Laila pulled the first bucket with a blood-red rosebush over the forest floor. It grated and scratched. At first, Laila thought the bottom of the tub had stopped. She stared in disbelief at a flat spot that shimmered brightly. Loose earth and pine needles covered the material. Laila wiped the rest of the earth with her bare hands. A small piece of glass became visible.
She closed her eyes and pleaded to wake from this nightmare. She looked into a glass coffin. The sun's rays shone mercilessly on the glass window and the terrible contents. Laila stared into the face of a half-rotted woman's body. Dream or reality, the ramman had not lied.
Bucket after bucket dragged Laila across the floor and exposed the hidden truth underneath. The women had not died of natural causes. Often Laila saw brownish streaks on the glass surface. The suffocating women had desperately tried to break open the smooth surface with their bare hands. Even the progressing putrefaction could not wipe out the horrible despair from their pained faces.
The bucket with the white rosebush stood on the grave of a skeleton. By far the oldest act of Dick. Laila recognized the dress. Sandy had worn it on her prom. Laila knelt on Sandy's grave and cried bitter tears. To Sandy and to herself. Again fate had struck cruelly when Laila thought she was well on the way to normalcy. Shame and hate rose bitterly in her throat. Another man, who had lied and cheated on Laila, joined the queue of those she had encountered in her life.
And she seriously thought she could help him and herself a little bit. She had felt so noble, so well, when she had come to understand Dick and his situation. She had seriously believed that she was once in her life with a man who was truly devoted to her, who trusted her and whom she too could trust. Apparently she could only rely on two men. On Benedict and on the ram man. If it were not so sad,
Laila could have laughed loudly. Your personal freak show. A computer genius and - yes, and what? A hallucination? The devil? Laila slowly rose from Sandy's grave. She felt aged for decades. She went to the spot the ramman had shown her. In fact, the earth was wet and loose there. Someone had to have dug here recently. She ran back to Dick's hut.
Laila made sure Dick was still fast asleep. Then she showered extensively and got dressed. She chose long pants so he would not be suspicious of her nettled legs. Laila was hesitant in the kitchen when she heard him wake up on the floor in the living room. With wooden steps she went to the couch.
He beamed at her. "Morning sunshine." Laila wanted to cut his wrong grin out of his face. She forced her mouth upwards. Are you giving us your famous bachelor breakfast? " He reached for her hand. "Maybe later?" She withdrew her hand. "You're insatiably." He got up and touched her face. Laila had to muster all her strength so as not to flinch in front of him.
His thumb stroked her full lips. "You are hungry too." he whispered to her ambiguously. The lunatic already had a stand again. Laila looked at the bathroom. "Go shower cold Dick. If your coffee gets better than the last time, maybe I can do something about your appetite." Loose and elated, he went to the bathroom.
Laila waited until she heard the rushing of the water and spurted off. Hastily she entered the tool shed and tore the ax from its holder. The tool was heavy and reassuring in her hands. The edge looked blank and sharp. She remembered the words of the ram man.
"Kill him before he kills you." Laila stood for a long time with her eyes closed, preparing for the inevitable. Laila entered the hut. Dick was already standing in the kitchen, beating eggs in a pan. He looked at her for a moment. "What do you want with the ax?" Laila turned the handle in her hands.
"I thought we could beat some wood and love the roaring log fire." Dick scraped the eggs into a bowl and carried them to the table. "Very romantic, but unfortunately I do not have a fireplace." He sat down at the table. Laila looked at the tanned skin on his neck. "That's a pity." She gripped the ax handle with both hands and pulled out. "Pity, a pity." With the first blow, the cutting edge penetrated deep into his flesh.
Laila heard it crack as the ax hit his spine. Dick had no time to scream or fight back. He was dead the first time. He fell face down on the table. His blood splashed against the ceiling of the kitchen, leaving behind a pattern of reddish mist. Laila pulled the blade out of the wound with an ugly smack.
Dark, almost black blood dripped on the floor. "Fucker" Laila took a measure and separated her head with another heavy blow from his body. The ax fell from her hand. Almost as if in a trance, she reached into his full, wet from showering wet hair and carried his head with him into the living room. From the almost empty bag Laila grabbed two tealights.
From Dick's neck, thick drops of blood dropped to the floor and pulled a bloody trail to the door, behind which stood the framed photograph of Sandy's Prom. Laila put Dicks head on the board and positioned it so that his broken eyes fell on the photo. Serenely lit, she lit the fresh tealights and removed the burnt ones that Dick and they had set up together the previous night.
Dick was right, when the tealights go out, something bad happens. She closed the door behind her.
Three hours later, Laila was in her Porsche, shooting on the road. She had thrown all her things in her duffels and cleaned the cabin as best she could from her fingerprints. Dick's body had left her in the kitchen. At the next major rest stop she stopped and ordered a buzzer breakfast with strong coffee.
She called Benedict and informed him of the recent events. She asked him to give her the address of a first class spa hotel. Arriving at the hotel, Laila immediately made an appointment with the in-house type consultant. Laila explained that she had just come off a long-term relationship and wanted to completely change her type. The counselor advised Laila to a chin-long pageboy.
The house's gay hairdresser dyed Laila's hair brunette and pulled in rusty red strands. Her locks were combated with a straightener. The type consultant contributed dark brown contact lenses to complete the work. Laila looked curiously at her new face in the mirror. No one would associate her with a long-haired, curly blonde. Laila treated herself to treatments and massages for three weeks and bought a farm in Canada via the Internet. Benedict did the paperwork.
Laila tried as best she could to relax. She slept a lot and was a frequent guest in the spacious spa area. Especially at night, she enjoyed the loneliness and swam many tracks, until she fell asleep from exhaustion in her bed. The ram man appeared to her only once. Laila was alone in the spa area again at night. Lonely, she made her rounds through the water.
Feeling not yet exhausted and afraid of throwing herself around in her bed, she finally decided to step into the hot tub. Laila leaned back, enjoying the tingling of the air bubbles on her skin. She dozed off. Laila woke up drowsily or kept dreaming, she was not sure. The ram man sat behind her. Gently his fingers stroked Laila's breasts. She leaned relaxed against his muscular chest.
His lips touched the delicate skin under Laila's earlobes. She felt the tips of his sharp teeth, an exciting feeling. Laila allowed him to spread her legs and position her over the jet of water from a floor nozzle. His sharp claws pulled her labia apart and Laila felt the stream of water streaming against her sensitive skin. He held her with his strong arms in the right position.
Laila let herself go.