{I'm working on redoing my story! So I'll be replacing the chapters with better ones as needed. Some are very good. Others not so much.}
"Okay, so we've applied for Hot Topic, Claire's, Romancing the Stone, Deb, and GameStop. Doesn't look like there anywhere else with positions we're qualified for." Lydia stated, flipping through a folder of available jobs in the mall at the customer service booth.
"Well, boo." Danielle looked to the folder, the two of them checking again to see if they had missed anything. Soon Lydia set the folder down and they stepped over to Cinnabon for drink. They had had a busy week, moving quite a distance from home to transfer to a new college in Springwood that had offered them scholarships better than their previous school. They almost had to turn it down because of the distance, but luck was on their side, for Lydia had discovered a great house for sale online. It was dirty cheap on the forclosure list. What a great find! They had been amazed no one else had bought it. For years it had been on the market. Even the name was cool. Elm Street! Lydia loved trees.
"We need a strawberry smoothie and chocolate mocha shake with no whipped cream." Lydia ordered. When they received their drinks, they grabbed straws and wandered back to the shop's entrance where they stopped to open the straws and put them in. They effectively blocked the way for other customers, but neither of them were noticing, until a derogatory racial slur broke the peace of tasting their drinks. The two turned around, and Danielle was unsure what to say, frozen in place by the shock.
It happened quickly; Lydia struck a redneck's face and the two were screaming at each other. Lydia narrowly missed a punch, elbowing the man in the face. Two more men were closing in on her, but a mall cop managed to end the skirmish before Lydia could be hurt. The cop stayed with Lydia until the hillbillies were far from Cinnabon.
"Let's… go to Sears." Danielle suggested, stirring her straw.
"I'll meet you there in a few minutes." Lydia answered, walking off.
"Lydia… Don't do anything dumb…" Danielle sighed.
Lydia made her way down a staircase to reach the underground parking lot. Glancing around, she concluded there were no security cameras. This place was ancient.
"You know." She leaned against the cleanest spot on a dirty truck sporting a confederate flag. "I hate a lot of people. I especially hate racist people. But honestly, you fall into quite a number of categories of those I hate. You're disgusting. You're stupid. You're a wide range of things that really - "
"Yeah whatre u gonna do about it? Get offa mu truck, ya skank-ass –"
"What did you ask me?" she asked smoothly. Dangerously calm as she slide a hand into a coat pocket, examining him thoughtfully. She didn't give him the chance to answer.
She stopped at a bathroom to clean the blood from her hands and a zebra print pocket knife. She was turning the blade on the water when she thought she heard something; quickly she hid the knife in the sink with her hands over it while glancing over her shoulder. But it was nothing. When the glanced back to the sink, for a split second she could swear the blood wasn't washing off the blade… but coming from the faucet, only to be clean water after her next blink.
Aw, crap. She'd left her drink in the parking lot, she realized before sinking back into her thoughts. So much anger had been building over the years that she had finally snapped at an opportunity to retaliate. It was scary. And it felt amazing. Powerful.
The door opened and she closed the knife, swiftly concealing it in her coat.
Danielle saw all of it. "Oh my god…" She added when spotting the red in the sink, "What if… What if you get arrested…"
"I won't! Don't worry. They have no cameras. I haven't even seen them upstairs anywhere. Have you? Come on. I need to find my drink." Lydia stated, turning off the water and pushing long, auburn hair behind her shoulders.
"What, are you an expert security checker now, Lydia? How many others have you murdered?!"
"None. It's not a big deal."
"It's SO a big DEAL! Remind me not to piss you off, you might KILL ME in my sleep or something."
Lydia followed as Danielle stormed away.
She knew her friend was different. A little disturbed. Maybe a lot disturbed, but to kill someone… Danielle stopped in her tracks, all the air leaving her at once when her gaze stopped on a corpse sprawled out on the concrete beside an ugly truck, messy gashes lining his neck, the scene painted in wet crimson.
She screamed, taking a step back and bumping into Lydia, who embraced her.
"Danielle. Please. You're overreacting."
"I'm UNDER-reacting! If I were anyone else, I'd be calling the police!" she snapped while pouring Lydia's drink onto the ground. "People who kill people don't deserve shakes!"
"Look, you're my best friend, how could I let this guy get away with talking to you like that? These kind of people are disgusting burdens on society… I'm making the world a better place, can't you see that?"
"You… You really killed someone…" Danielle trembled, breaking free of Lydia's hold on her.
"You make it sound so negative…"
"It is!" Danielle exclaimed.
A long, awkward silence ensued before Lydia asked, "Do you hate me?"
Danielle's expression softened now that she had turned away from the bloody hillbilly. "You know I don't… Just… Lydia… If you end up in jail, I'll kick your ass."
When the girls returned to their new home on Elm Street, they finished decorating the house in tons of posters of Michael Jackson, their hero. Lydia added some Disney décor too. Things were still awkward after the mall, but quickly the distance was fading.
Danielle picked up Lydia's phone, snooping through the notes. "Oh! You wrote a poem and didn't tell me?"
Lydia snatched it away. "Oh, yeah, you don't want to read it."
"Yes I do. Recite it!" Danielle replied.
"… Very well, here we go.
Organs rearranged and veins severed –
Her weakened body tightly tethered;
A stream of blood cascades to the floor-
Another scream then nothing more.
Staining its trail- a sea of red;
A scalpel cuts into her head.
Neatly, and so precise
Isn't this sweet vengeance nice?
A glimpse of hope, a chance at life;
A new found pulse within this strife.
Let's slow this down, we need the time-
To savor each second of the crime.
Another injection, another disease
From victim to victim, the outcome varies.
Unknowing of her error, Her eyes forever open in terror.
Unable to speak, unable to plead
A pitiful sight it is indeed.
But give no sympathy, we laugh instead
Waiting until the fool is dead."
"Well… It rhymes…" Danielle said as she fidgeted and felt Lydia waiting for a response. "We should go to bed. School tomorrow… Ugh." She nervously watched her friend smile and ascend the staircase.
"Goodnight!" Lydia called out to her and closed the door.
"Goodnight…" Danielle sunk down into the couch. Lydia was a psychopath. Had she always been like this…?