It had been a few months since Paul had decided to move out of the home he and Carl had shared. How long exactly? Carl had no idea. Last he had bothered to check, it had been... Five months? Maybe more?

Carl opened his bleary eyes, and groaned, raising a hand to wipe away the excess blood on his face that had been obscuring his vision. He blinked at the small amount of sunlight streaming into the room through the askew blinds. He groaned once again before sitting up, propping himself up on his elbows.

The room was in shambles. Carl had been busy working on new and better projects to keep his mind busy, and he hadn't exactly had time to do the laundry or pick up the room or... Really, didn't have time for anything besides trying to create bigger and more horrifying uses for the bodies.

Oh, right. The bodies. Carl had forgotten about those.

He got up, wandering over to the pile of limbs in the corner of the room that explained the blood sprayed about. "Ah, thanks for lending a hand, buddy." Carl picked up an arm and smirked at it a bit sickly before chucking it over his shoulder.

Carl sighed heavily, before he sharply turned to look at the Paul mask that was just lying on the floor where Carl had been passed out minutes ago.

He narrowed his eyes at the plastic mask, "That was a fantastic joke, what are you talking about."

There was a long pause.

"Oh, oh. ExCUSE me, I wasn't aware we were auditioning for the Chuckle Hut." He rolled his eyes before he paused. His eyes rested on the body parts around him before smirking and quickly propping two of the torn-off leg pieces up so they were facing the Paul mask.

"See? These guys gave me a standing ovation."

The overbearing silence that the man received in response was...

Well, it was something.

Carl wasn't exactly sure what this feeling was. Because ew, feelings. What.

"...What. Don't look at me like that."

Carl's own voice broke the silence, but he didn't seem to register just how surreal the situation was, with the body parts lying in a heap on the floor and a mask of his best friend's face staring at him, and Carl staring just as intensely back at the plastic.

He frowned and brandished a severed finger at the mask. "This is like, the fourth time you've been rude all morning! And I only woke up three and a half minutes ago!" He frowned for a long while, before he simply glanced at the dismembered digit in his hand, and chucked the finger back over his shoulder casually. He began quietly picking up the mask and slipping it around his neck, letting it hang down over his chest like a necklace.

"Come on, Paul. I'm going to find a way to surprise you... I can do it. Just you wait..." He grinned, stepping out of the room and ignoring the mess he had to step over on his way out. He had far more important matters to attend to.

Paul's apartment was everything he had wanted, aesthetically speaking.

He didn't have much furniture as of yet. There was a nice light yellow armchair and a nice nightable and lampshade that was the same shade of yellow as the chair, and the living room had a nice light red rug on the floor, (which nicely covered up most of the stains from the disaster of a so-called "apology" present.)

Paul, for the most part, had been content with this new living arrangement.

He remembered only a few days ago, sitting in his armchair and reading a novel to himself, trying not to have a single care in the world as he turned the pages.

He tried to relax.

He really did.

His eyes scanned the pages quickly, a little too desperately trying to grasp the story.

His brow furrowed, a slight crease in his forehead as he tried to ignore the silence of the small apartment.

Paul scoffed as he read further, letting the book rest against his knee a moment as he looked away from the pages and frowned at the room around him. It was fine! Right? Yes, of course it was. It was nice and quiet, safe and calm, in his nice, quaint, normal apartment.
He was a normal guy, reading a normal novel, and having a GREAT time.

He lifted the book back up, straight in front of his face as if he was trying to absorb the book instead of read it.

He stared, and stared at the pages, truly wanting to enjoy the leisure time that he had now that he wasn't babysitting a mass-murdering sociopath constantly... But ...That clock was so loud.

Tick... Tock.

Paul snapped his tongue against the roof of his mouth in a bit of irritation. He told himself he wouldn't bring up Carl in his thoughts. He lifted the book closer to his face.

Tick.

It was just that, this extra time he had to just relax... What did other people do with it? What do people do when they have time they don't have to dedicate all their time watching after a dangerous killer?

Tock.

Was he doing it wrong? Did normal people with normal lives sit around and read?

Tick...

Maybe this wasn't right. Maybe Paul would have to go out and figure out something else to make up for the absence of... That person he wasn't supposed to think about.

Tock...!

"That's /it/!", Paul slapped the uninteresting fictional novel closed with a sharp sound, and abruptly placed it on the side table with a thwack that only slightly deadened the ticking of the clock in the room absent of life. He stood up and quickly made his way outside. He of course peeked out the keyhole of the door before opening the door and making his way out to the small garage just outside of the apartment complex. He opened it, a metallic rolling sound accompanying the sight of a bunch of cardboard boxes stacked on top of each other. Paul straightened his red hat on his head with a serious expression as he dug within the garage.

It took about 15 minutes of Paul tutting and fussing with the apparent 'mess' of the neatly stacked boxes around him before he found what he was initially searching for.

He had a slight accomplished expression as he lifted the old music player out if the garage, closed the heavy door behind himself, and headed back inside.
He trotted over to the kitchen counter, sighing as he set the music player down and went to dig in the box for any record he could find at first, not being picky over which song he would play for now as long as it... sounded alright.

He flipped the record over onto the player, and set the needle just so on the disk, and played the vinyl. And of course, it had to be one of the upbeat jazzy records Carl had given Paul as a present. So that Paul could play it. If 'present' meant 'I'm giving you this so I can take over the record player and listen to jazz instead of your crappy pop music'.

Paul took a deep breath and lifted the needle carefully before he could listen any further to the happy yet curiously suspicious sounds that Carl used to seem to like.

He narrowed his eyes at the record as of it personally wronged Paul, and set it aside before digging once more into the box of old records.
"Oh!" Paul said, and switched it over to the radio function instead. It played some happy pop beat that easily drowned out the silence of the apartment. Paul smiled in satisfaction at the tune and hummed quietly along with it.

Paul let the radio go until he finally found a few records that were happy enough to play. He went back to reading his book contentedly, this time able to forget all of the things that were upsetting him earlier, and for once he thought maybe, just maybe, he would be able to go on and live like a normal person. He could sit by himself, doing something relaxing and not at all dangerous, and enjoy his new lifestyle.

This was better.

Paul awoke that morning, got ready, made breakfast, and was just going about cleaning the carpet once again. He tried to forget where the source of this red mess came from, with a shiver at the thought of the disastrous piano, and scrubbed quietly at the stains, hoping they would come out.

Tick...

Ah, crap, it's too quiet again. Ah well, he would have to get up and play music again at some point. That's all.

Tock...

He scrubbed at the faint red marks. Damn Carl and his apology gifts-!

Nope! No! Paul sighed, remembering that he promised himself not to think of him anymore. He was living a new life! Right? He didn't need to be thinking about all that blood, all that mess, how he used to wake him in the middle of the night with his questions, or with the loud saxophone playing, or finding messes everywhere and arguing about it forever before he would confess in that stupid voice of his that was hard to stay mad at...

'Paaaauuullll?'

He scrubbed the carpet, a little relieved that the mess was slightly better after the bleach solution.

'Paul!'

...Oh, crap.

That wasn't really THAT person outside calling him, was it? He wasn't REALLY here, was he?

"Bank manager! You have an appointment!"

Paul sat back, setting the rag in the bucket of cleaning soul utopian and taking his gloves off in a fed up manner as he listened to Carl just outside of his door. "What do you want, Carl?" He asked in a tone of resentment. Paul couldn't help but notice how Carl sounded. He never sounded so... Human. In the way Carl told him he actually missed him!

'He's good at that. Acting human, isn't he? You've seen him do it. At the ridiculous Homeowner's Association meetings he goes to! Everyone else thinks he's a fantastic member of the community.'

"You made a mask of my face?"

'Nobody knows about what he is... Except you. You know how he is! He doesn't really care. He didn't even remember your name for three years! He just wants somebody to call his name and give him attention.'

"Caaarl. Please." Paul sighed, staring at the floor in front of him, his hands slowly taking off the gloves he was using to help scrub the blood stains out of the carpet. Paul realized that his own voice sounded slightly shaky. Crap, he hoped Carl didn't hear it in his voice. "I really gave you every chance I could, I just- ... I can't do it anymore..."

'And you're giving him what he wants... Again.'

Paul realized what he was doing. He was giving Carl the attention that he wanted.

Nope. Nope!

Paul stood from his spot on the floor, making his way to the kitchen and flipping on the cheerful music he often used to keep his attention off of the crazed serial killer he used to be roommates with.
He went back to the spot on the floor, scrubbing the blood away, trying to ignore the sounds of Carl talking to himself just outside the door, keeping on a conversation with himself, probably with the mask he made of his face.
Carl stopped scrubbing in order to brush at his eyes with the back of his wrist.
"I'm putting on some music. I'm not listening anymore!..." Paul spoke up, and sighed shakily as he made his way to the record player and set the volume on the loudest setting it could go, hoping to drown out the sound of Carl's voice entirely. He wandered back to the spot on the floor, hoping that maybe this would be it. Maybe Carl would become bored and leave.

After a while of not hearing a response, Paul glanced at the door, hoping just maybe that Carl had left already. Maybe this would be the last timee he had to worry about horrible, violent things happening suddenly out of nowhe-
SQUAK! SQUACK!
And there it was, in all of its bloody, gory, terrifying glory; the swan-piano.

A flock of geese, down together with piano keys and string, each pathetic flap of their collective wings creating disharmonious jumbles of piano keys and splashing drops of blood everywhere on the carpet he literally just managed to clean.

"CAAAAAAAARRRRRLLLLLLL!"

Paul cried out as loud as he could as he quickly stood, trying to figure out what to do with the swan-torture abomination in front of him. He grabbed a broom and kept the piano back away from himself as he escaped out the back door. Crap.