Young Writers Society

Alfie held a cigarette out when Daniel came by his porch. Daniel tugged his pants up and sat down a step below Alfie. He waved the cigarette away. Alfie leaned down to look at Daniel's face. His eyes were puffy and red, and he had three parallel scratches along the left side of his face where his dark hair met the skin just before his eyes.

Alfie grinned, showing his gnarled yellow teeth and greyed gums. "Long night?" He said, placing a dark hand with chubby fingers on his shoulder with an audible thump. Daniel looked up slowly, nervously. Standing behind Alfie was a girl.

***

Daniel threw his motorcycle keys in the general direction of his coffee table. It hit several empty packs of cigarettes and a beer can to the ground before sailing under the couch. Daniel tossed his helmet onto the couch and leaned down to search under the stained and frayed brown couch.

"Oh good you're back." Chris yelled from somewhere in the apartment.

Daniel sat straight up, banging his head on the rickety coffee table. The table crashed to the floor and spilled magazines and trash over the filthy yellow carpet. Daniel rubbed his head.

"I was starting to worry you'd miss my window."

"Window?" He yelled as he rubbed his head and stood up.

"Time is a funny thing with me." Her heels clicked along the floor and Chris's long legs turned the corner out of his bed room. She tossed a magazine and a pair of scissors onto his kitchen table. "There are small windows in my schedule when you can meet with me, and if you don't... Well I guess you should try to figure out what I wanted to say before it's to late." She leaned against the corner separating the cracked gray tile of the kitchen and the pussy yellow of the living room carpet. She had a tight black dress ending two inches above her thin pale knees and thin black reading glasses hanging at the edge of her nose.

"And what do you have to say to me that's so important?" Daniel went back down under the couch.

"I am disappointed in you Daniel." Chris stepped over to him, standing so close if Daniel looked up, he'd be looking up her skirt.

Daniel made sure to keep his eyes fixed on the pale white toes that peeked out of the tip of her heels. He knew this was a test. A direct challenge would be to leave his keys and look her straight in the eyes. To look up from where he was would show his lack of respect and intelligence. Also that he was an idiot. Staying where he was showed that he understood where he was in her eyes.

"Why?" Daniel fumbled with his keys under the couch.

"You're not ambitious." She stepped back as he stood up. "You have killed three times, always with poison. You need to understand death clearly."

"I think I understand death." He told her, his gray eyes looking just past her. He felt a lump form in his throat.

"No, I want you to feel death." She pulled his right hand toward her. She held it in her hands for a second, looking over the grime staining his fingertips. Then she placed it just below the neckline on her dress, over where her heart was. "Do you feel that?"

Her chest felt hard, which Daniel suspected it would, given her over the top feminine characteristics. She had a little help getting the right curves. But that was not what he was supposed to be feeling.

Daniel swallowed the lump in his throat and waited to catch her heartbeat. He nodded when he did. It was fast and unsteady, but it was there.

"That is my life. That is human life flowing in and out." She took his hand and placed it over his own heart. "This is your heart. Each breath is unlikely, Daniel. Unconscious and hard to control. Except it is easy to stop. Death is easy to accomplish, but hard to face. Face it."

"What? You want me to jump of a cliff?"

"No," Chris smiled motherly. "That is easy. It is unnatural to face one's own mortality, but facing someone else's is even harder."

"No kidding."

Her expression hardened. "No, you have faced guilt. You know someone died, because that is what poison does. You have not seen someone die, knowing that this was you." She took his hands and held them in her own ice cold hands. "I want you to feel death take over a body. Feel death end pain. Murder someone with your own hands, and feel for a pulse. Life and death will be at your disposal. The chance to stop. The chance to understand mortality before dying. It is something I can not deprive you of." She leaned in and kissed his stubbly chin, she hung her arms around his neck for a second with a sly grin on her face.

Daniel held his breath while she was close to him. He stared down at the carpet until she was gone. When the door clicked shut he let go of a shuddery breath.

***

David held the handle of the knife. It had an ivory design woven into the copper colored grip. His fingertips ventured to the blade. It was a simple metal blade, but it shined like it had never seen anything but the glass case it had been sitting in. It seemed a shame to use something so beautiful for what he was about to do.

"I think this is a bit out of my price range." He told the pawnshop owner, Quincey. They were sitting in his back room surrounded by filing cabinets filled with mostly false legal documents. Daniel knew because that was why he was here, because he was a slimy connection in Chris's web. He was the one of the longest standing members because every year on his taxes he gave Chris more to blackmail. But for a member of the crime ring, he was pretty trustworthy. Even Chris visited him every now and then, which she rarely did for people who weren't big time gang leaders or, unfortunately, him.

"No, this is free. No money, just a beautiful very strong blade. And look..." Quincey folded the six inch blade into the handle. "She folds. All free, plus I'll through in some of this metal polish." He grabbed a can of polish from the other side of the desk. "All free."

Daniel sighed and opened the can of polish. No surprise, it was completely empty. He grabbed the knife. "Just the knife thanks." He stood up so that he was above the shriveled little man.

Quincey straightened his thick glasses and held his hand to shake. Daniel ignored him and left with the knife. Two months ago he would have shaken his hand. He wouldn't have checked the can of polish, he would have been excited to get the shiny blade, he might have even had to pay for the beautiful knife. But two months ago he wasn't the boss. Now he knew how to assert his dominance. That was the easy part. The hard part was not getting killed in the process.

***

Daniel considered his plan. There was one person he knew he would have the chance to kill. A young man in the local gang, who didn't have the good sense to go home using the main roads. Physically Daniel knew he was stronger than the kid. He knew he had a better fighting technique, and also he had the advantage of being Chris's new play toy, so he didn't have to worry about getting arrested. This would be the easiest, and the hardest, stabbing in the history of murder.

***

Daniel found himself visiting Tobias Flynn the next day. As usual he was waiting with his two guards and a broad smile on his face. He motioned Daniel over when he saw him. His wrists rubbed against the cuffs as he did, aggravating the red circles forming around his wrists.

"Julio!" He said turning his head as far as it would go to look at the guard. The guard nodded stoically in response. "My main man, could you loosen these cuffs a bit? I think I'm bleeding.

"Sure T-man." He said with a deep rich voice. He grabbed his keys and began to loosen the cuffs carefully so that no one at the other tables would notice.

"So Danny boy, what's sup?" the serial killer flexed his wrists. He closed his eyes and sat back in his chair as if content with this new found comfort. Still he had that unnerving smile on his face.

"Chris asked me to do something."

"Something worse than murder?" He smirked.

"Well murder but-"

"Then do it." Flynn sat up, putting his hands together and rolling his shoulder blades slowly. "Daniel, I don't know how else to say this." Flynn's smile faded for a second. "You don't mess with him. Chris, he'll get what he wants whether it takes your holy effin' soul. Mortal peril is worth immortal soul." He looked David straight in the eyes with his white-less pits that were his eyes. "Trust me."

***

Daniel sat in the back corner of the bar. His head was in his left hand and his beer was in the right. The object tonight was to get drunk, and from the way everything was getting blurry. He was almost to his goal.

"Long day?" Asked the girl sitting next to him. She was pretty. Nice dark hair and black skinny jeans made out of an weird fabric that gave off a sheen.

"How could you tell?" He asked sarcastically. He swished the last third of his beer around in the cup.

She brushed the hair out of her face and faced him. "I just have a feeling."

Daniel squinted, "Hey you look familiar. Did you go go that party- eep!" Daniel fell backwards in his stool. He crawled backwards until he hit the wall. Chris grabbed his beer and sniffed it. Daniel could feel his heart in his ears.

"Oh relax." She took a sip of his beer then sneered at it. "God, this place is a dump."

Daniel stood up slowly and looked around. The music was so loud in the bar that only one or two people noticed that he fell over at all. And they didn't seem to care too much. Daniel tried to focus, he looked at Chris. She was blending in surprisingly well. She had a long sleeve black shirt rolled up to her elbows with leather gloves and black make-up that made her look like she spent the night with a needle and nightmare.

In short, she looked like she had gone through hell.

The only chink in her camouflage was that she wasn't wearing glasses. Her eyes darted across the room even while the rest of her body acted quite normally.

"Buy me a shot." She waved him back up to the bar.

Daniel obeyed, buying himself a shot too.

He drained his in a second, but Chris sipped hers like it was a fine glass of a wine.

"Do you drink?" He wondered out loud.

She smiled "I used to, when I was in college. If only for the hangover."

"You wanted the pain?" He smiled, feeling a giggle forming in his stomach.

"Never got it." She sipped the drink.

"Do you drink now?"

"If it doesn't do anything why do it? This tastes awful by the way. You need to go find yourself another bar."

"Not like I could afford more than this." Daniel rested his chin on the counter and watched the condensation fall on his glass of beer.

"What are you talking about? I pay you 35 hundred a week."

Daniel squinted at her for a second then turned his head to the side. "What?"

"Well you've got to have some sort of income to appease me. God you're an idiot when you're drunk. Well, no, you're always an idiot." She downed the last of her shot and Daniel's beer and cracked her neck. "Come on." She stood up and waved for him to follow.

"Where are we going?" He said, squeezing in between chairs and tables.

"Bathroom." She said nonchalantly. In the back there was a dark uncrowded hallway where the two bathrooms sat. She didn't hesitate, she found the one labeled "Men" and walked right in.

"Wait, Chris this is the men's-"

"Just go pee." She said walking over to the grimy white sinks and wiping her leather gloves off with a wet paper towel. "And shut it."

"In front of you?" His mouth contorted in disgust.

"No, idiot. Use a stall. God you're gross."

"Not as gross as you." He mumbled under his breath and walked into a stall. While he was in there, Chris pulled a sharpie out of her pocket and drew a little heart on the stall door.

"Stay in there." Chris advised.

"Why?"

"Because I want to show you something."

Daniel sat on the toilet seat and waited silently. He stared at the hexagonal white floor tiles under his feet. When he was in High School, doing things he probably shouldn't have done with friends he probably shouldn't have had, he used to stare at the tiles of the bathroom. The school had this ugly yellow version of these tiles. When he was High he used to see flowers in the pattern. Later in his senior year, he could see little hexagonal trucks in the pattern. Right now he could only see the brown lines in between the tiles, like the lines were on top of the tile instead of the other way around.

He wondered what would have happened if he hadn't seen so many beautiful flowers in the tiles when he first did crack. If the floor had looked like it did now, all shifty and unsteady, he might have not done it again. And that change in his life might have stopped him from meeting Susan. Thus he might not have been here at all.

"Welllll hiiiii!" A man said with a thick alcohol slur.

"Hey." Chris said.

"You minddd if I...?"

"Not at all. Go ahead."

Daniel heard urine fall to the ground and he stood up slowly. He carefully stuck his head into the corner of the stall so he could look through the crack. A man about forty, who was obviously heavily intoxicated, was standing at the urinal missing it entirely. He couldn't see Chris, but he was sure she was making that disgusted face she had with her nose all bunched up.

The drunk guy zipped his pants up and walked over to the sinks where Daniel couldn't see him. It was obvious he was only washing his hands because Chris was there.

"Well aren't you cutttte." He said.

Chris giggled. "You're pretty hot yourself. I've never dated a mature man before."

"You want to?" He said excitedly.

"You could buy me a drink first." She suggested.

"Sure..." He sounded unsure, but also excited. The two of them walked past, supposedly to the door. But before the door opened, Daniel heard a body hit the wooden door. "Ooo! I like that in a woman."

Daniel leaned down on the ground and peeked under the stall. Chris had him pinned to the door with her lips on his. Daniel sat up. He didn't really want to see this. They made out for a bit, then, all of a sudden, the man squealed in pain.

Daniel poked his head under again. The man was on the ground, clutching his private parts. Chris stood over him with her hair and shirt disheveled. She reached into her pockets and pulled out two, very small, switchblades. The man was at her mercy.

"That was fun." Chris smirked. "No really, I haven't kicked a guy in the nuts in years. Oh yeah and I guess you're and adequate kisser. But you know what I've been really craving to do?" Chris switched her blades up and smiled. She leaned down and kissed him on the forehead. Then the knives went deep into his rib cage. The drunk man choked for air much like a fish.

Daniel looked away. There was a lot of screaming and gasping for air, but Daniel sat where he was behind the toilet, with his head in between his knees until the stall door swung open.

Chris stood in the door way, with her heels in her hands. Her gloves and her knives were missing, but she was otherwise clean. "Oh how precious." She smirked. Daniel stood up, he was unsteady from the alcohol and fear. "Now do you want to see?"

Daniel shook his head, but he followed her out.

On the door was the drunk man. His shirt was taken off so the slashes in his chest where clear. His hands were stuck into the door by the knives. His mouth was covered in blood Chris had smeared there and a cross was drawn on his forehead. He looked like Jesus on the cross. Out of all his years of bible school and Catholic heritage he didn't understand what pain crucifixion meant. He did now, and he was so thankful to Jesus now.

"Come on." Chris told him, walking toward the door.

Daniel followed reluctantly, but as he passed through the door way, he heard a small cry for help.