A/N: To all my Cruel Intentions fans, I'm really sorry for putting "Lovestory" on hiatus for so long. It's just been difficult for me because it's essentially, well, a love story, which will probably have a happy ending, and right now I'm just not in a place psychologically where I can write that kind of thing.
The chains, the darkness...they are familiar to her.
They are not familiar to Niki from real life, but they are familiar nonetheless. They're common enough in the horror movies she watches, late at night desperate to get to sleep, the movies about girls her age who get kidnapped by the serial killer, the evil cult leader, the man in the mask. He usually has a room he takes them to, a basement hideaway, no real furniture expect for the torturer's medieval dungeon implements. Deep laughter and frantic bargaining—I have money, my father's the mayor, don't do this please you're not really like this—followed by screams. They always scream when the blood starts to flow. Not a second before or after. Afterwards, quiet sobbing.
Niki would drift off to that sound, lying on her back on her twin bed, her body spread out in front of her like a slab of meat.