Chapter 10
1162 Words
"And what would you do if you were face to face with him?" he questioned, catching me off guard for the second time. I did not expect that he would be so direct with a question like that.
"What?" I questioned back, half disoriented, the pain rising through my head.
"What would you do if you could do whatever you wanted with him? If you could have your revenge? Independently of any jurisdiction or morality."
Dozens of answers came easily to my mind.
I would throw myself at him. But I already did that.
I would fight vehemently with him with everything that I had. And I fought.
I would drive my knife into his core as he drove a knife into me.
But I had already stabbed him.
"The next time you find him, shoot him in the head, to kill, no matter who needs to die for that to happen." Those were Alan’s words to me in the hospital parking lot.
So that was what I would do. I would shoot him in the head with my gun, I would watch the cruelty in his mind be expelled with the gray mass of his brain. I would tear the mask from his face and see life drain from his eyes like a flame being extinguished by a blow that departed from my lips. To be certain that he had died, that I was responsible for the final act.
However, I had that chance in the past and wasted it. I was face to face with him, a gun in my hands, and I handed it to him. And when he made a motion to kill himself right in front of me...
I screamed.
I screamed for him not to commit such an act. Panic took possession of my mind and silenced my good sense. I was willing to prevent him from killing himself in front of me, even if his death should be the greatest objective of my career.
There was something deeply distorted with me.
"Miss Cross?"
The voice of Dr. Rayson was what pulled me from my mortal daydreams.
He looked at me patiently, waiting for an answer to his previous question. It was when I realized that I had been in silence for minutes, trapped inside my own disturbed head, staring at the wall behind him like a lunatic.
"Are you alright?"
I did not answer him.
I said nothing. Not even when I grabbed my purse, stood up from the armchair and headed to the door. Without casting my gaze in his direction or even worrying about what he would think of my conduct.
If I could not flee from my mind, I would flee from where I was.
The office was located a few blocks from the only cemetery in Grimwood. For that reason, I decided to visit the graves of my parents, who lay one beside the other.
Michael and Claudia Cross.
Only my father’s grave had flowers.
I did not remember any moment with my mother. Nor the sound of her voice or laughter. All I had were photographs to remind me how much my features were similar to hers. After all, she committed suicide when I was only two years old.
Postpartum depression, that was what they said.
He changed completely after her death, that was what they used to justify the hostility with which my father treated me my whole life.
None of that mattered anymore now that both rested seven feet under the ground.
I adorned both tombstones with bundles of white and fresh roses. I knelt, searching for tears burning in my eyes, a painful tightness in my chest. Anything that showed me that some feeling had been left in my core besides anger. For being condemned to always be alone and never having discovered what it was like to have a family.
However, I found nothing.
I knew there was a logical explanation for that. It was dissociation that made me incapable of missing those whom I could not see. An answer that my emotional self created to deal with trauma.
But it was not sadness or longing that guided me to that cemetery.
It was doubt.
I wondered what my parents would think of my decisions if they were alive.
The answer to Dr. Rayson’s question echoed silently in my mind during my way to the chalet.
The truth was that I did not want to kill the Ripper. No. I was willing to know him, just as he longed to know me. I wanted to penetrate his mind as he penetrated my skin with a blade.
To unravel each layer of his nefarious thoughts. To discover why he did what he did. What he felt when killing. Who he was behind the mask. How he lived.
And, in the end, perhaps that would make me as sick as he was.
For that reason, I had no choice but to flee from the office.
I was not prepared to face that hidden side of mine. It was better to leave it buried in the depths of my mind, where I could keep it latent and was incapable of accessing it.
Upon arriving, I went straight to the kitchen with the bottle of white wine that I bought when passing by the market. A gift to myself. I deserved a treat after so many disasters in sequence.
I held the glass bottle firmly with one hand and the corkscrew with the other. I positioned the tip in the center of the cap, slightly downward, applying pressure. There was a bang when the cork flew across the kitchen.
I did not bother to look for a glass, I drank directly from the bottle.
The refreshing and citrus liquid went down my throat, leaving a slight burning of alcohol on my tongue. I felt my limbs relax immediately with each swallow that I took. Drinking everything as if it were water.
The storm in my head ceased, grounding me to the present moment.
The night breeze that crossed the open kitchen window threw my hair back. From where I was standing, I could glimpse the full moon high in the sky, without clouds, illuminating the tops of the trees around the chalet. Owls whistled outside. Bats flew among the branches in dark blurs.
It was when I realized that something was wrong.
I had not left any window open when leaving the house.
The bottle slipped from my fingers and hit the kitchen floor with a sharp shatter. Pieces of glass were scattered around my feet.
Through the reflection of the window, I found the figure of a masked man sitting comfortably in the living room. Camouflaged by the complete darkness like a predator in the night.
"Hello, Evelyn," said the Ripper behind my back. The corner of his lips stretched into a mordant smile, revealing the tip of a sharp canine. "I said that I would find you again."
- Writer
