Chapter Two: Aftertaste

I'm tired, but that's how everyone usually feels after a meal. I just need some physical activity, that's all. Just a little recreation to help me digest my food faster.

I tighten my grip on the butcher knife.

The man is close but I have no idea where he is. This damn aluminum kitchen reflects noises and throws them all over the place. Bad situation for me, but then again, I'm the one with the knife and the desperation.

I notice that I'm standing up – crouch, stupid! On my knees now. They're dry, and quieter than my wet sneakers. Okay now, shuffle forward… good… good, no noise, just the silent shuffle of dirty jeans on smooth tile. My muscles are loose and limber from years of doing this, years of hiding and running and lurking and eating. My body glides over the tile like a gay figure skater, every fiber of my being coordinating to swiftly carry me through this metal maze and take me closer and closer to my doomed target. But where is he? His footsteps are louder now, but I can't really-

There.

I rise one leg and position myself into a cautious kneel, subtly glancing around the corner of a sink. He's a medium-sized man; I can take him down, even without the knife. He has brown hair, I think, and pudgy facial features. He's not wearing a cop uniform, which relaxes me. Teenage girls are bad, but police will add a whole new level of felony to the mix.

But that still doesn't conclude that he's not a law enforcer. A street cop, most likely – someone that was ordered to check out the school in hopes of finding any traces of the missing girl. He thinks he won't find anything, and that's why he isn't looking very hard. I feel sorry for the poor guy - to be mutilated on a Saturday. And he probably could have had this day off if he wanted to. I stop staring at him and turn around.

He makes a little scuffing noise with his feet. He sounds bored – a gentle rhythmic tap on a counter accompanies the shoe scuff and confirms that he's a little less that enthused. A perfect, bored stiff, unsuspecting target. I blink hard, readying myself.

God, all this metal makes me feel as if I've been placed right into that scene in Jurassic Park. Except a human is the hunter this time.

The thought of comparing myself to a velociraptor strikes me funny for some reason, and I painfully stifle a snicker. Just a little noise makes its way past my lips – enough for Mr. Suddenly Goddamn Perfect Hearing to turn in my direction. I hear his cautious footsteps getting ever closer to me, and I hastily plan my attack.

It's not very nice, but he looks taller than me and slitting his throat won't be easy, so I might just go ahead and slash his ankles wide open. It's messy and cruel, but a quick way to take down someone bigger than me.

He gets closer. Yeah little fishy, come here. It's simply your punishment for hanging with the piranhas and thinking you can swim in deep water.

…I'm horrible at metaphors.

His leg is suddenly in my sight, and instinct drives the blade right into his tendon. I hear it open up, the skin around his ankle tearing, the itsy bitsy veins popping and writhing as he falls. A perverted grin overcomes my face as it gets splattered with fresh and gorgeous blood. He's on the floor now, wriggling like a little worm, and I giggle, the horrible young kid with the deadly can of salt. And for a split second I can see my reflection in a sheet of metal on the side of a counter. A malicious demon glares back at me; his face is drenched in red, the dark shadows blacken his eyes and his broken-glass teeth are twisted into a wide, hungry smirk. A scream pierces the stale air, and the evil spirit disappears.

My victim's scream is sharp and full of life, not unlike a woman's screech when I kill her. This man wasn't rough and rugged like other guys his age – his voice was higher than expected, but that's probably just from the fear. After just squatting there and watching him yell for a few minutes, I softly poke him with the knife. He looks up and sees me and slips into that state where a person gets so afraid that they can't breathe. His bellows mutate into silent, muffled sobs. His nose, eyes and gaping wounds are dripping fluid. I can't help smiling.

I'm not usually like this. I don't kill just because I can – I devour what I can get my bloody hands on and disappear like a good dream. I'm a calm, unnoticed person with big feet, an almost-funny smile, sharp animalistic teeth and a sick addiction to meat.

Women can't get enough of the smile.

But now – I'm mad at myself. I let my lust for violence drive me to kill an innocent man, and I let my hunger drive me to kill someone I actually loved. I didn't just think Miss Green Eyes was pretty enough to eat – she was one of the nice ones, a girl who wasn't a slut and really wanted to be with me, one who laughed at my jokes and kissed me with an affectionate fire that I regret extinguishing. The screams of the man blend with the screams of my girlfriend pulsating through my mind, and I'm suddenly surrounded by pounding noise. Anger consumes my body, and I'm about to take it out on this fucking cop.

His screams turn into gasps again as I rise to my feet and smile that crooked, demonic grin of mine. He can't back up without using his feet. The bloody knife is clenched loosely in my left palm, but I place it on the counter. I hate knives. I open my mouth and bear my shiny weapons of choice. He's crying so much now that his nose begins to bleed.

I'm silent for a minute. Then I mutter in my gritty voice, "You like snooping around? You like hunting for people who don't want to be caught?"

My hand shoots down and clutches his jaw, squeezing his cheeks together. Harder. He puts his hands up to mine, but he's too drained to defend himself. His skin stretches, and I pull harder.

In a slow ripping process, the bottom half of his face tears completely off. His jaw muscle is flapping and bleeding and I can see the three fillings in the back of his mouth. Like a kitten, I snatch the pretty little tonsils from his throat and yank until they snap and I'm left with a bit of meat that I slide past my lips like popcorn. It's lumpy and juicy and I nibble all of the taste out of it before I swallow.

This guy is in so much pain I almost feel bad for him. Almost. His throat must burn like hell – I giggle and make it worse for him by digging my dirty sneaker into his mouth until he gags on it and vomits yellow and red. After he's done I crouch down and punch him in the stomach just to add to the effect. He's almost gone. Now where did I put that knife – ah, here we go. I grasp the plastic handle and lean over his wriggling form. Through his weary eyes he sees the blade and a few more tears flow down his disfigured face before the knife is jammed through his breastplate. I begin carving, making my way down his chest until I make a wide slit. He closes his eyes and stops moving.

The knife clatters to the floor. My fingers slide into his leaking chest cavity, meandering around his ribcage and finally resting on his succulent lung. I rhythmically tap it a few times, then clutch a rib and pull. It breaks after one or two yanks, and I toss the bloody thing behind my back; it lands with a wet clatter on the tile floor.

Three more ribs later and the kitchen is an absolute bloodbath. The grey walls are splattered with little droplets of blood and the floor is a massive, unholy puddle of scarlet. I'm drenched from head to toe, even my hair. Needless to say, this guy's a bleeder.

His lung is exposed now, and I don't really have to think anymore. It's soft, yet structural, and the veins running along its smooth surface bulge out with gusto. And yet I'm not hungry. Miss Green Eyes filled me up. But… my corrupt conscious tells me I can't just kill this guy without having a reason. So I search the surrounding area for a baggie or something. Tupperware. A coffee mug. Something.

My hand, digging through a metal cabinet, finds a thermos. Probably belongs to one of the lunch ladies or something – I open it and discover nothing inside but the foul, worn-in smell of rotten shrimp gumbo. It'll do for now.

I place it on the counter and lower myself into the scene of the crime. The knife is in my palm without a second thought, and in a moment's notice the blade is carefully slicing out the entire right lung. Blood spurts a few feet up and I place the slab of meat on the counter. I crack my knuckles and expertly slice the organ into strips, placing each one into the thermos as I go. I feel like a chef on one of those shitty infomercials – demonstrating how sharp the knife is by cutting something up. I try my best to imitate a woman.

"And now our chef will show us his expertise with a very delicate food – human lung. Chef, how will you prepare this exquisite cut of meat?"

I demonstrate a horrible Italian accent. "Why a-yes, Susie! This-a lung is some of de best-a meat I've ever tasted! It's delicious raw!"

I drop the act after the last bit of lung is in the thermos. I toss the knife behind me – I won't be needing it anymore. Before I leave, I clutch the thermos and scoop up some of his blood in with the lung. Time to get out of this place.

I slink off, the thermos in my left hand, softly sloshing as I walk. I'm leaving so much evidence behind that the police will think a madman escaped and murdered someone. The bloody scene behind me is infested with my hair, spit, fingerprints, tooth marks and footprints. And yet I'm not afraid. I'm a shadow. Impossible to even notice except by the girls that I eat.

I casually make my way out of the front doors of the school, drenched in blood and leaving my handprints all over the glass door. A full moon is out and it's bright as hell. Still casual, I waltz on over to the wooded area behind the school and slip away into a world of darkness and unexplained happenings. The sirens begin to wail just as I run off through the trees, still dripping blood.

Two hours later.

The police are over this school like mutant ants on a Twinkie. They've taken so many pictures and documented so many fingerprints that I'm actually starting to get bored. I munch on some of the lung from earlier and make disgusting slurping sounds as I begin to nod off in my secure spot in the shadows of the trees. All this fuss and their murderer is right under their noses, watching them being complete idiots. It amuses me, and I shove another strip of lung into my mouth. Goddamn, this tastes so good! It's like a box of sweets after a delicious meal. Meat like this is hard to come by.

I'm nodding off. The last thing I want is for them to find me sleeping under a tree, covered in blood and holding a thermos full of human organ. Time to hide in a boat or train and get to a new town.

I consider the idea I had earlier – I can kill a rich chick. The pretty ones are harder to seduce, of course. But I can do it, I can con anyone into thinking I'm someone I'm not.

Shit. I'll have to eat pizza.