Your beverage started to get warm in your hands, and that made it all the more painful to drink. The burn from taking one too many Vodka Pineapple shots sat uncomfortably in the back of your throat, and when you rubbed your tongue on the roof of your mouth, the pineapple’s acidity stung a little bit sharper. But, with your vision getting increasingly wobbly, and your mind a little hazy, you thought nothing of it when you threw the remainder of the shot back after sipping on it like a morning cup of tea. 

You mentally chastise yourself when you leave it sitting in your mouth for a second longer than necessary, and your face tightens in a sharp cringe. Besides you, your friend laughs, and it’s amazing that you could hear her over the music and the drunken slur of the crowd. You try to laugh back, but it’s half-hearted, your cheeks quickly coloring when her amusement grabs the attention of different strangers around the both of you.

“Stop drinking them if you don’t like them!” She leans over to speak into your ear, and your stomach does an anxious flip when the taller man standing next to you looks down at the top of her pretty head. Both of your hands come up to grip the edge of the bartop nervously after setting the empty shot glass down, nails digging into the surface before promptly yanking them away as if you got burned. Men don’t close in on themselves, men don’t act skittish. You try to get your shoulders to relax, but it looks more like an awkward slump than anything. The fog wrapping tight around your brain is the only thing that numbs you from assuming the worst. Everyone here thinks you’re an idiot. Or better yet— they don’t know you’re here at all. Alcohol had a funny way of making things more bearable. 

“I like them, I like them!” You manage a grin and wave her off, “there’s just… a lot of vodka in there.” You gesture to the bartender for one more, and your longtime companion groans. You both met fresh out of highschool, the first day of your very first job ( or for her, her third job within a span of three months ), and both of you bonded over being college dropouts. She had confided in you that the stress was too much for her, and with a shitty dorm-mate added on top of it, she had abandoned the idea of college life all together. You, however, tried to stick it out. Did your best to overcome and conquer, but sometimes ritualistic hazing is far stronger than your best could ever do. 

Five years later and you’re still thick as thieves. You both made a point to make time for each other one day a week at the very least. This week, both your availability had lined up on a Saturday night. Which in your friend’s mind, meant club night. She was far more outgoing than you, more willing to dance with strangers, made acquaintances everywhere she went, so bright and pretty. It felt like a cruel joke to even be able to stand next to her, and an even crueler one when your self-deprecating thoughts ( and jealousy ) were proved to be factual each time you went out together.

Something dark twisted in the haze of your mind when the man on your opposite side, the one that had been looking down at Jess when she leaned into you, ignored your presence all together in order to worm himself between you and your best friend. Not the first time it’s happened, and most certainly not the last. You were a wallflower. Watching as everyone’s life flittered by them without so much as sparing you a glance in return. Or when they did, when someone finally noticed you, the only thing they could muster up was confusion, disgust; As if you were a frog to be observed and dissected. The testosterone had helped, your voice deepened, your shoulders just a little more broad, and your curves not as feminine. But it’ll never make you taller, or the softness of your features harden into what was commonly associated as male. Not with the sporadic dosages you were taking; Insurance didn’t cover the injections, and you’ve already exhausted yourself over crying about it. Now, there was only bitter acceptance.

It would have been so much easier if I stayed a g— Your next shot burned extra on the way down, and you gave the bartender a glare when his back was turned. Was he putting way too much vodka in the drink on purpose? Or did he just suck? 

“I’m gonna go dance!” Jess pats your shoulder to grab your attention again, and when you turn, you’re all too aware of how the man who shoved between the two of you doesn’t even look your way. You frown, brows pulling together slightly and you bite your bottom lip out of worry. You weren’t entirely confident that you’d be able to keep an eye on her in the sea of people cluttering the dance floor, and as if reading your mind, she gives you a reassuring grin. “I’ll be back in a bit! I extra promise, okay? Join us when you’re ready!” That grabs the tall stranger's attention, and he looks down at you with a raise of his brows. Curiosity lingers there, his gaze flickering down to your chest for the briefest of seconds only to find nothing of what he was looking for, and back at your face again. The stare makes you entirely self-conscious, and as confident as you were with your binding, you still feel too vulnerable in a room packed with so many people. 

“Okay,” you relent, leaning in to whisper the last part, “if anything happens just come and find me. I’ll stay in the same spot.” Appreciation laces her expression when you pull back, and she laughs when you hold up your seventh empty shot glass. 

“Can’t wait till you get fucking drunk! Then maybe you’ll finally dance with me!” She doesn’t stick around to see your scoff, and the stranger is once again hypnotized as she pulls him along to the dance floor. The thought of being pressed up against that many bodies nearly makes you shudder, and you don’t have it quite in you to explain to her why the thought of dancing with that many people around would be your personal nightmare. You turn back to the bar, blinking when the rows of alcohol bottles and syrups begin swirling together. Yeah, maybe that seventh shot wasn’t the smartest idea, but it was easier to be drunk than sober in a place like this. When the bartender comes back around to pick up your empty glass, you barely register him asking if you’d want another, and you shake your head with a few mumbled “no”’s. The worst hasn’t even hit you yet, you could feel it, and you’d rather cool the flames before making a bigger fire. The earlier patrons have now dispersed and new faces surround you. Taking each of them in one by one, you chuckle to yourself when you have trouble focusing on every individual feature. It goes ignored, either because no one could hear you over the DJ, or they just couldn’t bother with some weirdo ominously laughing to himself. 

The multitude of colors across from you grab your attention again, and you could barely make out the words on the bottles. It’s when you’re struggling to pronounce the name on a bright, cherry red one that two girls immediately fill the empty space at your side, flagging down the bartender to order. 

“Are you sure we should even be out?” One of them says, a nervousness in her tone that you find solidarity in. “You know with… Uh, um.. The murders and all?” 

Your eyes flicker away from the bottle and down at the murky brown bartop. Suddenly, trying to read the names of alcohol bottles wasn’t all that interesting anymore. From Pennsylvania and now to Roseville, Florida, a predator stalked the streets at night. With a new killing seemingly every week, the city of Roseville was in a whirlwind of panic. The murderer, this Ghostface, had been nothing but the talk of the town. Front page of every newspaper since he arrived a month ago, and after the first two weeks of seeing his name and how he murdered his victims plastered on every news story and magazine, you figured it best to not send yourself on that downwards spiral. The last thing you needed was more of a reason to fear going outside. Besides, running into some super psycho serial killer didn’t happen to people like you. 

Not unless this murderer wanted an article titled Ghostface: A Passion for Hate Crimes? In the Roseville Gazette’s new piece about him. The thought of it has an amused smirk tug at the corner of your lips. Funny, in a morbid and should totally not be funny sort of way. 

The nervous woman’s friend sighed, rolling her eyes and popping her gum for dramatic flare. “What’s he gonna do? Come in here and try to kill every single one of us? We’re way safer in a crowd than at home. He gets ya’ at home.” 

Maybe it was the alcohol, or maybe you wanted to try your hand at being like Jess. Friendly, likable, and sociable Jess. You turn your body slightly, facing the two women’s direction and remembering to make your posture as welcoming as possible. Eye contact, speak from your chest, don’t be afraid. A breath in, a breath out, and you ignore the tightening of your stomach. “I think he just likes the attention,” you voice your opinion, successfully earning the two’s scrutiny. They eye you with guarded looks, the nervous one’s gaze much softer than her friend’s. The one closest to you, the gum chewer, however, drums her nails across the bartop. Your palms become clammy, but you continue. “I mean— it just seems like all the news stories and articles are what's spurring him on. A total attention seeker, just don’t give him any and maybe he’ll leave you alone.” You force a laugh, and it burns much worse than vodka ever could. 

“Fag.” 

The smile is wiped clean from your lips just as quickly as your face colors with embarrassment. Shame is dumped over you like scorching hot tar, filling your throat till you can’t speak, can’t breathe, and the heat numbs your body to the point it feels cold. Hot. Cold. Hot. Cold. You’re going to be sick. There’s something heartwrenching forming in your chest that’s familiar. An old friend. Like a dumbbell weighing you down, your movements are slowed when you try to face away from them, fingers curling into the edge of the bartop again with how quickly you were shot down. The more you feel yourself drown, the louder the ringing in your ears gets. You knew it was a mistake coming here. You knew it. And the mean, petty side of you blames Jess for it. If she hadn’t dragged you along, if she knew what it was like.. 

The two women go back to their conversation; As if the word never escaped the gum chewer’s mouth, as if you had never talked to begin with. As if you were never there at all. The alcohol makes it harder to force down the humiliated tears welling in your eyes, and you’re actually thankful they no longer notice you. It’s one thing to be called slurs in public, but to cry about it right after is another brand of shame entirely. Your shoulders are slumped again, arms folding together over your chest as a means to self-soothe. You're angry with yourself for not saying anything back, for immediately losing your voice at the first sign of hostility. Not only could you not stand up for yourself, but you crumpled like a wet napkin. God, what a loser.

Like clockwork, someone comes stumbling up next to you. Too stubborn to look directly ( no way were you going to let anyone see the red rings you know are forming around your eyes ), you can tell it’s the tall guy who went off to dance with Jess by the color and style of his shirt you catch in your peripheral. The ringing was still too loud in your ears to hear what he ordered, but by the sudden shift of his posture, you could tell he was looking at you. 

Please no. God no. 

He says something, but it’s hard to make out over how overwhelmed you were. So instead, you don’t answer, and will yourself to become invisible. Strange how it works, the back and forth between your hopeless desire to be noticed, and to stay in the unacknowledged spot you were all too familiar with. 

The silence between the two of you is almost painful, but he promptly forgets your existence the moment the bartender reappears with his drinks. One you recognize as Jess’s signature order, a Bloody Mary, and the desire to leave hits you like a truck. You need to go home, you need to go and tell Jess what happened so you can both get the fuck out of this shitty night club with a shitty bartender; And away from all these shitty people. Without thinking, you move a little unsteadily on your feet right at the same time Jess’s new dance partner does, colliding into his chest face first. There’s grunts from you both, and the collision has his drinks slip from his hands and toppling down directly on top of you. The gum chewer and her friend shriek in surprise, cursing when some of it splashes against their shoes. The combination of liquids feels like thick sludge running down your hair and to your shoulders, staining the fabric of your shirt a bright red. It drips off the ends of your locks, sliding all the way down to your fingertips and creating a small puddle where you stood. 

Again, you are left speechless. Your drunken daze makes it entirely impossible to think. You slowly lift your chin up, the strong scent of what was Jess’s Bloody Mary becoming that much more powerful when it leaves red trails down the length of your face. Even without the hamster running on his little wheel to get your brain cells working, a small conscious part of you knew this was when the man was supposed to apologize. Ask you for forgiveness so he could still score with your best friend, maybe even go the extra mile and grab you a few napkins so you could wipe yourself off. But when you look up and your eyes manage to focus, he is looking completely past you, mouth babbling apologies towards the two women who were unfortunate enough to be in the splash zone. 

You do not exist.

Serial killer be damned. You’d rather brave the pitchblack streets of Roseville then stay there another second. I don’t exist, the wheel in your brain started turning again, Ghostface won’t even see me out there. Turning in a very dangerous direction.

Like a robot, you stiffly maneuver yourself away from the bar and towards the exit, careful as not to inconvenience anybody. Your promise to Jess would have to be broken for a single night, but you hoped she would understand. You hoped that having two drinks dunked over your head was enough to warrant leaving and never going back. You leave through the front without sparing a single glance at the bouncers, and the humid Florida air only worsened your predicament. Everything felt sticky and cold, disgustingly so. And you hadn’t even realized you were crying until something wet and warm served as a stark contrast to the chill sludge of your now most hated beverage in existence. Your tears dribbled off your chin, and a pitiful whine escaped your throat. Another sob turned into an ugly snort when you tried to stop it halfway. Men don’t cry. Men don’t cry. Men don’t cry. 

You try to exhale, but it comes out in a stutter, and inhaling only has the same result. Your legs move entirely on autopilot to get you home, and though you were stumbling just a tad, you still had the sense to try and determine just how long it would take you to get there. 

Only a few miles. Thirty minutes at least.. It’s okay. It’s okay. Stop crying. Men don’t cry.

You press your lips tightly together to silence yourself, and you focus on the street sign ahead as the club’s music slowly fades out from behind you. Retting LN. it reads, or at least you think it says Retting. You stop for a moment, eyes squinting up at the sign and mouth slightly parted. Left or straight ahead? You couldn’t decide. Trying to get yourself to think was like trying to connect the right wires in a generator, and you definitely weren’t a mechanic. Straight is… longer. You eye the different dimly lit stores and bars down the street ahead, swallowing hard when a group of different figures emerge from a particularly seedy hole-in-the-wall pub. 

Left is shorter. But when you turn, the pitch black that meets you feels all consuming. There’s nothing but a flickering street lamp several blocks away, and porch lights that don’t meet the sidewalk. You’ll be totally blind, minus that one street lamp. But it’s shorter. I feel sick. The chorus of laughter from the group you saw prior was getting louder now, and in a moment of drunken panic, you picked left. 

The group seemed far wiser than you. Carrying on down their path without even sparing a glance towards the horror filled shadows you decided to brave. You sway to the side, catch yourself last minute, and right yourself up again with a few low murmurs. Even you had no idea what you were saying to yourself, and anyone who’d happen to pass you by would surely think you were crazy. But the streets were empty, minus the few cockroaches you were too drunk to notice skittering around your feet. The Ghostface crosses your mind again, his mask flashing in the forefront. You spook yourself when your vivid imagination turns the mask into an actual face, morphed into a perpetual scream and his jaw begins opening wider and wider. Tearing the corners of his mouth as it completely unhinges and threatens to swallow you whole. 

A shiver runs down your spine, and you force yourself to think about something else. The lamp post is coming up quickly, and you’re relieved when its light seems to stretch towards you no matter how dim. Your saving grace, your angel; Its light was a God Send when even your own mind began piecing together horrors beyond what you thought you were capable of conjuring up. The gentle buzz of the lamp as you stood under it was a helpful distraction, and so were the bugs swarming beneath it in chaotic circles. Now, maybe, you can finally understand why the little creepy crawlies were so attracted to the light. Were they also scared of some mass murderer? Afraid his sadism didn’t stop at just humans, and he’d crush them under his boot a little too enthusiastically? It made sense, you concluded with a final nod to yourself, The Ghostface didn’t just strike fear into the hearts of the people of Roseville, but in every living creature that just so happened to be within the city limits. Or maybe, his influence had already reached outside the city limits. 

The rumors stated he had made his way from Pennsylvania to Florida, who knows where he’d go next once he grew tired of this dingy city. 

Having your head tilted back and your eyes fixated on the lamp for too long had you feeling even more dizzy than you already were, and you instantly regretted your mistake. Facing forward again had your world spinning, swaying side to side with a miserable groan. You were never drinking again, you’ve had it with the effects of alcohol. Stumbling when you don’t quite pick your foot up all the way, inches away from the line that divided illumination and the shadows from a moonless sky, there was a loud clatter from behind the picket fence that separated you and the yard it came from. Startled, you curse, the exclamation echoing off the silent streets. It’s followed by a gasp when your foot slips off the curb of the sidewalk, and you finally go tumbling down on your ass for the first time that night. The road’s gravel bites into the skin of your palm and your forearm when you try to catch yourself, and there’s a sharp sting against your thigh when it rubs against a few loose rocks as you try to right yourself too fast. Your mind can’t keep up to your body’s instincts, and your feet don’t seem to work right even when you finally manage to pick yourself up. 

You run with awkward, clumsy movements across the street. Your heart beats heavy in your chest, so hard you can feel it in your throat. It feels like you’re choking again, your arm and palm hurts, your thigh is rubbing uncomfortably against your jeans. But it was all left ignored. You had to escape, you had to run. Run from what? You try to rationalize. It was just a noise. A raccoon, a stray cat. The Ghostface doesn’t care about a nobody like you. 

Though, none of your rationalizing mattered. Your legs had a mind of their own, carrying you down different streets and letting fate be your guide. The dark blinded you, and like a moth to a flame, you began following the flickering lights of the back alleyways subconsciously. A stupid move on your part, wouldn’t it have made more sense to stick to the shadows? It would have made for an easier escape. That is, if you even were being chased by anything. Or anyone. 

You had no idea where you were by the time you stopped, wheezing as you tried to catch your breath. The muscles of your legs ached, and your side cramped with each inhale. If you didn’t feel sick before, you really do now, and a gag bubbles up your throat that turns into a short, dry cough. All that running made you absolutely parched, and your own saliva did nothing to remedy it. Leaning against the alley wall for support, you take this moment to collect yourself. There was nothing but the sound of your own breathing, nobody reaching out from dark corners to drag you into Hell, and certainly no masked killer choosing you as his next victim. Your laugh comes out as an amused sigh, your exhaustion doesn’t allow for anything more. 

The night was full of embarrassment. But at the very least, there was no one to watch you sprint around like a mad man. 

You blink slowly, giving yourself all the time you need in order to process where you are. You’ve already given up on getting home in a timely manner, and instead focus on trying to get home in general. There’ll be no more scaring yourself, no more wild imaginations, and no more brainlessly staring at street lights. Step one, get yourself out of the alleyway. “Yeah.. yeah..” You mutter to yourself, rubbing both your eyes. You’ve forgotten how sticky your face was, and you pull your hands back with a soft “ew.” Most of the alcohol spilled on you had dried, but it didn’t make it any less uncomfortable. The top of your head still felt wet, your clothes stained far past salvation, and you smelled awful. You fucking hate Bloody Marys.

Lifting yourself off the wall, you decide to head straight. Might as well finish what you started, and there was a right turn calling your name. Further into the busier part of Roseville, the back alley’s nearly acted as a maze, but you were certain that finding the road again would be much quicker after taking that right. Where you got this confidence from, you weren’t sure. You’d never been the back alley type, not even during your edgier phase in high school. You walk with the certainty of someone who wasn’t seconds away from pissing their pants just moments before, shoulders back and posture straight. You’ve had it up to here on your metaphorical limits chart and the next fixation on your mind was a nice, hot shower. Rinse the day off next to all the red sludge dunked over your head, forget those unfortunate interactions at the bar, and carry on the next few days like nothing happened. Your hand and arm would heal, you’d apologize to Jess for leaving her at the club, and you'd rid yourself from any thoughts about Ghostface. 

You refuse to live your life filled with paranoia. Not again. 

Something strange sounds ahead, just around your chosen right corner. It makes you hesitate, but you swallow that fear and chalk it up to nothing. Nothing! Your self assured pep-talk wasn’t about to go to waste, and the worse it could be was some crazy drunk wandering around the back alleys at night. So someone a lot like you. 

If that was the case, you’d simply turn around and go the other way. 

Your hands balled into fists, determined to see it through. The sounds got louder the more you approached; odd shuffling, was that a… groan? And someone is talking. One person, or two? You couldn’t make sense of it, and now you really, really wish you hadn’t taken so many of those shots. In a desperate attempt to prove yourself, you march faster towards the corner, figuring that as long as you didn’t give yourself time to tuck your tail between your legs and scurry off in the opposite direction, you’d come out accomplished. If you could face this, you could face anything. That’s how it worked, right? The gum chewer woman comes to mind, and you vow that if you could walk past whatever lurked in the shadows of this maze with your head held high, you’d be able to do the same when confronted with people like her. 

You round the corner without giving yourself a moment to think. No time to pause and really listen to what was being said. To what was being done. The heat from the alcohol leaves your body entirely, and what feels like the ice cold body of a snake coils around your limbs to make you immobile. The breath you were holding chokes you, but you can’t even manage a cough. Your hands and legs grow numb, your eyes warming with tears. 

Things like this didn’t happen to people like you. You were a wallflower. A nobody. Hardly visible to anyone outside of Jess and your boss when he needed you to cover someone on your days off. The grotesque wet noises pierce your ears and threaten to draw your attention away from the dark figure standing only a few feet in front of you. A gloved hand wraps tight around the handle of his blade, the other gripping some new, poor victim by the front of their hoodie. One last groan and spurt of blood dribbling past their lips, their legs give out and they slump in the man’s hold. But you can barely register any of this. Not when the ghastly, white mask slowly turns to peek at you from under its hood, locking the hollow of its eyes on you. 

It sees you. 

He sees you. 

Ghostface slips his knife from the fresh corpse with ease. Crimson drips from the tip of it, and he makes no sudden movements. Neither do you. A silent understanding, if you run ( run, run, run—! ) he could easily catch you as you are now. Drunk, fastened to where you stand by fear alone. He moves with such brilliance, the fluidity of a cat, a hunter. The casualness of his regard for you shows the depth of his cockiness. The black holes of his mask suck you in far deeper than the shadows of the path you’ve chosen, and this is the second time in your whole existence that you’ve experienced what true fear is. The frigid bite at your rapidly beating heart, the feeling of T.V. static crawling up your skin and to your horrified expression. You can do nothing but stand there, gaping, as a mass murderer fully turns to look at you. 

He sees you.