The Repeated Death of Skylar Holmes [PM]

[Skylar]

BANG!
It all started with a BANG!
_____________


You drive until you have to pee,

and even then you keep on driving. You figure if you do he won’t find you, he won’t hit you again, and you’ll be free. He wasn’t happy about you torching his bike, he wasn’t happy when you jumped in the car that he paid for and gave him the finger. But you were. You had the biggest smile on your face when those flames licked the side of that paintjob that you had done, when the leather started burning and stinging your nose. Even when he came home and screamed like a girl, like a little bitch, and threatened to hit you again. It would be the last threat you ever heard, because then, having packed up your things during the night he was gone, you jumped in your car. A cute little convertible, powder blue and soft topped, you gave him the finger and slung gravel at his face as you drove off into the rising morning. You didn’t stop until you were four counties over. You didn’t want to stop then, but you needed gas and another pack of cigarettes. After you found out he froze your account, you paid cash, and then laughed because there was only about four grand left out of the hundred grand that had been in said account. You had slowly gathered everything you would need for this, tucked it neatly away from the world and waited. You knew the night he came home late it would end in disaster, but you stayed up anyway, hoping you were wrong. He had walked in, smelling of liquor and another woman’s perfume, and that was that. You lost it and he backhanded you across the kitchen, a normal night for you two, only you had formed a plan. This was the last straw. He would never do this again. So you took out a grand at a time, careful not to let him see the statements, careful not to put it where he would find it. Then, one day, when he came home late, he would find his motorcycle on fire and you speeding away. That was a week ago….


You found a little town.

You really like this little town, mostly because it’s not that easy to get lost and they had a vacancy in the ratty motel near the edge of town. Your car can’t take much more, not without an oil change and some new tires. You pay cash for everything, no paper trail. And you take the key from the aging man behind the counter.

In your room, you spot a few roaches, there’s one working light and everything, including the walls, looks dingy from cigarette smoke. You don’t care though, you are just happy, because you are free. You set your luggage down and decide that you want a shower. In the shower, there’s a giant spider, so you decide against it, combating roaches is one thing, spiders are a different story entirely. With no shower, you freshen up and change your clothes, all of them are black, so it really doesn’t matter what you choose. Today it’s black jeans and a black shirt with Harley Quinn on the front. You slip on your shoes, a nice pair of Docs you made him buy you before you left, and you look at the bed. The sheets are yellowed, and there’s a smell coming from them not unlike mold or maybe mildew, you make a slight face, the rings in your lips drawing downward as you express your displeasure. You walk out the door, locking it behind you, because you are frugal and didn’t get one of those hotels with a nice key card or an indoor pool. The one you chose has a pool, but the water is black and looks slimy to the touch. You wouldn’t dare go in it, even if it was summertime. You pull your hoodie on, because you didn’t realize how cold it was here, not until you are standing on the balcony of this ratshit motel and the wind is cutting through you like a hot knife through butter. The hood hides your black and purple hair, something you did right after leaving him, no longer are you the brunette he knew. You are free to make your own choices. You’ve never felt this before, and it’s exhilarating. You decide to let your feet be your guide as you walk down those concrete stairs and into the dark night, looking both ways before crossing onto a street called Ferret, you giggle but otherwise the night is silent.


Someone is Watching.

You cross into a small park, there’s a playground and a few benches. You don’t linger, crossing the grass to the other side in just twenty of your short legged steps. You watch your shadow elongate and morph into something unrecognizable as you cross under the streetlights and away from them. Somewhere in the back of your mind, you wonder if you’re being followed, it’s the dead of night and you don’t know the town, your paranoia starts to show. You dart your eyes around, feeling the hairs on the back of your neck raise as you turn around, heading again, toward the motel and it’s safety. Fight or flight making you flee the scene as quickly as you can, but will it be quick enough?

[Andre]

It was a fine night, he decided.

He paused there, above the streets, to sniff at the wind. He knew these roads well. Too well. He had laid claim to them long before the rest of his bloodline moved in, before anyone else had thought they had a right to them. There can, though, be issues with knowing a place inside and out. There was no longer any challenge, no thrill in the hunt there. Tonight he felt like a change, a conscious turning of the tables. With an unnecessary tug at his cuffs to make sure that they were in order, he turned and made his way south.

The off the cuff decision to break from routine felt good. It had been far, far too long since he had been able to simply exist within the city, perfectly at ease and able to roam at will wherever fancy took him. He had rules, responsibilities, forced upon him by others. It would be untrue to say he had been averse to this, or else he would not have accepted them, but it rankled. He was, as he had ever been, a free spirit. Tonight it almost felt as though he had reclaimed a small piece of that, once again being able to simply… be.

Perhaps that was why the human caught his eye as they made their way across the park, some sixth sense appreciation that would not have occurred to him otherwise. A degree of insight brought about by his newfound lack of external concerns.

His hunt had been without incident, thus far, and he found himself stood atop a town house at the edge of park, deep in the southern reaches of the city. It was not somewhere he would usually visit - he had had more than enough of wooded areas down through the years and the foliage tended to impair his preferred method of hunting - but tonight it was as though he was meant to bear witness to something.

He pondered this as he watched the human, the hood of their top pulled up to hide their face, stopped and cast about them almost as though they could feel his eyes upon them. Whoever it was seemed unremarkable. Just another lost little mouse out after dark, fleeing from the shadows and what they imagined might be hidden there. Or perhaps there was more to it. Could it be that this person, whoever it may be, had actually sensed him watching? They had certainly reacted as though they had. If so, that was something that might bear investigation.

In stages, he made his unhurried way down to ground level and took a moment to get used to this new perspective on the hunt. After all, he had wanted a challenge tonight. Straightening his jacket, he sniffed at the air, his head tilted slightly to the left, filtering out the myriad scents for that one thread he needed.

Then there, suddenly, it was. The vibrancy of the figure’s fear, curling through the trees and tinged with a hint of stale smoke - fitting, he decided, appreciating the poetic symmetry. He set off, following the trail. Melting from shadow to shadow he made his way through the park, pausing occasionally to make sure he was still headed in the proper direction. He was, each and every time, he was pleased to note. He had heard a saying, once, that some things were like riding a bike - impossible to forget. It still made him smile, though.

Before too long he found himself standing outside of a fairly low-rent looking motel. It would have been no effort at all to simply force his way into the room he knew that his prey was currently occupying, but that was also exactly what stopped him. It was a strange quirk of the human psyche, he had always thought, that when faced with danger they insisted upon backing themselves into a corner. Even the most desultory scouting of the area had shown him that the bathroom window was far too small to provide a point of egress, leaving only one way in - or crucially out - of the room.

Simply forcing the door open and barging into the room would be too easy. It was what everyone else would do and that, therefore, ruled it out as a plan of action. A rapidly increasing number of ploys and ruses flashed through his mind, each one more complex than the last, before he settled on the go-to plan of every gangly youth in every coming of age movie in the 1980s. After all, it worked beautifully for them, so why - in its simplicity - would it not work for him too?

Something akin to a smile cracked his lips as he started flicking small pebbles at the room’s window from the shadows.