Chapter 10: Would You Break Me? (part 1)
Mary opened the door and walked into her apartment. Nothing was out of place. As a matter of fact, everything seemed too quiet to be right.
Chills raced down her spine and through out her body as the complete eeriness of the room fell upon her. Something was wrong, there was no evident proof of that, but she knew. She could just feel it within the room.
She had forced herself into the room, and had convinced herself that everything was okay. The charade was over now. Whether it was actually something wrong or just her imagination, she decided that she had to get out of there.
She turned and started for the door.
"Wait!"
Frozen. She stood there. The very voice instantly made her adrenaline rush. "Greg?" she choked. There was no answer, only silence. Cautiously, she turned around. She saw Greg standing there with a gun pointed to her. Now, she regretted ever entering the room.
"Don't worry," he stated. "There's only one bullet and it's not intended for you," he explained.
Mary just watched him as he walked around her. She turned her body as her eyes stayed glued on him while he walked over and shut the door. She was too afraid to say anything to him. She was no expert, but she was pretty sure that if someone had a gun and was ready to use it, that you only spoke when spoken too.
"Well?" he impatiently asked. "Aren't ya gonna ask who it's for?"
"Um, who's uh, who's the uh bullet for?" she barely managed to get the question out.
"Me," he answered. "But there's one catch."
"Yeah?" Mary asked.
Greg smirked to her. "Yes," he said as he apporached her. His eyes stuck on her, piercing into her. "You, are going to be the one to pull the trigger," he explained.
Mary stood there, her eyes stuck on the gun. With only inches between them, the closeness was making her extremely uncomfortable. She could also feel her morning sickness starting up, making everything worse.
"I don't think I can," she carefully argued.
"Are you disobeying someone with a gun?" Greg questioned as he stepped closer to her.
Mary tried to speak, but nothing came out.
"Don't worry," he chuckled. "I would think that you would have learned by now that I like you. Some would say love. Now knowing that, you would never shoot some one that you love would you?" he asked.
Mary shook her head. She knew that he didn't love her though. Love wasn't about always getting the other person to do as you please. His slipping sanity was the only thing that kept her from speaking up.
"Good," he whispered with a sneer. He turned and took a few steps over to the window. He had her right where he wanted her. Desperate for her life and willing to do or say anything to keep it. "Now," he stated with his head down.
Mary turned and looked to him. One word that struck fear within her. She could hear it in his smug tone of voice, he accomplished something. He was on his way to getting something, something that she didn't want to allow to happen. "Yes?" she choked.
Greg turned to her and smiled. His deep disturbing thoughts revealed without any words.
Mary stood there, thoughts racing through her head of the next words that could come out of his mouth. Every single bad situation played through her head. She could feel her heart beating in her chest as her hands shook. Eyes watering as her lip trembled. It was quite obvious to her what he had wanted, and it was obvious as to who was going to get their way.
She kept telling herself to scream. Try and run for it. There was one thing holding her back, she was afraid. He may only have one bullet, but she had no idea how good he was at aiming. If done right, it only took one bullet to take a life.
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Rhoda had stood infront of the mirror as she fixed her hair. She was taking her time to try and make sure that she wouldn't get impatient with Mary, who was now beginning to take an awfully long time. This was unusual for her friend, and she was starting to get concerned.
Sighing, she tied the scarf around her head and then hastened over to the phone. She dialed the number and anxiously awaited an answer, an answer that she wouldn't get.
There was something wrong. She knew that Mary would've answered the phone. There had to be something wrong. She knew that she could be paranoid at times, but this time she had a feeling. An umistakable premonition of some ominous event occuring right now. She had to go with her gut feeling.
There was no reason to wait anymore. She hurried out of her room and down the staircase to Mary's appartment.
"Mary!" she called out as she opened the door.
"Hey!" Greg yelled. He took his gun and quickly pointed it up to Rhoda. "Get over there!" he ordered as he motioned to the couch with the gun.
Rhoda's hands went up, as if she were surrendering to him. Without taking her eyes off of Mary and Greg, she slowly went over to the couch and sat down.
"All right," Greg said. He focused his eyes on Mary. "Now, you are going to be the one to do the honors," he explained. Extending his hand, he held out the gun for Mary and waited for her to respond.
Mary's eyes widened as they locked onto the gun. She caught onto what he was saying, and she knew that she couldn't do it. Deep down, she hated his guts, but no matter how much she hated him, how much he had complicated her life and mentally abused her, she could't bring herself to kill him.
Her trembling hand grapsed the gun and held onto it. She had accepted it.
"Good," Greg responded. He went and grabbed a knife from the kitchen and then walked back to stand before Mary. "Now," he instructed. "If you miss me, I stab you and your friend over there. Got it?" he questioned.
"Why are you doing this?" Mary softly cried. She was on the verge of a break down. Tears forming in her desolate eyes.
Greg looked down to her, the smirk faded from his face and was replaced with the first ounce of sympathy that Mary had ever seen in his face. He gently grabbed her chin and lifted her face. "We dated. I gave up my fiancee for you, risked my marriage. I would do anything for you. You kept our baby a secret from me. I would have done anything for you and you left me. You were my only reason for living and you left me. Mary, you took my life away from me already," he explained.
Mary stood there, staring into his eyes. For the first time, he sounded human. There was nothing threatening about what he had said, there was no grin pasted on his face revealing the disturbed fanatasies that he held so close to him. "How did you expect me to react?" she whispered. "You had a wife. You used me. All I was to you was a fun vacation from her, and you know it. Somewhere in that time, you became obsessed," she argued.
Rhoda took the opportunity to sneak over towards the phone and snatch it. She didn't dial just yet, she wanted to wait until the two got louder so that Greg wouldn't hear her as well.
"I tried to explain this to you Mary, but you never gave me the chance. You just kept pushing me away," he replied. The anger was steadily growing within him. "Why don't you just take the gun and do what you've already been slowly doing to me? Go ahead and shoot me you bitch. Shoot me. My life means nothing to me anymore, and I know that you want me dead. We can both have what we want," Greg raised his voice to her as he dropped his hand from under her chin.
Rhoda sat on the couch, trying her best to hide the phone. As Greg grew louder, she started to dial the number to the police and once the phone began to ring, she just held the phone out for the operater to hear.
"I can't do this!" Mary yelled. "I can't kill you! I can't shoot you! Just please Greg!" she begged. There was nothing else for her to do at this point.
"Damn it Mary! Take the goddamn gun and just do it already! Or else I'll fucking stab you! This entire time you've been a bitch to me, making my life more and more miserable and you can't even do one fucking favor for me!" he yelled.
Rhoda took this time to duck down behind the cushions and state the address at which this was going on at. She then cautiously hung up the phone. As she was about to place it back onto the table, she jumped. A shot went off. "Mary!" she exclaimed as she quickly sat up and looked over.