She moved like a worm, wriggling away away from me. Her clothes had blackened from the coal-stained floor. She was as dark as my empty heart, still, she was beautiful. I hated that. I hated her.

 

“I have to do this. You remind me of her, my girlfriend.” I said.

 

“W-what?” She stuttered.

 

“Katie, she left me. I can’t find her” I paused. “But I found you.”

 

I could smell her blood, I could smell my vengeance. I wondered how long it would last this time. When would I need to kill again, kill Katie again? I had become a vampire, lusted for blood when all I could find was water. It satisfied me but only for a little while.

 

“Katie? I-I’m Adelaide.” She tried to convince me.

 

“You’re just the same.”

 

Ice. that’s all I felt. Now, now the ice has cracked. It’s melting.

 

***

 

“So you murdered her, them, because they looked like ...Katie, was it?” The detective queries.

 

“What? I wasn’t listening.”

 

“Your victims, Lauren, Victoria, Adelaide and Emily; they reminded you of your ex?” He asks again.

 

“Yes.”

 

The victims of my cruel crusade flash before my eyes. I never knew their names. Only, Adelaide. Only, Adelaide. She was a rose in a field of wicked, wilted weeds.

 

“How did you kill her?”

 

***

 

She had wriggled herself all the way to the back wall. Nowhere for the worm to go, all the bird had to do was swoop down and kill it. Then it happened. I asked her something I never asked the others.

 

“Any last requests?”

 

I don’t know why. It could have been the last spark of light in me, hoping to start a fire. Hoping to save my soul. Hoping to save her. She stared up at me with wide eyes. Her posture changed, she seemed to relax. It caught me off guard but it couldn’t stop me.

 

“Yes.” She paused. “Give my mother a book. To write to me. Even though I wont be there. Words can be stronger than actions.” She mumbled the last part. I heard it though.

 

I’ll never forget it.

 

I took a knife out of my pocket and stumbled toward her, tripping over my own obstacles of emotion. Rage. Guilt. Hatred. Pity. I placed my hand on her head, to steady her-

 

“I forgive you,” she swiftly whispered.

 

And dragged it over her neck.

 

I watched the life leave her body. As she entered eternal sleep, I woke up. The words bounced in my aching mind, ‘I forgive you’. I couldn’t believe my ears. They made me realise. I stole her life just to satisfy a hunger for closure, vengeance, whatever. This twenty odd year old woman. Her corpse was a mirror and in it, I saw myself; a Dorian Grey portrait of death.

 

***

 

The detective looks into my eyes, probing everything I am.

 

“Yep, that fits the reports. Everything you’ve said fits. I have a few more questions before I charge you.” He pauses, leans forward, and squints his eyes. “Why did you turn yourself in?”

 

The words once again whisper in my ears, ‘I forgive you’. They are so vivid I can almost see them. Adelaide has become my guardian angel, guiding me to the light. She forgave me in my darkest hour when she never even knew me.

 

“I guess I finally got closure, revenge. Either that or I realised I never needed it.” I admit.

 

“Hmm.” He straightens up. “One more question, did you do anything else before turning yourself in?”

 

“No.” I tell him.

 

That was a lie.

 

***

 

She helped me, now I needed to help her. I wiped my knife on my shirt and cut a lock of hair from her head. I stepped back from her body and noticed something. Her hand had uncurled after death, revealing a piece of paper. Adelaide had prepared a note for her mother, in the event of her passing. She was locked in the old factory overnight, must have written it then.

 

Hatred will only cause you pain, don’t let him hurt you like he hurt me.

I love you mum, Addie x

 

The coal medium confirmed my suspicion. I had to leave her empty vessel in the vacant factory if I wanted to fulfill her wish. I planned to turn myself in after, so it wouldn’t be for long. I took one last look at her, she was beautiful in her own way now. She was no longer a Katie substitute. No girl would ever be a Katie substitute again.

 

I drove to a small store, the only one open at 4 am, called ‘24-hour fulfillment’. Maybe it wasn’t, I could have imagined it. I went inside and purchased sellotape, a pen, and an azure notebook. The colour of her eyes. I got back in my car and sellotaped the lock of hair to the inside of the cover, then wrote ‘words can be stronger than actions’ underneath it. I stared at the empty first page then before writing my own message to Adelaide:

 

Adelaide,

 

I’m sorry. My actions now and for the rest of my life will be dedicated to proving that. Not just to you but to the other people I hurt as well. I say hurt because I don’t just mean those I murdered but their families, their friends, as well. After I deliver this book like you wanted, I am handing myself over to the police. You made me realise what I have become. What started as heartache turned into a tumor of hate that would not stop growing. I fell victim to myself just like you. I don’t mean this an excuse because there is no excuse I could use that would justify what I stole from many people: hope, love, happiness, memories, a future, and most importantly life. Again and forever, sorry.

Simon.

 

My hand had started to shake, possibly because I’d regained an essence of humanity. The horror of my nightmare became clear to me. I was freed from my anger-fueled oblivion. I made way to her home, where she lived with her mother. I knew where it was because I had followed her there before I took her. I had checked she was alone. The thought made me feel a little disgusted with myself. The journey to her door felt like a lifetime, her lifetime that she would never live. My legs had begun to shake now as well. I gently placed the book on the porch, then lay her message on top of it. I rang the doorbell and struggled back to my car before I was noticed. I drove off before I could see her mother’s reaction.

 

---

 

His suspicious eyes don’t leave mine. He probably suspects I’m lying but it’s early in the morning and he was probably on nightshift. He’s just glad to be the hunter who slayed the vicious wolf. Only I know that he never caught me, Adelaide did.

 

“Well then, Simon MacNess, I charge you with four counts of murder-”

 

I cut him off, “You don’t have to say the rest, I know it.”

 

The cell at the courtroom is cold and empty. Fitting, unlike my suit. I have to keep my mind busy noticing the pointless things, like the voices from the warden’s radio, or my regained humanity will eat me alive. I’ll end up in a psychiatric hospital instead of a prison. Well, I suppose they are both prisons. I wish this vehicle would hurry up. Thirty years. That’s my sentence. It’s not enough. I should be left to rot. A journalist begins speaking on the radio.

 

“Mrs Thomas, Mrs Thomas! Tell us your thoughts?” She shouts.

 

Everything goes silent on the radio apart from some ear-stabbing static. My heart beats like it’s trying to escape my chest.

 

“He has left a mark on me like coal does on paper, with time it may fade but it will never disappear. My head wants to hate that man’s very core-” She stops. “But...somehow my heart has managed to forgive him. Hatred will only cause pain, there has been enough of that for today.”

 

I take a deep breath. My prison awaits.

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My dear Addie,

 

I have managed to forgive the monster who took you from me. It doesn’t surprise me that you wanted me to forgive him. You have always been the same, kind and forgiving. There is not an act in this world that you would see as evil, you don’t have it in you. You are and always will be the brightest soul to have blessed this planet. From the moment you were born, we knew you were special. Me and your father, It gives me peace to know you are together again. Adelaide means ‘full of kindness’ and you are the proof that this is true. Only you could convince a serial killer to do the right thing. I love you eternally, that will never change.

Mum x