Chapter 10: A new friend

"P… please…" I begged. "Stay…"

He stood still.

"You're weird, aren't you?" He sighed. "This is the first time I've ever seen a human dare to beg me to stay like you."

"What do you mean…?" I spoke up after pausing for a few seconds. "You… you saved my life, twice, for god's sake…!

He stayed silent for a while. He sighed again, but more heavily than last time. "I guess I shouldn't question you about that. There's barely a time you humans have seen a faceless monster with tentacles on his back saving a human girl, am I wrong? I shouldn't be surprised that you're acting this way."

He did have a point there. He was said as a merciless murderer on the Internet, after all. But… I felt like there was something about him, something that was completely different from what people said. Was he always this way, or was it just me to feel this way?

"But… please just stay, Slenderman…" I tightened my grip around him. "I… I couldn't understand any of this, at all…"

He sighed, for the third time.

"You're really weird to act this way, you know."

"You have no friend…?"

"Yes." He answered. "From the first moment I was born, I had had this face that lacks features and unusual pale skin. My father didn't want to take the responsibility of raising me, so he left without saying a word. One day, when I was about five, my mother told me to get into the car for no reason, but I followed suit anyway. She also told me to take some pills, saying that the new roads were very bumpy and I might vomit if I didn't take that pills. I soon drifted to sleep. When I woke up, I found myself in an orphan center."

"That… must have been very painful for you…"

"Yes, that was so painful that I still remember every detail until now." He paused before continuing. "My childhood wasn't easy. The other kids in the orphan center tried to stay away from me because they thought I had a rare disease and me being the one and only faceless child in the entire world. I tried to make friends there and at school, but no one understood my pain. I soon had enough of it and ran away when I was about thirteen, starting my own life in the forest I am currently living in, and killed animals and even humans to survive. From then, people's disgust started to change to fear, and that made me so satisfied."

"... I couldn't believe how you could live in that terrible childhood."

"Well, it's a typical villain scenario, actually." He crossed his arms in front of his chest. "In those things you humans call 'movies' and 'fairytales', a villain suffered a difficult childhood and then developed their evil personality because of that."

"Well, yeah, you're right, but…" I kicked my legs back and forth while sitting on my bed. "All of those things you had to go through… those were too much, really."

"What happened, happened. You can't change your past, and that's a fact."

I didn't reply back once again until a few seconds later.

"Now, I realized that I wasn't the most unlucky person..."

"What do you mean?" Now it was his turn to be confused.

"Well, you have probably known my name already, which is Konna Fujikama."

"What's about it?"

I sighed before continuing. "I'm sure you can clearly understand I was originally born in Japan. I spent my first years of my life there until I was eight. My family moved into here, England, because of my father's work. I thought that saying goodbye to my friends in Japan was the worst thing, but then I realized I was wrong. My parents passed away in a car accident when I was twelve, and I'd never cried so much in my life. My uncle who also lived in England raised me, but he died afterward because of cancer when I was sixteen. I then got a job where I sent out flyers, so of course the salary was low. When I entered college, I luckily got a job at a popular café, so my salary now is high enough for me to pay for my studying."

Before I could realize it, the tears had already formed at the corners of my eyes. I quickly wiped them away, not wanting to let him see me crying.

"I didn't know you have such past." He said.

"Yeah, I know, but yours is even more difficult." I chuckled quietly. "So now I shouldn't be complaining about it anymore."

Both of us had done telling our stories, so the silence had its chance to slip through again. Luckily, he spoke up to break it.

"Oh, speaking of the café… You returned from work at night, correct?"

"Yes, what's about it?"

"Well, a gang of guys attempted to kidnap you one night when you were walking home from work."

"What?!" I exclaimed, but not too loud not to wake up the quiet neighbor.

"I assumed that they made you unconscious somehow, then they dragged you into the dark alley and tied you up. They started looking into your handbag, saying that 'girls working at that café are paid very well', so they thought you were having a lot of money with you. But afterward, they seemed to find nothing, so they said 'let's have fun, since girls working there are pretty hot'. But before they could lay a finger on you, I beat the hell out of them."

I stared at him for a while, doubting that he was lying. He seemed to be telling the truth, and the things he said and the ones I saw matched together perfectly. The cloth with chemical smell must have been dipped with anesthetic, and it must be the reason why I passed out. The morning after that night, my wrists hurt like hell must be because they tied me up, like Slenderman said.

"T- thank you… so I guess that you saved me three times, then."

I turned over to look at him to see a very deep expression visible on his face. Was he thinking of something? I was about to ask him, but decided against it afterward. He then asked me.

"I'm having a very small question, but I'm wondering if you're going to agree to it."

"Tell me."

He inhaled. "Since we both have bad past, can we be… like… friends…?"

I stared at him.

"Y- you know… in those 'fairytales', two people who both have to suffer uneasy childhood becomes friends…" He was stuttering. "I- I'm not sure if that works in real life b- but-"

Not waiting for him to finish, I held his hand using both of my hands, cutting him off. He looked down at me and smiled. "That works in real life too, Slenderman. We humans can understand each other's feelings when we have to go through same problems and mistakes, making us more forgiving to others."

He stared at me and down at our hands. "So…?"

"So…" I held his hand more tightly. "That makes us friends."

He didn't say anything before sighing lightly.

"Thank you."

He gripped my hands.

"Thank you for being my first friend."