agreed she was a witch of sorts, we settled on taking her to the lake. Now, usually with witches, you want to drown them to make sure they are good and dead. So we tried to drown Elianore, kept her under that water for a good 20 minutes, but she was still alive so we did the one thing we could think of to make sure she was completely dead; we cut off her head. No one can stay alive after their head is cut off. We also burned the rest of her body, just in case. Some of had our doubts that she was just a witch, so we took all precautions. After that, we tried to kill Valentine, to corner him and burn him, but he was too powerful, killing half of us in his desperate attempt to get away. We knew it was him that had done this to her, who else could have made her that bad? He was the one visiting her every night doing Lord knows what! He claimed that she was the love of his life, that it was not his fault, that it was her choice. But why would Elianore choose a life of killing people? Who would choose a life of killing people? He never wanted it to turn out this way, he said, he never wanted her to kill people or for her to die. He said his heart was broken by what we had done and we would never be rid of him. But of course, we just ignored his warning, letting him escape after he killed half a dozen of us, seemingly without lifting his hands. He destroyed as many buildings on his way out as well, making sure we knew what he was capable of. We drove him out once,  but those of us that survived the ordeal haven’t tried again. This town almost didn’t survive after that and we are trying to now just live peaceful lives, so we ignore him the best we can.