Page 10 of Bake the Town Red

For her.

Over the three years she’d been my ward, Dahlia had had panic attacks every 31stof October without fail.

She hasn’t had any since I moved out of that godforsaken building. I still visit her apartment on the last day of October. Every year. After she kills all those people.

Dahlia rests peacefully in her bed. She doesn’t need me to hold her like she used to.

No meltdowns. No crying. No panic attacks.

Meaning she won’t stop.

It’s just a guess, though. I can’t know for sure.

We don’t talk anymore, she and I. I keep her at a safe distance. I was an asshole, shut her out of my life to protect her. I had to. There was no other way to save Dahlia from fate.

That last October we spent together, the worst happened. The events of that day made it clear to me that the universe had it out for Dahlia and me. It hated our happiness. Hated it when we were together, even as friends.

We couldn’t stay in touch. She could—she fucking would—end up dead if we had any sort of a relationship.

A piano would drop on her from the fifth floor. A taxi driver would kidnap her. A poisonous insect could sting her.

Really, anything.

So, I pushed her away. Moved out of the apartment complex and ignored her calls until she stopped trying to contact me.

But I haven’t left her. I still stalk her, unhappy as fuck. I hide in alleyways to spy on her shop. Climb the fire escape to her apartment at night. Do inexcusable things to her while she sleeps.

We’re not together. We’re not happy, dammit.

It’s one-sided.

That’s what I tell myself. What I shout at the universe while I watch her. While I put blog posts about her out there. The murderous person who terrorizes Manhattan every October without incriminating her.

That’s how I cope with losing her. That’s how I keep what remains of my sanity while keeping her alive.

Dahlia is the love of my life. The girl who’s turned into a twenty-two-year-old beautiful woman.

My little savage.

My angel of death.

My obsession.

I close every window on my laptop that has to do with my day job. Click on the button that’ll take me to the desktop.

A picture of my late grandma fills up the screen. Gray hair as the moonlight seeping into my dark apartment. Eyes light brown like syrup. Smiling.

The last time I saw her was the last time I saw Dahlia. The day my world burned down in flames.

When she died—no, when she wasmurdered—she was eighty-nine. She couldn’t take a step without her walker, much less leave the apartment she clung to. She and Grandpa had lived there for years, she’d say. Couldn’t part from the memories of him.

My grandma didn’t mind the cracks in the brown wallpaper. The old pale blue cupboards in the kitchen. The small bedroom—hers. I didn’t mind the sofa bed in the living room, either.

A knot twists in my stomach, looking at her. She didn’t want to move out. Neither have I, once I became Dahlia’s legalguardian. Dahlia refused to move out in case Ian came back. And I couldn’t be away from her. I didn’t love her like I do today. I cared for her as the kid she was.

She’d been through too much to be abandoned by me too.

In hindsight, I wish I pushed harder.

---