Hey, Devi, I remember your name…

It was the one year anniversary of the massacre that claimed Devi's life. He hadn't meant for it to happen. It was a freak accident, a mistake, a tragedy. It was all his fault. If he had known she was in that mass of people at the 24/7-Mart he never would have started killing.

His boots lightly tapped the cement as he wandered farther down the cracked sidewalk to her grave. One year; it seems like only yesterday. His long black coat swayed with the breeze as he looked over his bouquet again. A dozen black roses.

I left a dozen roses on your grave today…

He stopped in front of her tombstone and read the words engraved on it.

R.I.P.

Devi D.

June 23rd, 1974 – August 21st, 1997

It was so plain. There were no endearing words carved in the stone to remember her by. It was just a basic setup consisting of only the necessities.

I'm in the grass on my knees, wipe the leaves away…

Johnny knelt down and brushed the autumn leaves away. He placed the bouquet across her grave and traced his hand over the cracking stone. The rock was covered in dust and cracking in several places. Before another year was up, the stone would split in two and need to be replaced. Of course, there isn't anyone to pay for a replacement, and even if there was, they wouldn't care enough to do so. Johnny specifically remembered Devi describing how uncaring and cold her family was towards her.

I just came to talk for awhile, got some things I need to say…

"I'm so sorry, Devi. You weren't supposed to get hurt. I didn't even know you were there…"

Johnny's voice trailed off as he got caught up in the memory of her death. He remembered vivid and exact details of what happened. They haunt him constantly, but they terrorize him even more when he tries to sleep. It seemed more as if Devi herself were haunting him.

It was August 21st, 1997. It was a windy Saturday night when Johnny decided to stop down at the 24/7 Mart. He left in search of skettios and cherry fiz-wiz. The usually dead minimart was packed full of loud, arrogant, obnoxious people attempting to pay for gas and other overly-priced goods. Apparently there was some lame convention, or get-together of some sort, the next town over and everybody decided they had to stop here and stock up on supplies.

He went in and grabbed his few items and waited in line to pay. The store had two lanes, but only one was open. Customers were complaining that since it was so busy, there should be someone else running the second lane to speed things along. Already he was irritated with people and their stupid comments and the fact that he agreed with them. Who only opens one lane on a busy Saturday night?

Then again, the store was closing in a half hour and perhaps at some point the other lane was open, but closed to due to the fact that it was almost closing time altogether. No matter the reason, Johnny was severely annoyed.

Because he had given his full attention to the annoying clamoring of moronic customers, Johnny failed to notice Devi standing a few feet behind him. However, she more than noticed him, and she immediately stiffened up and attempted to conceal herself behind the numerous flood of people. She set her small basket of items down and headed towards the exit, praying to God that he wouldn't see her. That's when it happened.

By the time she started walking to the door, Johnny had already made it up to the counter to pay, and that's when he lost all control. He growled through his razor sharp teeth and his hair stood on end. The woman running the register was demonstrating her incompetence by spinning his can of skettios round-and-round to find the UPC code. He picked up three cans, but she insisted on scanning each one individually, instead of scanning one of them three times. After she finally found it and scanned it, it was time to ring up his fiz-wiz.

By this point Johnny was ready to explode. He wanted nothing more than to pay and leave. This idiotic woman was preventing him from doing so. She stood there with his fiz-wiz for what felt like forever, somehow failing to figure out how to ring it up. Finally she uttered the magic words that set him off.

"Do you remember how much this was supposed to be?"

His once low, subtle growl turned into a menacing hiss as he slammed his hands onto the counter and began his long, ineffective rant.

"Do I remember how much this was? DO I REMEMBER? You work here, and with a million people coming in and buying these things daily, you should know the price by now! Dammit! All I wanted was to come in here and get what I needed and go home! But no, nitwitted imbeciles like you always get in the way!"

He jumped up on the counter and hovered over the now terrified cashier. He turned to face the remaining shoppers and proceed to preach his displeasure and anger to them.

"And you! All of you! You come in here and bitch and moan about having to wait in line and pay fifty cents extra for something you didn't want, when you could have been out on the road to where-the-fuck-ever it is that you're going! Honestly! Did you all get together and decide to stop in this particular store at this ridiculous time of night to buy a mess of useless shit that you don't even need? DID YOU? What kind of moron doesn't have enough common sense to drive past a clearly packed gas station and go to the next one ten minutes down the road? You are all worthless, whiny sons of bitches that deserve that have their brains pulled out their ass!"

Johnny wasn't anywhere near close to being finished talking, but some senseless idiot from the crowd decided to speak out against him.

"Hey, why don't you stop being a little bitch and shut the fuck up?"

At first, the rest of the crowd looked like they were about to laugh, but when Johnny pulled a gun out of his coat pocket and a knife from under his sleeve, everyone decided against it. With a low, threatening tone, Johnny gave his reply.

"It's impolite to speak when others are talking."

And then the blood began to pour. Johnny fired aimlessly into the crowd of helpless people and quickly bent down and turned so he slit the cashier's throat. He jumped down and alternated between his knife and gun when he killed his victims. During his whole speech, Devi stood dumbfounded in front of the door. She had stood motionless with her hand on the doorknob until that man spoke out. As soon as he opened his mouth, Devi knew it was over. She knew Johnny had a weapon.

She tried to jerk the door open and make a run for it, but when he started firing, one of the first shots went through her hand. A couple more shots rang out and several of them hit her. She took one to her shoulder and two in the back. She was dead within moments of impact.

Johnny hadn't noticed her until after the massacre was already over. He stood over in the freezer section and let his eyes wander all around the store. He scanned over every one of his victims bodies and looked rather satisfied with his work. He put his gun and knife away and went back up to the counter to grab his things. As soon as he went to go out the door, he saw her small figure sprawled on the floor, soaked in blood.

"Devi…"

Johnny stared blankly at her grave as the wind ripped through his stringy, black hair. He slowly let himself come back to reality and let the memory drift back into his subconscious. He blinked a few times to regain his focus and let out a breath he didn't know he had been holding.

He traced his hand over her tombstone one more time before standing up. He straightened himself up and rubbed his eyes. He let his hands fall limply to his side and then he changed his mind and stuffed them in his pockets. He let out another sigh and attempted to speak again.

"If I could go back and change it, I promise you would have made it out alive. I could have waited until you got out of the store, or even resisted the urge to do anything at all knowing you were watching me; waiting for me to show the world, yet again, my animalistic, monstrous side. Now it's too late for me to do anything. I can't make amends, rewrite the past, or apologize to you. I'm sorry…"

Johnny turned and began walking away. His metal boots clicked lightly on the sidewalk as he made his way back to the rusty, old gate and out to his broken-down, beaten-up car. As soon as he got in it though, the memory came back to haunt him. This time, it was just too much.

I gotta live with the choices I've made, and I can't live with myself today…

A few days later, in that very same graveyard, a new tombstone was placed.

R.I.P.

Johnny C.

February 17th, 1972 – August 21st, 1998

"A/N: So this was just a short little fic that I decided to write at the last minute. The idea came from the song "Lucy" by Skillet. I've been meaning to do a JohnnyXDevi story for awhile now, but I never had any good ideas. Even though this isn't really a romance story, it's still an idea. Well, I guess its one-sided romance. Eh, anyway, please tell me what you think in a review. Criticism is welcomed."