Of Pocket Watches and Tea

Demitri inherited several things from his father: artistic talent, a house, and a watch that runs on human blood.

Of Pocket Watches and Tea

The firelight caressed his face and the soft sounds of the crackling wood eased his nerves. The evening was cool and biting, as a winter’s night should be.

This one had to be perfect.

A gift left in Dillon’s own home just had to be a masterpiece, no matter how hastily it had all come together.

The skinny red head looked up at him still to shocked by the knife in her chest to speak. The red mess fell to the floor pooling prettily under her chair. He left her there to watch as he took the saw out of the cheap plastic bag and started to cut apart the dead man lying on the soft rug. He started at the joints. It always made for easier cleaner cuts.

He almost felt bad for making her buy the supplies for the evening. At least, he would have felt bad if he were capable of such a thing.

When the blood from her wounds slowed to a little trickle he placed a porcelain tea cup down to catch it. Then he went back to his work. When the man’s body was divided into adorable little pieces each one was gift wrapped and set aside.

By this time the women was dead, just the way he liked it.

He took the knife out of her with care then let it slide over her like it was sliding through butter.

For a second he panicked when he realized that he had forgotten to tell her to buy nails and a hammer, but Dillon had those things in his garage so it was ok.

Perfect. It was absolutely perfect. Dillon would be speechless.

So with a singing loveless heart he set out for home and tomorrow the post office.

~ 18 years earlier ~

“Do you see this Demitri?” The young boy nodded at his father’s gravel filled voice as it rolled over him like a distant thunderstorm. At the tender age of six years old, he could barely see over the edge of the sturdy oak table, but he didn’t complain. Today was the first time his father, the great painter, Demitri D'Aunay the fourth, had allowed him into the ever forbidden study. Demitri, the fifth that is, was determined to be as grown up as possible.

“I see it, Papa,” he said. And he did see it. More than that, he wanted it. He wanted the shiny polished something that his father dangled from reverent fingers very much. It caught the faint light of the fireplace and glowed amber in the musty, paint, book, and father smelling air. It swung ever so slightly, like the pendulum siting on the piano downstairs, left, right, then left again.

“Come son, get in the chair and have a closer look.” Demitri clamored up until his elbows leaned on table top, his knees folded beneath him.

“What is it Papa?” His father turned his lips up a bit. It was a tiny gesture, not like the gapping grin of the gardener, showing off endless lines of teeth, but to Demitri it was the best kind of smile. Father only used it when he was really, really happy, like whenever Mama entered the room.

Papa took the thing into the palm of his hand, and pressed the top in a way that sent the front of the thing swinging outward.

“This is a pocket watch. To be more specific, this is a pocket watch crafted by the hands of your great great grandfather, the first Demitri.” Demitri nodded again. There was a portrait of great great grandpapa in the library.

“The first Demitri was one of the greatest watchmakers in his time. To him it was more than a job or a craft. It was an art just as much as my paintings are. Do you understand?” He didn’t really but he said yes anyway. Papa ruffled his hair, which was very annoying.

“You’re a bit too young to understand now, but someday you will. The point is that this watch was his master piece. He built it especially for our family. It is our most prized possession. When he died he gave it to his son, who was seven years old at the time. My father gave it to me when I was seven and I will give it to you when you turn seven, tomorrow.” Demitri couldn’t believe it. The most valuable thing they had was going to be his.

“Are you sure Papa?” Papa smiled his tiny smile again.

“It’s going to be yours but I’ll take care of it for you until you’re a little older. Twenty or thirty years old maybe, just to be safe, but you can come in here and visit it whenever you want,” he assured. Demitri liked this very much. Mother had just yelled at him for losing his new toy this morning. What would she do if he lost great great gandpapa’s special watch?

“There’s one more thing, Demitri,” Papa said scratching the dark shadow of hair on his chin. “It’s nothing important, just a silly superstition that the first Demitri made up. He claimed that the watch runs on the blood of our family. So every time the watch is passed down a drop of the new owner’s blood is added to right here on the inside of the front lid, right here on this stain. Its tradition even if it is ridiculous. It is done when the watch strikes exactly midnight on the new owner’s seventh birthday.”

“Will it hurt?” he asked.

“No, it’s just a little prick on the finger. You’ll barely feel a thing,” Papa answered.

Demitri nodded resolutely looking down at his hand. That didn’t sound so bad, besides he wasn’t a baby.

“Does that mean that I get to stay up until midnight?” he asked hopefully.

Papa chuckled warmly. “No, it doesn’t.”

“But Papa!”

“No. You’re late enough for bed as it is. Go brush your teeth. I’ll wake you when it’s time.”

“Alright.” Before he left the room he saw the watch disappear into his father’s front shirt pocket and he thought that midnight couldn’t come fast enough.

For little Demitri midnight never did come. Oh he lived and the hour came and went, but the pocket watch stopped ticking at exactly ten twenty-seven pm. For that was the very second that his father died. As it turned out, the gardener with the great big smile was not nearly as friendly or as happy as he had always seemed.

In truth, he wasn’t happy at all. For years he had served the D'Aunay family. For years he had sat in his tiny cottage on the outskirts of the property watching them laugh their rich people laugh and eat their rich people food. It had driven him crazy knowing that they had everything and he had nothing. He lived in the house they gave him. He used the money they gave him. He ate the garden’s crops they gave him. Everything he had they gave him. So for one week, he had picked up a side job at the nearby town. There he earned enough money to go out and buy a gift for his employers.

As it turned out, that gift was a rather large axe.

A little after ten twenty-seven pm, Demitri reached out from his hiding place inside of the large armoire and with trembling fingers took the watch from his father’s shirt pocket. Father was gone now, just like his little puppy had gone last year. It was up to him now to protect their family’s most special treasure.

He closed the door to his hiding place, huddled down into the back corner, and looked at great great gandpapa’s watch. He focused on it completely, trying to block out the sound of his mother screaming and the sharp swoosh of an axe coming down.

It took three days for someone to find him. It took two for something deep within him to die. 

~*~

Demitri woke to the sound of his own screaming. His breath heaved in his chest.

His therapist was a liar, he thought angrily.

The twenty something blond hippie of a woman, had promise him that his nightmares would go away with time. Well he was fourteen years old now, it had been seven years since his parents were murdered and here he was again.

“I hope she chokes on one of her stupid puppets one of these days,” he mutter to himself.

Quietly he got out of bed and ambled down the stairs to the kitchen. On the way he passed the unconscious lump that was his uncle Alexander, or Alexi-poo as the giggling floozies he was always bringing home liked to call him. “Alexi-poo,” they would cry. “Buy me some pretty jewelry,” or “Alexi-poo, can’t we go for a ride in your Mercedes?”

Mind you it wasn’t his uncle’s Mercedes at all. It had belonged to Papa. Everything had belonged to Papa. Now it all technically belonged to Demitri. Papa had left uncle Alexander just enough for them to live off of. Everything else was taken care of. The servants were being paid by the bank as per the will’s instructions. A company came in every other year to assess the estate and do any repairs that were needed. The money for the old gardener was transferred to the new gardener because it didn’t seem right to keep paying the man who chopped you into little pieces.  Everything else was sitting safely inside of a trust account alongside the deed to the house and all the other important documents.

Meanwhile, uncle Alexander was asleep in a nest of empty liquor bottles on the sitting room floor. Demitri sighed and stepped over him.

You shouldn’t get the wrong impression. Alexi-poo was actually a fairly happy drunk. He wasn’t abusive in the least. In fact, most days the man forgot that Demitri was there at all. The driver took him where he needed to go and once every week he would scare the man half to death by appearing and asking some question or another.

So no, he wasn’t abusive, just worthless. He hadn’t always been that way. Demitri’s father would never have left him in the man’s care if he had been like this before. He had once been a rather successful business man. Then his wife, formerly known as ‘Auntie Caroline’, currently known as ‘that filthy s**t’, had run off with his best friend, his beloved older brother died, and his business went belly up. All of this happened in the span of six months.

Things had kind of gone downhill since then.

You really couldn’t blame the man. Now all he had was a few money grubbing w****s and a dwindling inheritance. Had it been him in that situation, Demitri probably would have started drinking too.

The cold sip of water soothed the ache that the screaming had left in his throat. It felt so good that he sat down alone at the table to finish the glass. He didn’t love his uncle. Demitri didn’t love anything. He hadn’t felt anything at all in a long time. He wasn’t even sad that his parents were gone.

Sometimes that bothered him. He remembered very clearly loving them. They had been his everything, but now it was all so numb. Still though the dreams of that night sent terror through him. At times it was like he was still kneeling there in that dark armoire. Maybe that was where he had left all the other stuff from inside of him.

He took another sip of his water, stepped over his uncle, and went back to bed.

~*~

The next morning he awoke to the sound of uncle Alexander outside of his bedroom door. It was unheard of to the extreme. Demitri wasn’t even sure if his uncle knew where the third floor was. Vaguely interested in what could have broken their long standing routine he made his way out into the hallway still dressed in his baby blue pajamas.

That was where he found Alexander committing the ultimate offence.

Paintings hung on every one of the many walls of their estate. They were very expensive and Mama had said that no one was allowed to move them. She had told him that Papa had put a tiny piece of his soul in each and every one of them.

Now Uncle was putting his booze stained fingers all over one of them as he carried it away down the hall. Demitri rushed after, for once feeling an emotion fully and completely.

Anger.

“What in the world are you doing?” he cried fists clenched.

Alexander jumped a foot into the air, surprised as always by Demitri’s presence. “Demitri?”

“What are doing with father’s painting?” he demanded again. His uncle sighed heavily as if explaining his crime was too tiresome for him to even think of.

“Kid look, the money my brother left is almost gone. Just one of these painting could fetch us enough for a few more years at least.”

“And whose fault is it that the money’s gone.” Demitri hissed.

“And what’s that supposed to mean, you little brat?” he growled in a cheap imitation of Papa’s voice.

“You know exactly what it means. Maybe if your tramp shopped less, there would be more money left. Besides, none of the paintings are yours to sell.” His back straightened and he tried his best to seem bigger and more adult. Papa and Mama weren’t here to punish uncle so it was up to him.

“Then it’s a good thing for me that you can’t stop me, isn’t it?”

Uncle turned and walked on. Demitri had a plan though and threw himself forward, snatching the painting from his uncle’s hands. Rushing down the hall he set it down just next to the far side of the big stair case.

Alexander came huffing and puffing along after him, face purple with the strain.

“You stupid little b*****d. Do you really think it matters if you safe this one painting. Look around, they’re everywhere. What are you going to do, hide them all?”

Demitri smiled heart pounding. How exciting it all was. He walked forward backing his uncle up just a little bit.

Without any warning at all he shot forward and shoved his uncle with all of his might. Then he watched with fascination as the man tumbled backwards down the wooden staircase. He had never known that someone could bend quite that way.

“I’m going to save them all, Uncle Alexi-poo.” He said in the following silence, taking a seat on the top step.

Slowly, a hand crept through the bloody pool.

“Help me. Demitri, help me.” His uncle gurgled softly. Blood fountained up from his mouth. The man would die unless he called an ambulance. Demitri was fairly sure of that. So he got up, retrieved the chair from his desk, and took his time putting Papa’s painting back, exactly where it ought to be.

When that was finished, Uncle was still but for a few shallow chocking breaths. So he sat down next to the man and pulled great great grandpapa’s pocket watch out from around his neck where it sat since the day they found him in the armoire.

“It hasn’t moved a single second since Papa died. I have an idea why. Would you like to hear it, uncle?” He got no response.

“Papa said that the watch runs off of the blood of our family and that I am only allowed to add my own when the watch strikes twelve.”

Uncle Alexander may be worthless, and all but dead for that matter, but he was still a D'Aunay . And as previously stated he wouldn’t be around for a very much longer. That meant that, even if it worked the watch would still belong to Demitri at end of the day or rather the end of his uncle.

“Papa said that it only needs a drop.” Glancing down at the wide pool of warm red he smiles. “As you can see we have plenty to work with.”

He used a pen to collect the drop. He ran reverent fingers over the decorative carved case of the watch. It popped open smoothly as if it was newly made. How perfect it was. The back of the case was smeared a vague reddish brown. With a steady hand he poked the pen into the open wound on his Uncle’s arm, right where the white bone had ripped through the sopping wet business shirt.

The watch deserved the freshest blood.

Demitri stared in awe as the shining crimson orb shattered against the metal. His breath stopped where the ticking began. Excitement rose up in his chest. Tick Tick. His heart pounded in tune with that magnificent sound. Tick Tick. The seconds flew by leaving him heady and weak with the happiness of it all. He, he, Demitri D'Aunay the fifth was happy for the first time in seven years! How could he have lived all this time without it? His breath came in painful gasps and he had to grasp his uncle’s battered body for support so absolute was his joy. A hysterical gigglish laugh fell unchecked from his lips. He shook with the force of it.

Tick . . .

What? The elation died in an instant. Hands shaking he looked at the pocket watch shook it gently hoping to bring it back to life, to bring the happiness that he needed back to life. He tapped the glass, dropped more blood into it, and shook it again. It stayed silent. He checked the time. Its hands now rested at ten thirty exactly. A mere three minutes had passed.

No. How could it have stopped? He had given it what it wanted, the blood of a D'Aunay . . . a D'Aunay. That was it. It was all his uncle’s fault! Hadn’t Demitri thought it himself a thousand times? Alexander wasn’t much of a D'Aunay.

He wanted to scream and rave and beat the pathetic worthless man to death, but he was already gone. He had died sometime during Demitri’s bliss and he hated him for that as well. If only he could raise the dead, he would beat the man until he was dead again.

The worst part was that, uncle Alexander was the last member of Papa’s family besides Demitri himself. Did this mean it was over, that the pocket watch was going to be silent forever now?

“It can’t be over.” He whispered in a painfully dead emotionless voice.

“No,” he replied to himself. It just needed more blood that was all. There may not be any more from his family right now but surely other people would do. They may not be as good but if it moved even a second per person then it would be well worth it to put in the effort.

Killing was wrong. Mama had said so at some point; he was sure, but if there was one thing this whole mess with Alexi-poo had taught him, it was that sometimes you have to break some rules in order to accomplish something more important. What was a useless uncle in comparison to Papa’s paintings? Nothing that’s what.

Great great grandpapa’s watch was a thousand times as important as the paintings, so a thousand people wouldn’t be too great a price to pay.

It all made perfect sense.

Slipping his treasure back under his shirt, Demitri got up and stared down at the mess. He really was lucky that neither the cleaning staff or the cook were scheduled to come in on the weekends. This could have been terribly awkward.

Hmm . . . What to do with uncle now? He could bury him in the backyard with his puppy Mr. Buttons. He shrugged. It was as good an idea as any.

It took ten minutes to turn the body over. By the time that was finished Demitri was gasping for breath and his pajamas were dyed a horrible purple color. He hated purple. He hated being dirty too for that matter. For God’s sake he had blood in his hair.

Sigh. Maybe he should go take a bath and forget all about it.

He shook his head. “If I leave the mess until later it will only get worse.”

What he needed was a new plan. Obviously, his current one wasn’t working out. Before he killed anyone else he was going to have to start working harder in gym class. What did normal people do when they had a dead body on their floor?

Maybe he should call the police. Can a killer do that? He could always say that he found it there when he came down for breakfast, but he was covered in blood. That didn’t look good, or feel good. Maybe he should consider the bath idea again.

No stop!  There are more important things to worry about now. The blood would help him. He would say that he had tried to wake Alexander up. It was perfect. Kids his age were supposed to be stupid like that.

Rushing over to the phone, he made sure to leave plenty of panicky looking footprints along the way. It looked very convincing in his opinion. He was very proud of himself.

He cleared his throat as he dialed, working up the appropriate watery whimper.

The police were camped out in his foyer in twelve minutes and thirty-nine seconds. He had timed them. His performance had been a roaring hit. If he wasn’t still on stage, so to speak, he would have given a little bow.

The police turned out to be a rather alright group of people really. Sure they asked a lot of stupid repetitive questions and they treated him like a blithering idiot, but at least he got a clean set of clothes, a long warm shower, and a bowl of ice cream.

The ice cream seemed like a bad idea, actually. If he had been a normal teenager he would have been stuck associating ice cream with dead uncles for the rest of his life. Lucky for him, he didn’t have that problem.

Lying was easier then he remembered. It must have had something to do with the lack of guilt. Mama had always known when he was lying. It helped that the questions were easy to manipulate.

“Did, you witness what happened to your uncle?”

“No.” He hadn’t witnessed. He had participated.

“Where did you find your uncle?”

“I-I found him at the bottom of the stairs.” It wasn’t hard to do. All he had to do was walk down and tada, there he was.

“The science people say that your uncle was pushed. Was there anyone in the house that morning?”

“No. But I heard voices in the hall.” Of course he did. He and his uncle had been talking very loudly.

“Did you recognize the voice?”

“Sort of. The voice called uncle, Alexi-poo. Only uncle’s girlfriend calls him that.” And Demitri, but that was neither here nor there.

The police officer had leaned in close at this.

“Do you know the name of your uncle’s girlfriend?”

“Miss Decon, but uncle calls,” here he paused dramatically looking away, “uncle called her Lorrie.”

The policeman clapped a hand on Demitri’s shoulder and told him he was a very brave boy. In Demitri’s opinion he really should have gotten an award for his acting.

Two days later they arrested Miss Decon, aka the tramp. They found her on a shopping spree with uncle’s credit card, wearing Mama’s ivory cameo necklace around her neck.

When the police asked Demitri about it, he told them he had seen it in Mama’s jewelry box the day before uncle died. A day, a week, it was close enough.

In the next two weeks the manor was closed up and he was moved all the way from foggy old England to busy New Orleans, where his Aunt Angelina lived with her husband and two daughters. She was Mama’s sister, a kind woman as far as Demitri could tell. Her endlessly dark black hair fell in waves down her back just like Mama’s had.

It was nice to look at.

Her daughters weren’t lucky enough to inherit her coloring. They both had their father dirty blond locks. As twins they were both a year older than him. Cassandra and Antoinette, who preferred to be called, Cassie and Annie, had decided early on that he was a poor little orphan boy who was just quiet to cover up the shattered remains of his abused young heart. At least their diaries had hinted of such thoughts.

Personally, he’d hated them the second they had mutilated his name by calling him Demi.

~*~

“Demitri, are you listening to me?” An annoyed voice cut into his thoughts.

“Of course I am Darling. You were just telling me about your friend Sarah’s new boyfriend. You said he was stupid, arrogant, mean, and handsome.”

“I did not call that-that caveman handsome!” She screeched indignantly. Demitri took a sip of his coffee.

“You didn’t have to. Why else would she be with him, if he’s that bad?” She blushed at that.

He didn’t understand why she talked to him about this kind of thing. It wasn’t like he cared about her friends. For goodness sake she was his live-in girlfriend and he barely cared about her.

Her name was Gwendolyn, or Gwen, not that he ever called her that. Instead he called her things like honey, sweetie, or darling. Why people felt the need to butcher perfectly good names, he had no idea.  At twenty-five she was the same age as him. They had gotten together three years ago after a blind date. If he had been smart he would have smothered his cousins in their sleep when he had the chance.

“You’re right, she does deserve better,” he answered her question on perfect cue. It was remarkably easy to tune her out. If he wasn’t so observant, acting like the perfect male specimen might have been more difficult.

Not that she wasn’t a perfectly acceptable girlfriend. She was both adorable and smoking hot. He knew this, because he had asked his quote unquote friends not long after he introduced her. To him she was just artistically pleasing. He’d used her as a model for several of his paintings. For some reason that made her all but worship the ground he walked on. She was weird like that.

“Are the paintings ready for the next exhibit?”

Demitri put his finger to his lips signaling for her to watch what she said. She immediately looked panicked and scanned the people at the neighboring tables to see if anyone had heard her.

Demitri was actually a famous artist, having followed his father’s footsteps into the world of painting. However being a hunted serial killer didn’t really mesh with being a world renowned artist. Makes blending into a crowd more difficult and getting tagged by a witness more likely.

So, early in his career and with the help of a friend of his father he had created the alter ego, Dante Dorset. When it was time for an exhibit he would have it arranged so that he could set up his work in the dead of night, when no one was around. At first he only displayed his work in places run by family friends, when he got more popular though other galleries agreed to his conditions because the air of mystery his alter ego added was good for business and because his art was good.

“I’m so sorry! I swear I’ll be more careful. You know sometimes dating you is like dating a super hero,” she confided.

Yes, here comes the amazing Demitri. By day he is the perfect imitation human being, by night he was Dante Dorset artist extraordinaire, by later that night he was the Tea Party killer. Seriously, you spill a little Earl Grey on one dead body and you’re branded for life.

He really hated living in New York sometimes.

“It’s alright, Hun. My work is coming along. I’m just putting the finishing touches on the last one tonight.”

“You’re going to be working late again? This will be the third time this week. You need to get your rest.” No. He needed to get the dead body out of his refrigerated storage locker.

“I know. I’m sorry I haven’t been around lately. You deserve better than this,” he muttered looking down at his hands and counting to ten.

“No. No, Demitri! I love you. I know you do your best work at night.” No argument there. “I just worry about you is all.” She reached over and held his hand tightly. He brought it to his lips trying not to think of all the germs that must be on it.

“I promise that when this exhibit is over, I’ll pay you so much attention, you’ll get sick of me.”

“Never,” she sighed. Eleven years later and he was still waiting for that Oscar.

 ~*~

It wasn’t until three in the morning that Mr. Greaves, aka dead guy, was posed just the way Demitri wanted outside the diner where Dillon ate lunch the night before.

Dillon Jerald was the officer in charge of the Tea Party killer case. Well he was sort of in charge. After the seventh body, they had called in everyone they could find for help. Some high ranked fed was technically in charge now, but Dillon had the perfect level of obsessiveness to be Demitri’s arch nemesis so that was who he was screwing with.

Every serial killer needs an arch nemesis. It keeps things from getting dull. The victims certainly weren’t going to do it. Seriously it was like they weren’t even trying half the time. He had once convinced a guy to get into his car by saying, “I have beer.”

As it stood. Demitri had four arch nemeses. Jack in New Orleans, Dillon in New York, Anthony, in San Francisco, and Darrel from Plover, Wisconsin. He had only spent two months in Plover and hadn’t been back in the last six years, but he still sent bloody and all around graphic Christmas cards to Darrel every year. It helped keep the spark alive.

Ah. The struggles of a long distance relationship.

In any case, his new victim was really a work of art. Stomach slit open, ribcage exposed; top hat tilted ever so slightly over one eye with a picture of Dillon eating at the same table tucked into the circle of fabric just above the brim. Fresh Earl Grey was sitting on the table.

Just because he didn’t like the name didn’t mean that he was going pass up signing his work.

Finding a dead rat was remarkable hard considering what city they lived in. It had to be dead too. He was trying to display a victim not get rabies. The tiny body was set down in what looked like a sleepy sprawl on the table in front of the opposite chair. On the table a message was carved. It read, “How dare you have Tea without Me.”  The last chair contained a giant stuffed bunny holding a picture of a seemingly random five year old girl.

He hadn’t killed her. He never touched kids. In fact a great number of his victims were child abusers. Mr. Greaves for example, had just killed his niece for the insurance money.

Anyone complaining about his display now? Didn’t think so.

Not all of Demitri’s little play pals were killers. Some were just annoying or rude or had dropped a falafel in his lap.

Either way he had left the picture because he knew it would send Dillon into frenzy. They would find her lying in a shrine he had constructed in her honor, dressed like an angel. She was surrounded by lilies and roses. The room was sealed and the air conditioner was on full tilt so she would still look like she was sleeping. She deserved nothing less.

Had he killed her uncle sooner she would still be alive now.

In the living room the police would find instructions to turn on the DVD player. When running surveillance on the uncle he had ended up videotaping the murder. He didn’t need them pinning this on him.

He may be sick but he wasn’t that sick.

Hopefully Dillon would appreciate his effort.

When he got home, he made a beeline for the shower. Dead bodies were gross. Gwendolyn thought it was because he didn’t want to wake her with the smell of turpentine.

She had stayed up waiting for him. Damn.

“Did you finish your work?” He nodded tiredly, and then paused thinking through the list of response actions and reactions he had complied through countless hours of experimentation.

The problem with being an artist was that he couldn’t just pretend to be perfectly normal. The acceptable image of an artist is riddled with depression, bipolar disorder, or obsessive compulsive tendencies.

So instead of normal he had developed an attitude that was a mix of exaggerated drama, poetic devotion, low self-esteem, and obsessive love. He had based it off of all those dark brooding artists from the movies. You know, the ones men want to beat to death with a shovel.

It wasn’t hard. All he had to do was come home late and frantic occasionally. Standing in the rain for a few minutes to make it look like he had been wandering the streets aimlessly worked just as well. When at home he had to lapse into bouts of silence and stare at Gwendolyn as if he had just spotted a unicorn. If he pulled out a sketchbook while doing that, she sat perfectly still for him then spent the rest of the night in the bathroom crying. He hadn’t figured out why yet.

After the first time it had happened Demitri had tried to tone it down a little. He had acted normal for a whole week before she started throwing things at him and accusing him of having an affair. Words like s**t, muse, and fake, had been thrown around in a weird mix of tears and swear words.

Out of sheer shock he had been perfectly honest with her for the first time. The words, “I didn’t want you to cry anymore. I thought you would be happier if I was normal,” had stopped her dead in her tracts. They had spent the rest of the night wrapped in each other’s arms crying.

Well, she cried. Demitri sat there and tried not to kill her for getting his new shirt wet.

He’d completely given up on that act now.

When he had last tried to pull the Joe normal look off, his friends had staged an intervention and he’d had to go back to therapy for three months.

He really hated therapy.

“Demitri, are you ok?

Tonight, he decided to go with a classic.

“I’m tired. Will you lay down with me?” In seconds the lights were out and she was clinging to him like an octopus.

His favorite routine was similar to this one. If he waited until the middle of the night and woke her up gently, he could pretend that she had caught him staring at her as she slept. Then if he laid his head down on her shoulder and just held her like that shaking lightly, she would weep silently and make him pancakes in the morning.

He still didn’t understand the connections between staring, weeping and pancakes, but he really did enjoyed eating pancakes.

Far be it for him to discourage good behavior.

~*~

Demitri’s nostrils flared as he scented the air. His eyes narrowed with the intensity of his concentration. The dusky shadows cloaked him in their warm anonymity. His long trench coat swept out behind him like black wings.

It was all just so very perfect.

His prey was coming to him.

Brian Lortic took this beautiful little back alley everyday on his way home from work. You see Brian was a lawyer. A very angry lawyer, who had cussed out an old lady last week on the street and as his arms had flailed about like a madman he had knocked the cup out of Demitri’s hand and sent hot coffee all down the front of his shirt.

As such, he had to die.

A noise came from nearby. Quickly he crouched down behind the dumpster holding a knife in one gloved hand.

Brian waltzed down the alley fiddling with his phone without a care in the world. At just the right moment he burst forward wrenching the straight hard edge of the blade across the man’s throat so that he couldn’t make a sound and a giant spray of inky blood coated brick walls, quick easy wonderful.

The body fell to the ground and tried to crawl away so Demitri kicked in over.

“Now, now, none of that.”

 With a flick of his wrist, his pocket watch was out and a drop was placed lovingly on the inside of the case. Thirty seconds of magnificent ticking later he came back to his body leaning heavily against the wall and chuckling.

“Back to work.” He muttered to the darkness. He tried to avoid the puddle of something or other on his way to his newly stolen car. It belonged to a politician. If they managed to trace it, Dillon would have an aneurysm.

Getting the body into the trunk was always a chore. Especially in disgusting alleys like this one. The makeup and the wig didn’t make it any easier, but sometimes you have to do what you have to do.

With one final heave the great lump thumped down and he closed the lid with a sigh. Now he had get the body to the storage unit, drop the car back off in front of the politicians house, and walk six blocks to the art museum where he could change clothes, ditch evidence, and drive his own car home.

Demitri turned to walk to the driver side door and instead walked right into something hard being swung at his head.

~*~

His head hurt.

That rather intelligent observation was the first thought he had upon regaining consciousness. The second was that the room was bright and that opening one’s eyes is highly over rated. Something was wrong that much was fairly obvious. But what was it?

Option one: he was suffering from a hangover. The problem with that though was that he had never had a glass of alcohol in his life and didn’t see himself starting now. Drunken serial killers are bad for everyone involved.

Option two: He was in prison. Nope. Bed was too comfortable and for the seconds his eyes had been open he had seen very clearly that he was in his bedroom.

Option three: He had been captured by someone else. Who would be stupid enough to knock him out and then take him back to his own house? This idea got thrown out immediately.

“I see that you’re finally awake. I hope you slept well,” a lilted mildly accented female voice said.

Demitri’s eyes snapped open searing pain be damned and he tried to move only to find his wrists and ankles tied to the bed frame. He knew that he should be panicking now. This could very well be the end of his life and that was the only life on earth he really cared about, but all he could think of was that he was going to have to go back and put more thought into option three.

“I’m sorry about the ropes but you’re just so strong. I needed to be sure you would listen to me.”

Demitri raised an eyebrow at her. She didn’t look at all remarkable with her reddish hair and stick thin figure. He decided to remain silent until he had more information. He really did hate when victims asked stupid questions like: who are you, what do you want, what are you going to do with that knife.

She got onto the bed and crawled over him slowly. It was probably supposed to be seductive.

“I have been waiting to meet you face to face for so long. I never thought you would be so beautiful. So many nights thinking of you as I sat at my desk in the station.” Alright so she was working with one of his nemeses.

Her accent didn’t sound like she was from New Orleans, so probably not Jack.

“Those idiots don’t have a clue about who you are but I figured it out.”

No sun tan so probably not Anthony, either.

“I’ve been watching you. I watched you paint and kill with these talented hands.”

No Midwest twang, so not Darrel. Too bad, he missed Darrel. In any case, that made her one of Dillon’s friends.

“To think that that moron Dillon thought that all of those messages were for him.”

Maybe friend was too strong a word.

“Only you and I know that those killings were all for me.”

Demitri looked around the room for an escape. He had knives in random spots around the apartment. You never know when the urge to cut something will strike you after all. The closest one was taped under the night stand well out of reach.

“If you’re looking for that little b***h of yours, she’s being questioned by the police for the next couple of days. It’s just you and me.”

“Pity. It would have been nice to be rid of her. She made a nice cover as I waited for something better,” Demitri said. He looked deep into her eyes and moved his bound hand as if wanting to brush the hair from her face.  

“Really?” she cooed. He hummed sensually in answer.

 “The ropes aren’t necessary though. I was always planning to come and claim you eventually. What an impatient little kitten you are,” he teased.

“So I can untie you now?” Demitri nodded confidently.

“I could never harm so lovely a face.” Face no. Chest cavity yes.

“Alright,” she purred.

The ropes fell away painfully and left red welts behind. Explaining that to Gwendolyn was going to be interesting. And what exactly was he supposed to do with . . . with . . .

“Darling. Do you know what the first thing that drew me to you was?” She swooned as he ran his hands reverently over the skin of her face and neck.

“No,” she breathed.

“It was your name.” he answered.

“But Gertrude is an awful name!” she screeched in denial. It really was an awful name.

“No my love. Gertrude is a fierce name. Fit only for a warrior princess, a goddess of blood.” She blushed an awful splotchy red. “After I’ve finished my last gift to you, I want to paint you. I’ve done it before but all of those were sketched from a distance. They were never good enough so I destroyed them all. Now I have all the time in the world to get it right.”

She was so eager. She didn’t even realize he was laying it on way to thick. That or she had watched way too many of those serial killer romance movies.

“Gift?” she asked.

“Yes. I’m going to display Dillon’s body in your honor. I just need you to pick up a few things for me and then meet me at his house alright.”

~*~

An hour later, she arrived with a box of Christmas ornaments, a saw, some tinsel, ribbons, and a fed ex box. He led her inside where the body from earlier that evening was waiting. She asked what it was for and he explained with fake cheer that every Christmas tree needs presents.

Dillon and his wife were off at a police fundraiser and wouldn’t be back for hours. It wasn’t what he had planned for the night but it would do.

He instructed her on the best way to lay all of the tools out then when everything was ready he took her in his arms.

“What will the display look like?” she asked. He put on a fake smile.

“I can’t tell you that. It would ruin the surprise.”

“So we just wait here until Dillon comes home?” Just as she finished her question he pulled the knife out of his pocket and shoved it into her chest. She gapped wildly at him mouth opening and closing like a gold fish. He pushed her into the waiting chair. The pocket watch came out and a single drop of blood fell as it always did.

Thirty more second made it exactly eleven ten. Only one hundred more bodies to go.

~*~

Hours later Dillon’s wife walked into the living room and screamed in absolute terror. Dillon rushed in gun at the ready and . . . and stood in shock at what he saw. In the corner, Gertrude Lormain, FBI agent in charge of the Tea Party killer case, sat stiffly, her rip cage was exposed and open, so that each individually sharpened rib reached out like pale white spears. At the end of each one was a merry little Christmas ornament. Tinsel was in her hair. Her internal organs were hung on by the chimney with care and her intestines were pinned to the door frame.

At her feet another dismantled body was lying, wrapped up in little ribbons and next to that was a bloody teacup and packet of Earl Grey tea.

The coroner would later report that her lower most left rib was missing, have been sawed off cleanly. They would look for it high and low before assuming the killer had taken it as a souvenir.

The truth is that the rib was long gone in a box with a Christmas card on its way to Plover, Wisconsin, because, “if it fits, it ships.”

The End.

Author's Note

hi. i hope you like it. I might use this character again later.

Reviews

[Leonard Schneider]

Good creepy fun, written in dry sharp prose. I liked this a lot! Can't wait to see what else you have in store for Demitri.

[Zeph]

Wow, this was really cool. Loved the way it's written and I don't really know why but it reminded me of I am Legend XD

Anyway, I didn't find any major mistakes anywhere, (I might have missed in that case cuz it's so long and I'm a fast reader)

This was a very interesting read and I'd love to see it in a book if it's possible, it's awesome.

100/100 + fav

[Capris]

thank you! i didn't think anyone was going to actually read this