Page 34 of Like A Moth To A Flame

Once I’d finished, I let myself out the same way I’d come. I wasn’t going upstairs just yet. That would happen later. I had some fun surprises planned for her.

The weight of guilt bore down on me with each step toward the cemetery, a solemn reminder of the heinous plans I had set in motion against the former chief’s innocent daughter. The sun blazed mercilessly across the back of my neck as I entered the graveyard, its rays piercing through the veil of trees that offered little solace from the scorching heat. Every gravestone seemed to judge me for my actions, their once pristine marble tarnished by my sins. Shame and regret overwhelmed me as I approached the final resting place of those I had wronged. It was time for me to make amends before the darkness consumed me completely.

I approached Chief Harper’s grave. The sun glittered across his tombstone, the rays catching on the flecks of limestone in the granite. The wind whispered through the tufted grass, bringing whispers of rumors and shame. Guilt clawed at my insides as I knelt before the grave, and I reached out, placing two fingers over the picture inlaid in the stone.

I couldn’t look at him.

I couldn’t look at him, because he had seen inside of me.

Who else in this fucking town knew I was a monster?

Did any of them?

Did they all?

“I’m sorry,” the words escaped my lips in a whisper. “I didn’t mean to fall in love with her.”

The wind carried away my words, leaving a haunting silence that enveloped me like a shroud. I closed my eyes, trying to block out the images of what I had planned for his daughter. It was as if a dark force had taken hold of me, twisting my thoughts and tainting my soul.

I was broken. Something inside of me was dark and evil, even as hard as I fought to chase it away.

“But you knew that, didn’t you?” I asked, dropping my hand and staring into the cold, frozen picture on his grave. “You knew about me. You knew about all the dark things.”

His dead eyes were accusing as he looked out at me.

He knew what I was. He’d told me himself.

He could have stopped me, and he never did.

That was as good a proof as any.

She belonged to me.

I looked up at the sky, the white, puffy clouds floating lazily across the horizon. I stayed a moment and listened to the sound of cicadas screaming their love in the trees.

They were a lot like me.

Or maybe I was like them?

I turned away, stepping through the gates and back into the flat, rolling pastures, marching down the same path I always took back home.

What had I become?

I had taken an oath. I was a hero.

Wasn’t I?

Maybe it was like they said. Maybe I was just living long enough to see myself become the villain.

10

Look at the fire and think of me

Moth

Ilooked up at the sky, the stars twinkling faintly above me as a sense of unease settled in the pit of my stomach. It had been a long time since I’d looked at the stars. When I was a kid, I had so much hope in the universe and everything it held. I had hope in the thought of wishing upon stars. I hoped a white stallion-riding knight would come and take me away from everything.

Of course, that had been before the incident.

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