They Never Learn

by Layne Fargo

He’ll bask in her attention like a snake sunning itself on a rock, but he clearly doesn’t give a shit about her.

Reading was my most reliable escape in childhood, the one way I could get away from my father while still trapped in the same space with him.

So tonight I prepare: picking out the perfect outfit, shaving my legs, shaping my nails. All the things most women do to prepare for a date. But little do they know: killing a man is so much more satisfying than fucking a man could ever be.

how much easier it would be to kill with his help, his powerful hands holding men down while I finish them off. Blood spraying across Jasper’s skin like the dye is now.

We fuck until the water runs cold, and the whole time I’m imagining that the red sluicing over us is blood.

I’m not sure who I’m supposed to be, but I definitely don’t look like myself tonight. And isn’t that the whole point of Halloween?

I’m not an object or an obstacle to him anymore. I’m his goddamn ruination.

It’s exhausting, being in my head. I wish I could stop thinking. I wish I could be like everyone else.