Page 37 of Killer Knows Best

That’s what they call addiction and they’re right. There is a living, breathing monster inside my veins that screams for more. It demands it. And this monster always gets what it wants.

It wasn’t always like this. Once, I had a home. A family. Or at least, something that pretended to be a family.

Daddy left when I was six. I was named after him—Jeffra to his Jeffery. A permanent reminder of the pain he caused. Took his belt to my brother and me any time we so much as breathed in the wrong direction. My mom never stepped in. Heck, she took more beatings than we did. But when Daddy finally took off, it wasn’t the relief we thought it’d be.

The next guy, Luke, well, he was a different kind of monster. He came along when I was thirteen. He kept his hands to himself when it came to Mom and my brother, but when she was at work, his hands were all over me.

I tried to tell her, but she wouldn’t listen. She said I was trying to make trouble. She accused me of wanting to ruin what they had.

So I ran.

I was fourteen and just dumb enough to think I could make it.

That’s when I met Travis. He was sweet, at first. He actually made me feel like I wasn’t broken. Like I wasn’t the trash I’d always been told I was. But that didn’t last long. He was into meth. And it didn’t take long before I was, too.

Soon thereafter he started hitting me, calling it love, saying I deserved it. And you know what? I believed him. I figured it was the only kind of love I’d ever get.

I miss feeling something, anything.

Travis OD’d two years ago. Right in front of me. One minute he’s yelling about some dealer, the next he was twitching and turning blue.

I didn’t call anyone.

I just sat there and watched him go. In truth, I was too tired to care. By then, the monster had me, and for the first time homelessness was a very real possibility.

I tried to live with my brother after that. He got out of that mess my mother embroiled us in. He made something of himself. He has a house up north and has a beautiful family of his own now. But when I showed up at his door, looking for a way out, he told me I couldn’t stay. Not unless I got clean. And we both know that’s not happening.

I need it. The monster in me.

I’m just like them now—Daddy, Luke, Travis. They turned me into this. They turned me into one of them.

A chill runs down my spine, colder than the air wrapping around me. I can feel the hunger gnawing inside. It never stops; it never lets up. If I don’t feed it soon, it’ll eat me alive.

I pull out the cash I’ve got left, wrinkled bills from last night, and count them again. It’s nowhere near enough to satisfy this incurable itch.

The street is quiet except for the occasional hum of a car passing by. And that’s when I hear them. Footsteps behind me, slow and steady, like someone’s taking their time. My next john, most likely.

I don’t bother turning around. The guys that come down this alley, they’re all the same with their empty eyes and filthy hands.

I’m just something to use and throw away, like the rest of the garbage piling up around us.

But something feels off. Something isn’t quite right. I’ve always had a good sense about these things. I still believe myself even though my mother didn’t.

The footsteps are too close, too quick. And then?—

Wham!

Something hard slams into the back of my head. Painexplodes, sharp and hot, then everything fades. The last thing I feel is the cold concrete as I hit the ground.

Darkness closes in.

Another monster has found me.

And something tells me this will be the last.

26

EVIL

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