3. restless
in the day he sleeps, unwilling to take part in that horrifyingly bright overhead hang they call a sun. there has always been something about the presence of ultraviolet rays that has made him ill at ease, weary to the core. after just moments of basking in its light he feels the wrinkles at the corners of his eyes, the ones his mother put there once upon a time, deepen considerably. so he sleeps during the daytime, knowing full well that his processing power is better harnessed when the moon is up.
his mother never wanted him.
his phone doesn’t ring, reminding him that he should go check on her.
in the night, however, he prowls the streets, wary of every person that passes him sidewalkways, unwilling to catch their eyes in his own. he is not horrible, he merely wishes to keep to himself. peoples’ faces lit by passing neon and the flashing lights of all the clubs he’s ever attended.
he goes to his favorite, eats a steak, gets a dance, ignores everyone else. an older woman tries to buy him a drink, so he leaves before he can get back into the private room tonight. he can’t stand the thought of sitting still for long enough to fuck. not that he could get harder than he does when he thinks of the body in the basement and how it’s going to stink eventually and no one will ever know who’s responsible.
another club, another steak, another dance and he’s off again, the overwhelming stenches of sweat and shame clouding his judgment. there’s a pretty one standing beneath a streetlamp and it’s begun to snow. if only she weren’t busy trying to peddle her wares she wouldn’t have to freeze her tits off in this weather. he offers her a jacket, and she smiles, unguarded and unaware.
come back to my place, i’ll feed you. and she looks like she hasn’t eaten in at least three days, not a result of poverty but rather personal choice. he doesn’t judge her, just nods when she speaks - something she does at length and without consideration to the wants and needs of others. when she isn’t paying attention he takes her bony fingers between his own, kisses each jabbing knuckle.
when he feeds her a can of chicken noodle soup, she blows his fucking brains out. and just like that he’s singular again, a cell, maybe two, a throat scraping waiting to happen. eventually he will be little more than just that, as her memories will no longer be relevant to any human experience. the worms eat into her brain, but there’s no way she knows that so he lets her go back to her streetlight state of being under the premise that they’ll do this again.
for the record, this house is not his; neither is the money that he presses into her palm as he’s kissing the shell of her ear. he has never been inside this building in his life, though he has spent at least as much time admiring it as he did her before choosing her.
the sun has risen outside the window and he needs to shower, can feel her random DNA all over his limbs, which are something like human but seem to be less when he ducks into the light of morning. perhaps tonight he will shed her away before finding her the second time or, better yet, finding another younger and prettier friend for a playdate.
his mother will ask if he slept. he will lie through his teeth and tell her he has, make no mention of the perfectly nice girl he paid for, all the while ignoring the bags underneath his eyes and the way his every body part aches for respite.
