Coffee and Croissants
The house looked empty. Maybe they weren't in? The dark man across the street sipped his coffee, but spat it out. It was cold already. Never mind. He could figure out how to use their coffee machine later. If they had a coffee machine. He had never really known much about modern kitchen gadgets. Food was food. As far as he was concerned you bought it and then ate it. He did have a microwave. But that was about it.
A kid on a bike cycled by and threw a newspaper onto the house's front porch. There was a pause, then the front door opened and a man came out in his dressing gown. He picked up the paper and opened it up, reading the front page briefly. A next door neighbour called a greeting. He waved back and entered the house again. The man across the street propped the old cup of coffee on a bin and made his way over the road, pausing to let a car drive past. He tried the door and found it was open.
Inside the morning radio was playing a song. It was a good song – it was about a guy who wasn't appreciated enough by the world. He liked the song. He hummed a line.
Their house was bigger than it looked on the outside. Their kitchen and dining room were a big open plan area and bright sunlight was streaming through the windows. He frowned. How come people lived this good? His apartment was a crummy little hole.
The man sitting at the dining table hadn't noticed him enter. He had his back to him, and was reading the paper, munching a mouthful of breakfast cereal. The dark man decided not to make this more difficult than it needed to be. As the man lifted another spoonful of cereal to his mouth the intruder lifted a hand and threw out a stream of ice. The man was frozen instantly. He walked forward and lifted a finger, starting to slice off the top of his head when there was a flurry of movement behind him. A slam of a door and suddenly there was a woman's cry.
Something smashed into the back of his head and he staggered, grabbing the table for support. A middle aged woman holding a baseball bat had it at arms length and swung at him again, but he dodged. The back of his head hurt. Really hurt. He had assumed this guy lived by himself with his daughter. This one wasn't special. She hadn't even been on the list.
As she stood there, brandishing the bat at him, he straightened up to face her. Her expression was one of supreme terror. Good.
His attention was brought back to the baseball bat. He made a bored face, as if saying, 'What, you think that's going to do anything?' and held up a hand. It flew to the other side of the room and she cried out. He turned the hand so that its palm faced her and she spun to the wall, held up in the air. But he couldn't keep her there while he concentrated on the other guy. He looked around and noticed the table. With another flick of his hand all the cutlery slammed into her body, pinning her like a butterfly.
Her scream was deafening. But the dark man ignored it and searched the dining room. The woman wasn't quite dead yet. She made a gurgling sound as he looked around the rest of the ground floor. He looked into their back garden. They had a pool.
The other one wasn't down here. Maybe she wasn't even out of bed yet. He took the stairs two at a time and opened the first door he came to. It was a large bathroom, but there was no one inside it. He found a study, a master bedroom with a bed that hadn't even been made yet and a guest bedroom. So the last room had to contain the girl. He gripped the door handle and pushed the door open slowly. But when he looked in, he saw the bed with the flowery sheets was ruffled, but empty. Annoyed, he hunted through her wardrobe and even looked under her bed, but it was clear that there was no one here.
He went back downstairs and remembered his frozen victim. Oh well, one was better then nothing. She must have slipped out through the front door when his back was turned.
He sliced open the other's head but paused and glanced around before he got to work. He spotted something, steaming and fresh beside the man's frozen hand. He picked up the mug and took a sip.
"Mm. Ground."
The pitter-patter of blood accompanied his activities from the dripping woman pinned up behind him. His arms covered in blood up to his elbows and knowing that he had already taken too much time hanging around here, he wrapped the brain in a tea towel and took the half empty mug of coffee with him.
He left through the back door, wondering if his next stop was eating breakfast too. He felt like croissants.