"The Devil, can sometimes do a very gentlemanly thing."
Life has a way of grabbing a tight hold of you and throwing you right into the burning pits of hell. With no warning, no life raft, you have to fight your way out. Sometimes there's someone to catch your fall and sometimes those people are the reason for your fall. I'm not one to blame the outcome of my inner monster on anyone, but my father played a huge part in molding and creating it. He happened to be the same person that the world saw as monster from a nightmare come true. His name, Hannibal Lecter. When spoken, that named caused an outburst of panic. Even the best of the police force couldn't contain him. He was a monster on the loose. To me, he was never that. Partly because I never knew the real him until later on. I discovered his dark secret one chilly fall morning when I broke into his locked study. The true monster was locked away in that study and I let him out.
Before I knew what he really was, without the mask, he was just my father, Franck Coventry. The likeable coroner who always wore perfectly pressed suits and loved anything involving gourmet food. His job choice was always an odd one to everyone around us, mainly because he was such a charismatic person. You would think being surrounded by dead people for hours in a day, you wouldn't have such high spirits. In a weird way though, that's were he was happiest. Never fully understanding why that was until now. Clarice, my mother, never talked about her life before she met my father. She was a formal FBI agent from the states, and that's about all she talks about from her past. She never talked about her family, and neither did my father. There was no evidence from their past lives. It's almost as if they erased their old lives just for their new life together. Their story of how they met is a short and simple one, on the job. I never knew that she meant that quite literally. They were your ideal married couple, always starry eyed when around each other and always showing some type of subtitle affection. It was the kind affection that used to make me want to dig my eyeballs out. A typical teenager maneuver. But when you look at it now, all I can think about is how could she ever fall in love with someone like my father?
They lived double lives, it's as simple as that. Always so composed and rehearsed in front of everyone. It was just a facade though, different stories and a heap load of lies. There were signs that I missed before, that now make sense some that included the many fake photo I. D.s and passports I found hidden in my mothers vanity. Or the fact that my father would always dye his auburn hair anytime his dark roots started poking their way out. He also wore these black rimmed glasses, even though he had perfect eye vision. I found out later on that the glass was just regular glass that anyone with eyes could see clear through. Our home was almost like a museum, different locks here and there, locking you out from what's hidden behind them. I always tried to catch glimpses into the locked rooms before the doors were slammed and locked in my face. My mother always told me that they were locked for my safety and that was the end of that conversation. When she wanted you to listen and to obey her, she made you. My father was absolute putty in her hands, and it's easy to see why. She was the only person who could protect his secrets from the world and from me. But my fathers demons were never very far away.
Hannibal Lecter seemed like a character from a Stephen King novel. In other words he seemed like a figment of someone's very sick and twisted imagination. To think that a person could feel such power from taking another persons life and turning them into a gourmet meal, seemed impossible. Something like that only happened in sinister books or movies. Sadly it was possible and that same monster everyone feared was the one who brought me into this dark and diluted world. It's simple though, two humans make another human and many more. That's just how the life cycle works. My father though couldn't possibly be human, he just couldn't be. Even if he felt so much emotion, so does an animal, which probably feels more. How could someone that could give another person life, feel so little empathy and sympathy towards other people?
Maybe I'm just some naive seventeen year old who's father happens to be a class A serial killer. Or maybe I am my father's daughter? The same monster and hunger that pumps through his veins, also inhabits my every waking move and thought. I would be lying if I said that I was or ever felt normal, even before I found out the truth. I never was normal, not really. I could look at a person and just imagine their warm crimson blood running down their lifeless bodies. It never ceased to amaze me how much joy those thoughts would bring me. Keep calm and try not to lose it, I would tell myself anytime I would look in a mirror. The face that looked back at me wasn't my own, the monster stared back and laughed.
I am Iris and the beast that's inside me, beating against my ribs, is unraveling. Every thought racing through my head is no longer my own. The chains that hold down this beast, are becoming rusty and loose. With just one simple tug and it would be free. Just tell me though, would that be so bad?
(Hello! First off if you are reading this, a big thank you! This story just popped into my head, and well I went with it! Please feel free to leave reviews, questions, comments or concerns! Everything helps me out in the long run!)