Don't Stop

by Lauren Biel

See, I like the sight and smell of blood—the life force within the veins of all things living—but I really love to taste it.

My mother used to make it, and it was my favorite meal. But that was before she realized how much she despised my very being and stopped making anything I enjoyed.

This is when a look of fear, disgust, or anger should replace the look on her face because I just smeared her blood on my fingers. But her eyebrows don’t furrow. Her lips don’t draw into a deep frown. She displays none of the usual reactions, and it’s fucking weird. Not even my own mother could control her discontent around me. This is so odd. Different. And I think I like the difference.

Speaking of death, if someone doesn’t taxidermy the fuck out of me when I die, I’ll stay and haunt them for all of eternity.

Instead, her finger moves to my chin and strokes my skin, gathering the blood. She brings it to her lips and puts it in her mouth, sucking on it. That one action has placed me squarely in the palm of her hand. If she told me to kill myself right now, I would do it.

I haven’t exactly toyed with murderous thoughts before—not seriously, anyway—but his idea sparks something in my brain. He’s just held a match to a dormant fuse inside me, and I wouldn’t mind leaving a little destruction in my wake when I detonate.

The mask only adds to the imagery, and when he grabs the baseball bat I keep behind the door and spins it at his side, he transforms into my perfect monster.

Fire

Nope, it’s real life—my very own pleasure-soaked purgatory.