My hands tremble as I unlock the motel's entrance. My eyes adjust in the darkness, the reception as empty as the rest of the rooms.
It's better how no one is here. I don't feel like working anyway.
I decide to walk up to the motel's small library instead of the apartment. I want to clear my head before I rest.
What a pleasure it would be to sleep the whole day...and to not wake up forever. I'd do anything to sleep like that. To dream and to live in my fake worlds, only to never get out.
I close my eyes, sinking in my mind.
Those worlds. Those different perspectives of life....
In which there's no one but me and other people who don't exist in this reality. It's better that they don't. People say that it's not good to imagine this much. But surely, you can as an escape?
But my head felt heavy with the conversation i had with Matt.
Matthew. You really like playing the hero, huh? You really aren't afraid of the consequences. Is it because you don't know what the consequences are? Or are you willing to face the truth no matter what? Why are you like this? Stubborn, ambitious, determined. You probably like these traits about you. But you don't know how foolish you are.
"Will you hep me, Joey?" He said, a hopeful glint in his eyes. "Will you help me end this?"
These words repeated in my mind but with this devilish slur that disgusted me.
Matt, he reminds me of someone from my past. Someone as oblivious as him.
I walk towards the library, a private room for only those who wish to get rid of the outside noise. I used to go here very often. Until.....
Until he ruined the peace of it. By murdering that oblivious someone who only wished to stay in here. She was a writer, i think. She was a nice person.
If only i knew that before I led her here.
I always kept my distance from her, but one day she caught me in the library, sleeping in one of the chairs. She didn't seem to mind. She told me that she had taken a month from her parents to travel the world.
"Isn't that less time for you?" I had asked.
She sighed, patting my head, "Even a twenty-six year old like me has restrictions. But, I'll just have to make it worth it then."
She wanted to write a book. A book about life and what it held.
"I like your company, kid." She grinned, once, after we started to talk more often, "I like how quiet you are. How you keep to yourself. Kind of introvertish of you, but you're not at all the person you look like. I'd definitely make the main character of my book like you. "
"That's stupid." I mumbled, trying to scrap at the wooden table with my nails, my head resting on it. "Your character should be happier."
That must have intrigued her more, because she gave me a skeptical look.
"So are you saying that you're not happy?"
"I didn't say that." Was my awkward answer. I couldn't even meet her eyes when i said it. Maybe, that moment increased her curiosity even more.
Why did I even talk to her to begin with?
Was it because i wanted to talk to someone? Ask for help?
But that's not like me.
I don't even blame Mr. Miller about it. He warned me things aren't going to end well for. He told me to stay away from her.
But... he didn't really push me to stop, did he? He never forced me to stay away from her.
Was it because he didn't mean it? He didn't want me to stop? Maybe he just wanted to hurt me, indirectly.
That explains why he killed her in front of me.
That explains why he waited for so long and didn't get rid of her the first day.
He just wanted to see my reaction. What, was i too cheery for your liking back then?
A small smile creeps on my lips.
Well played, Miller. Well played.
You have no idea how much that night affected me.
She was becoming too interested about my life over here. She tried to investigate and got herself the truth. She was quite a smart person. That very moment when she realized the reality, He killed her.
I begged him not to. But why would he care?
It wasn't my place to say those things anyway.
I remember the look on her face as the life drained from her body.
I remember what i felt when she was murdered before me.
I trace my fingers on the dusty and forgotten books on the shelves. Many of them she had read and explained to me.
She's anonymous in my mind now. I don't even refer to her with her name.
If she was alive though, i would have asked her one thing,
"Were you so foolish to befriend a monster like me?"
I sit on the chair facing the shelves of books, my mind racing with thoughts of Matt, trying hard not to compare him with Her.
But they're so alike.
They want to know the truth.
But in order to do so, they need help.
And who do they ask for help?
The very killer, himself.
Difference is, this time, i agreed to help him.
This time I'm going to help him search for... ME.
I don't know why but i have this obnoxious smile on my face. An insane sounding laugh wanting to escape my throat. I guess it's because of the pleasure of being alone, my emotions i have buried are now clawing out.
And maybe that's why I'm not even thinking straight, coming in the very room my first friend got murdered.
Worst part is, that her parents probably never bothered looking for her, thinking that she just wanted an excuse to leave them.
I feel guilty for not feeling guilt for her death.
I smile, "What a strange feeling."
Soon, the night was going to envelope the pink sky, the night fading.
Just then, a call rings on my phone, making me jump with the sudden surprise.
I take it out of my pocket, frowning at the unknown number.
Maybe it's Mr. Miller. Maybe it's not.
I pick it up anyway.
"Joey, ma dude!" The voice calls out, "Hope you're not slacking and doing your job like you were supposed to?"
The only word that came in my mind at that minute was,
"What?"