Page 12 of Caution Tape

She then lets me go, yelling after me that she’s going to take a bath anyway.

I get outside her apartment and I’m suddenly gasping for air, clenching my fists as I walk to my car. It’s going to be harder than I thought.

I don’t have time to find an animal to kill. I don’t have time to night drive and think wonderful, murderous thoughts.

But I can go to Target and glide amongst red-lined aisles and blissfully, cool white tiles.

The automatic doors are reassuringly smooth as they slide open to greet me. It is late evening on a Tuesday. There is pop music playing above me as I swim through aisle after aisle of candles, picture frames, mirrors, and the occasional beanbag. The store is mostly empty, and I am the lone ghostly figure, wandering around and thinking my exquisitely dark thoughts.

It is frustrating to have them categorized that way. I don’t find them dark. I don’t find them frightening, heinous or anything else of that nature. Other people do. The little shadows that flit around me are so easy to scare and manipulate.

I don’t know why I play their game, other than it is easy and I am good at it.

I come out of my thoughts in the kitchen aisles, at the rows and rows of glossy knives, meat hammers, cleavers and cutting boards. I run my hands along them, each new tool bringing a flashing scene of bloodshed to my mind.

A serrated steak knife.

Dragging it across her skin. Watching it snag and tear.

The long, seven-inch Santoku knife with the stainless-steel handle.

Driving it into her stomach.

Would it pop like a balloon? Would all the air rush out as it deflated?

Tiny paring knives. Two of them in a set.

What sound would she make if I stabbed her? Would she choke? Would she groan? Would she SCREAM?

“We’re closing.”

The voice is cold, haughty, and seemingly pissed off. I turn to my right and look down slightly to see an employee in a red polo shirt and beige capris glaring at me. Her arms are folded, and her nails are painted black, though I notice they’re chipped, almost as if she enjoys picking at them. Studying her features, I take note of her dark, faded blue eyes. They could almost be gray. They’re starkly contrasted against the black bangs framing her face, her short hair shining with the stinging brightness of the fluorescent store lights. I enjoy the way her mouth moves as she bites the inside of her cheek, like she’s resisting the urge to say something mean.

“Closing already?” I ask. “You’re gonna make me go home? Really?”

Her eyes narrow to small slits.

I flash her my smile with the expectation that the attitude will drop, absently expecting the anger to dissipate slightly. I let my eyes drift down her body, and I make it obvious, tilting my chin up and down in an exaggerated manner. Her name tag reads “Cora”.

“We close in five minutes.” She shifts her weight to her other foot and somehow manages to harden her glare further. “Please leave.”

Interesting.

She didn’t react to me. She’s attractive, absolutely, and sometimes attractive people put up a front and have this aloofness to them, even when coming across someone who looks as good as I do. But that’s not the impression I get. Cora from Target looks genuinely disgusted by the mere fact that I exist.

There’s a brief pause before I respond, my hand still near the paring knives. Meeting her eyes, I find myself gauging what kind of new creature is standing before me, when she breaks the gaze for the most minute moment.

She glances at the knives in that same lustful, hungry way that I do.

Smiling slightly, I walk out of the aisle. Sparing a glance over my shoulder as I leave the store, I see Cora trailing her fingers along the racks of knives, a dreamy and distant expression on her face.

I’m still thinking about her as I drive back to Natalie. It is only halfway there that I realize I forgot to grab snacks.

The days begin to take a toll on me.

I watch them roll on, a series of Thursday the fifths melting into Thursday the twelfths; my sense of time becoming a flowing, tangled sequence of images.

Dinners with Natalie, her face breaking apart and becoming Cora’s as my mind drifts lazily around, testing out different fantasies to keep itself entertained. I pick up hours at the hardware store just to occupy myself, and the steady, high-pitchedbee-woopof the cash registers start to calcify in my brain, making me grit my teeth as I take inventory. It gets to the point where I hear it even when I’m in the backroom, amidst stacks of bird seed and legions of gleaming riding lawn mowers.

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