#lcdyburke

&&. my muse to show their dark side

she is speaking- something. her mouth is moving, he barely hears the words. she looks worried, concerned- for him, perhaps, he does not know. he does not know and he wants to tell her to get out, to get out and get away from him and he can do nothing for his fingers are shaking and he cannot speak- he tries, his mouth opening, his tongue clammy between his teeth. he cannot breathe for it he cannot think he-

but. no. no.

hold up a second. take a step back, realize that even that panic isn’t real. a thought, dim in the back of his mind: it is not real. the shaking does not stop, he is almost apathetic as he watches it from inside his head. the panic is not real and he wishes it were, he wishes he were not thinking so clearly, so precisely because he should not be thinking so precisely, he should not be so calm and nothing in him is real, nothing in this is real, he is false and he cannot help it-

(because her throat is so slender, so pretty and so pale and he looks up and he can see the line leading to her collarbone, see the way her skin glows with the blood underneath it. he wants to sink his fingers down on them, snap the slender bone in them, feel her gurgle underneath him and press gentle at first, gentle with the intent to imprint. harder until skin reddened and turned black and blue, harder until flesh broke and red spurted out, until he fed the monster inside and it sated itself with all its mindless violence and flesh)

(except, truly, the monster is him, his want is his own and is it easier to pretend there is monster? is it easier, is this his conscience or is he simply weak?)

she realizes, he knows she realizes- he sees the very moment her eyes go wide and she takes a stumbling step back, he pinpoints the exact breadth of time when her gaze flickers from concerned to fearful. pinpoints the moment after when she convinces herself that nothing is wrong, the way the fear cannot be completely forgotten.

(he could, he could, he could-                     -he could break her, so foolish, so naive, listen to your instincts, run for you are prey and you have been taught all your life there are no predators- he could break every bone in her wrist and follow up her arm, rip and tear and break and there would be no method to it, there would be nothing except hunger and need and the sickening vision of her broken and blooded on the marble floor)

he does not.

he can not.