Monster nosleep

It was almost suppertime. My stomach grumbled. I had been waiting for several hours. I didn't want to miss my opportunity so I had skipped breakfast and lunch.

He caught my eye from across the road sitting at a bus shelter. Dressed in a muted brown suit with worn black loafers, he sat quietly waiting for the bus. I cautiously observed him as I slowly walked towards the bus stop. He looks old...frail... Thinning gray hair, deep creases in his forehead, and sad pale eyes that stared at everything and nothing all at once. He had tired shoulders weighed down from just existing so long on this Earth. His hand rested on top of his knees, knuckles that looked too big for his fingers. His thumb gently grazed the crease of his worn pants as if tracing a memory with the tip of his finger. His body slowly rose and fell with a visible sigh. I approached the bus station unnoticed and I stood beside him just a couple feet away. I watched him from beneath my cap from the corner of my eye.

It was a holiday so the buses were running few and far between. He glanced at his watch tightly fastened on his wrist and glanced down the road and noticed me standing there. I looked away but could feel his gaze on the back of my head. I hear a shuffle of feet and a creak of the metal bench and then silence. He cleared his throat once, then twice, and then I hesitantly looked back at him. He was still looking at me and his eyes twinkled with something that could have been some sign of recognition but he looked away quickly and averted his eyes.

The bus came and he sat close to the door in the middle of the bus. I opted for the seat in the front and sat so that I could watch him from the mirror. I noticed him staring at the back of my head his mouth slightly ajar. He licked his lips nervously clutching the bar on the seat on front of him. He glanced again at his watch and pushed the button to be let off at the next station.

The bus slowly stopped and began to kneel as I got up and got off with him, he looked back at me nervously but I turned the other way and started walking the opposite direction. I heard his shuffling footsteps recede and smirked, quickly darting into the adjacent path between the trees. I crouched behind the pines and slowly scuttled back towards him making sure not to step on the dry pine needles. He looked back and stared hard, a frown deepening his already deep creases. He shook his head and brought his hand to his balding head and rubbed it as if to keep his reeling head from rolling off his own neck.

He turned back and shuffled on to his destination. I stuffed my cap into my back pocket and took my jacket off and threw it aside and pulled up the hood of my sweater over my head. I made sure the hood covered my face as I silently got back on the path behind him. His body stiffened as he heard my soft footsteps and swung his whole body around to face me. He looked surprised as he saw me with my face down as I passed him trying to catch a glimpse but to no avail. He shook his head again cleared his throat and continued on.

This would be a bit tricky and I would have to listen carefully but I tried to match his pace and 'follow’ him. Luckily for me, he was close to his final destination and I stopped to tie my shoes and glanced back to see him heading toward an almost empty strip mall and enter a business that had recently been shut down.

I waited an hour, then another, then another. I finally took a piece of homemade jerky that I had saved just in case. He finally emerged looking even more disheveled than when I was following him. He scanned the now empty parking lot once, twice, three times and finally exited locking the door behind him. He took a ratty handkerchief out and wiped his brow before carefully folding it putting it to his nose and closed his eyes looking as if he was indulging in a aromatic scent. His shoulders shuddered and then relaxed as he placed the handkerchief back into his breast pocket.

I didn't bother to follow him this time, I knew where he was going. I also finally found out where he went every day. He was careless, too comfortable, forgot to blend in.

It was close to 10 o’clock in the evening and cicadas we're chirping the last song of summer. He would sing his last song tonight as well. I had waited long enough.

I watched him through the window sitting with his wifr, eating a meal befit for a king. I watched them eat their meal. I watched her carefully carve up ham and place it in her mouth, chewing slowly, gently patting her lips with a napkin. I was starving by now and my mouth salivated uncontrollably. He would be gone soon, and then I could have my dinner.

She carefully washed the dishes as he went to sit in his study. She went upstairs and drew herself a bath as she does every day and closed the door. He put on the nightly news and took out a fly he had been working on for his next fishing trip. He also took the handkercheif out and took at golden hairs to add to his fly. He was so concentrated that he didn't hear me slip in through the back door his wife had left open after throwing out the compost in their back garden. He was getting lazy...sloppy…old.This would be too easy… I had to take him first, he would hear me going up the steps. I watched him huff and sigh to himself as the news rattled on and on about recent disappearances of children in the neighborhood. Their parents horrified when they received small remnants of their bodies in waxed envelops left in their mailbox, doorstep, or on the windshield of their cars. He adjusted his glasses carefully adding the final golden hairs to his fly. It took only a moment for me to gag him with the solvent soaked cloth. He was heavier than I remembered. I took his loafers off so as I dragged him, his feet would follow smoothly into the garage. I found his keys, opened his trunk and gently placed him in careful to tie him and gag him before closing the trunk.

I went back inside and softly padded upstairs. She was more difficult to surprise. He hadn't bothered her when she was soaking for over 40 years. She heard the knob turning and called out surprised leaning over the tub to grab the neatly folded towel on the rack beside her. I quickly charged in using her imbalance to my advantage. Her skin was slick and I almost lost my grip and she screamed for but a half a second before I covered her face with the cloth. She was easier to carry and I quickly tied her up and placed her next to him before turning the lights off, locking up, and driving out in their car.

It was easy to get to the strip mall. It was so close and much more convenient to get to by car. I parked in the back even though there was no one out front. I was careful to park backwards as close to the back entrance as possible. I was taught to be extra vigilant with two bodies so I stepped out, walked around once, twice, three times, moved some boxes that I'd found into the building first and then I quickly moved them in as if part of a normal unloading. They we're beginning to stir so I propped them both up and sat down to wait. I took another piece of jerky out savoring the flavor, knowing I would be eating a full meal soon enough.

He woke first. He opened those ever paling eyes and the twinkle seemed more of a spark as the look of recognition and defeat clouded his face.  She woke up soon after. I kept her gagged knowing she would be confused...knowing she would scream. Her eyes opened wider and wider, darting from him then back to me as if asking how we knew each other.

“Hello”, he said. “I can't say it's good to see you...I recognized you before but wasn't sure. You look so much older….but I see it now. Your hair your golden hair has gotten darker…”

I nodded ever so slightly and licked my cracked dry lips. “You're not so young anymore either…”

At this point, his wife is gurgling and attempting to scream to no avail. The only sound that escapes is a horrible guttural moan as she slowly slumps over like a wounded animal that knows it's about to get eaten.

“You're hungry...I can see it. You've been starving yourself. You shouldn't do that, it makes you weak” he says.

I show him the piece of jerky that is in my breast pocket. I let him smell it before putting it back. His eyes glisten with what looks like hope as he says, “so you learned something that summer…”

“Only from the best at his prime...but it looks like you're on your way out. You're getting sloppy. You look…..weak.”

His wife’s eyes widen so large her eyeballs look like they're about to pop out of their sockets. She makes a tiny noise and tries to make herself smaller and smaller. I pay no attention to her. Fear makes the meat taste bad.

“Why now? Why me? I taught you, young flesh is the sweetest. You earn their trust, fill them with hope. It's a taste that is unequivocally the best….prime meat…”

“I hate what you made me into….I've fought to curb the appetite you so horrifyingly taught be to crave. But, you're right...young human flesh and meat is delectable...but over time I've realized a different taste, a different flavor. Young flesh is good, fresh and supple. But aged meat….undoubtedly an acquired taste hits on several different flavor palettes that I wasn't aware even existed. I traveled the world sampling all different kinds. You should know the type of air and water they eat changes the way the meat tastes. I have to say though, there's nothing like home food. I feel like a monster and have deep seeded regret but it’s comforting to come home after my travels and taste the flavors of my home town region.”

“You've matured into quite the monster…”he chides.

“I can never forgive you...you made me what I am…” I snarl.

“You were like my own child, I knew you were different. The way you never cried, never pleaded. I knew...you were like me” he softly claimed.

“I am nothing like you! And that is why I am here. You need to pay for all your grievances. I am not sick like you,  I don't steal innocent children. Only the bad ones. The bullies, the felons, the murderers...like you.”

“How is that different. Human is human. You're just trying to justify your actions.”

I waved his words away getting up from my chair and walked towards him with my carving knife. “ I'm done talking with you. You're already on your way out. What better way out then into me. It's a win-win for both of us. For the first time, I will have tasted flesh and meat of a man that devoured countless other bodies. It will be a real treat for me. And you….you'll get to live on in my body…”

I took the knife and slowly carved away his lips, tasting the saltiness of his previous meal. He screamed in agony pulling his mouth back revealing his blood adorned teeth. His wife was struggling violently in the corner, her body heaving with panic, fear, and pain. Her body would be soiled with fear...inedible. I would have to dispose of it some other way.

I slowly pulled pieces of his skin taking pieces between my thumb and knife sampling different parts of his body. I relished in his pain and wiped the knife his body as I made my way around him.

“You're more of a monster than I ever was…better...” he gasped as he curled what was left of his lips back into a gnarly smile. He gasped for air as I shrugged my shoulders and carried on. “I tried for years to stop, and my work around my conscious has been to rid the world of it's scum. The meal is just a byproduct. People don't miss the shitty ones. And I've made my meals last, you have so much more mass and surface area the the children you eat... Your skin will dry well.” I'll keep parts of you through the winter. Take you out for little snacks when I miss you.”

His wife was silent now. She seemed to have accepted her fate. His body was trembling now, he was losing blood very quickly. His eyes slowly glanced at a large door. I followed his eyes and raised my eyebrows. “I know what's in there. I’ve been watching you and finally found your kitchen. Shall we see what you've stored?”

I walk over and break the weak lock and open the door wide. Torsos, legs, arms, and wrapped bloody meat adorn every crevice of the refrigerator. A freshly cut head with locks of golden hair and parts of a leg sit atop a carving block. His wife makes a sound like a dying animal and faints. “It looks like you had some ham for dinner. I hope it was sufficient for your last meal. It also looks like you picked a new hobby since I saw you last. Fly fishing? That's a neat hobby. You make your own flies…you're getting quite sentimental…”

His eyes roll back into his head as he slowly goes in and out of consciousness. I don't want him to spoil so I dragged him into the meat locker. It will take me a while to cut him up but he has all the utensils and even brown butcher paper to pack my treats away. But I have time, I bring him back with smelling salts and sharp slaps to his hollowed out cheeks. I carefully filet his calves and thighs. I meticulously carve his skin off of his back, it'll make for good jerky...his body starts to convulse and I giggle as the blood spurts every which way. Smelling salts are not working but I give him a good shake to say goodbye. Goodbye old man, I appreciate the skills you taught me, it seems like it is appropriate to say goodbye now. His sallow eyes look up defeated and his eyes slowly blink once, twice, and then stay open as he gurgles his last breatgh.I decide to leave his wife in there to die. For good measure I slash her neck from ear to ear and father her blood to make blood sausages later. A quick note attributing her death to her discovery of his horrid fetish and clues of his next whereabouts will lead the police on a wild goose chase. They will be unfruitful in their hunt. But the kidnapping will stop, and the town will be relieved, and he will slowly be forgotten like all the rest of the scum slowly digesting in my belly.

And with that my appetite has been satisfied and I pack my bags and grab my neatly wrapped meat looking like present neatly wrapped in waxed brown paper and head out to wherever there are people that won't be missed. The forsaken, the guilty, and the bad. The taste of evil is delicious and I can't wait for my next meal.

Submitted September 28, 2017 at 06:40AM by braziliancarnival http://ift.tt/2hyctNR nosleep