“Alex!” she cries out, struggling against her bonds with all of her might.
“Well done!” says Finley, gleefully. “You really are the expert sleuth from your books. Found this big lug at the final scene of my masterpiece of a crime, disguised myself as a cop, chloroformed him when no one was looking, put him in his trunk and here we are!”
“Let him go!”
“How likely do you think that is to happen, really?” asks Finley, sarcastically. Alex’s eyes flicker. When he sees Lydia, they open wide and he starts to struggle madly, screaming into the tape sealing his mouth.
“Please,” Lydia begs, looking back at him with tears in her eyes. “Don’t hurt him.”
“I’ll do as I please,” says Finley. “He’s mine now. I’ve won. Haven’t you realised yet?” He rips the tape from Alex’s mouth and punches him hard, causing blood to gush from his broken nose.
“Don’t!” Lydia screams. “Alex!”
Alex looks up at her from the ground with desperate, pleading eyes. “Lydia…”
“I’m sorry…” Lydia whispers, gazing into the helpless, stricken face of the man she has only now realised she loves.
“Aww,” says Finley, mockingly. “Did you hear that, Al? Your girl’s sorry.” Lydia closes her eyes and turns her face away defiantly. “And it looks like she doesn’t want to watch me torture you,” he goes on, as Lydia’s whole body shakes with sobs. “But, oh dear, Lydia,” says Finley, stepping close to her, “I’m afraid you’ve got it wrong again. You see, he’s not the entertainment.” He leans in close and whispers. “You are.”
“No, please…”
“I’ve always been curious about love.” Finley pulls up his chair again, resting a foot on Alex’s head. “Other people are just so… revolting, don’t you think?” He looks down at Alex with pantomime disgust. “Why on earth would you want to spend more time with one than is absolutely necessary?”
“Please don’t.” Lydia shakes her head helplessly, her fragile sanity hanging by the finest of threads.
“You can’t rely on other people, Lydia. No one really cares about anybody but themselves. Oh, they all pretend, some well, some badly, but all for their own selfish good.” He snatches a clock from the wall and holds it next to Alex’s head. “Time ticks away, tick-tock, tick-tock, and those we thought we loved become crutches for us to bear. Burdens we resent. Vacuous, animated lumps of flesh with no redeeming features at all.” He hurls the clock away and it smashes into pieces. “It’s all just a grim façade, Lydia. All of it. What matters is us,” he taps his own chest, “ourselves,” he taps Lydia’s the same way, “what we want. Don’t you see? When all the pretence is dropped and the mask slips, that’s who we really are. Selfish. Greedy. Lustful. Hurtful.” He breathes the words as though savouring each one on the tip of his tongue. “Wicked.”
Lydia tries to tell Alex with her eyes that everything will be okay, that she will get them out of this. How?! The voice in her head screams at her. How?! She whimpers involuntarily.
“Do pull yourself together, Lydia,” Finley chides her. “This isn’t the real you. I know the real you. You’re dark, and lonely, and fascinating, and untroubled by such mundane emotions. This is some temporary madness you’ve been afflicted with, and I am going to cure you.”
“I’ll do anything you want, please…”
“Excellent. So tell me then, what is it exactly that you love about this… pathetic creature?” He removes his foot from Alex’s head and gives it a swift kick. Lydia screams.
“Don’t hurt him!”
“Then tell me.”
“I can’t!”
“You will.” Finley rises in a passionate temper and hurls the chair away. It crashes against the wall and falls to the floor in pieces.
“I love…” Lydia stammers, gazing into Alex’s desperate face. “Everything.”
In that moment, time freezes for all in the dank room. Alex’s retinas widen upon being hit by the open declaration from his lady love. Lydia feels her chest open like a butterfly’s wings, leaving her heart bare. Suddenly, in this grim situation, she feels free in a strange way; even if this is the end, she knows now that she can finally breathe. The couple take each other in for all they can, as the world around them melts away into a haze, just as Finley rolls his eyes.
“What a cop out.”
Finley, without hesitation pulls a pistol from behind his back, and before Lydia knows what’s happening, he shoots Alex straight through the heart.
BANG!
“NO!” Lydia’s heart cracks. Her lungs freeze. Her brain swims. This is a bad dream. It has to be. She stares, mouth wide open, saliva dripping onto the dusty floorboards, as blood spills from her lover’s chest and spreads slowly over the floor towards her. Alex’s eyes are glassy and then lifeless. He’s gone.
“Grief is terrible, isn’t it?” Finley whispers, watching Lydia’s face greedily. “And beautiful.” He takes a slow, deep breath. “Intoxicating…”
Lydia is paralysed with grief. She wants to look away, to scream, to cry, but every inch of her is frozen by the pure horror of the moment. Finley reaches out and slaps her face hard.
“Oh come now,” he says, bracingly. “Don’t get all mopey over a wet bag like that. He isn’t worth it.”
“Why?!” Lydia manages a strangled cry.
“Why what?” asks Finley, confused.
“Why did you kill him?!”
“Oh.” Finley looks down at Alex’s body. “Why not?” He shrugs. “Like you said, I am a monster.”
Lydia slumps in the chair, head bowed. She is still breathing, but for all intents and purposes she may as well be dead.
“That’s it,” says Finley, sinking to his knees in front of Lydia, bony fingers clutching at her. “Feel the pain. Understand it. Embrace it. Die and be reborn with me, and together we will do such beautiful things.”
Lydia lifts her head slowly, eyes burning with cold hatred. “Go to hell,” she hisses.
“That’s the plan.” Finley gives her a gentle shake. “But I don’t want to go alone, Lydia. These past years have been so empty. There was something missing from my life.” He gazes up at her meaningfully. “I know you know how that feels.”
Lydia grimaces, blocking out the tiny voice in her head telling her that he is right.
“We must have a purpose, Lydia,” Finley says earnestly. “We must each find our own meaning in this sick, broken world. Ours will be to fix it. To cleanse it of the hypocrisy, and the waste, and replace it with a pure, chaotic beauty. It can be our art of darkness.”
Lydia swallows hard as the nausea swells deep inside her. She visualises the block of ice encasing her shattered heart, closes her eyes and plays the game through to the end in her mind. She only has one chance.
“Why me?” she croaks, hoarsely.
“You know why.” He’s circling her now, like a predator sensing an imminent kill. She hasn’t long left. “We are as one, you and I. You must have felt it when you saw my beautiful works. When you read about my great deeds. You may not have known my name, but you knew me, and you understood the truth of my nature.”
“What truth?” She forces herself to look him in the eye. She has to let him read her. Let him believe.
“That I, like you, am drawn to darkness. Pulled by its invisible gravity. I am both its servant, and its master. Creator and destroyer. I have the power to take life,” he kneels again next to Alex and touches his bleeding heart reverently, “and to give it back.” He takes his finger, covered with Alex’s blood, and anoints Lydia’s forehead like a priest at a baptism. She shudders as the warm liquid trickles down her face and into the corner of her mouth. “Yes,” Finley breathes, intoxicated by the scene, “taste the power.” He licks his own lips hungrily as though the blood were on them instead.
Fighting the impulse to wretch with all of her strength, Lydia closes her eyes, extends her tongue and tastes the blood. She can’t see the look of ecstasy on Finley’s face, but she knows it’s there. Keep going. It’s working.
“Oh, bravo my dear, bravo!” Finley claps his hands together and Lydia opens her eyes, startled by the sudden noise. “I knew you felt it. You poor thing. You’ve been in hiding your whole life, like I was in this wretched attic. But now you are free. I have set you free, and together we will make such beautiful things.” He slips a knife from his pocket and cuts her bonds.
Lydia shakes her head. “The police will come,” she whispers, massaging her wrists, getting to her feet, which she can now see are encased within sequinned shoes. “There’s no way out,” she adds.
“Oh, Lydia,” Finley coos, like a smitten lover, “you forget who you’re talking to. I am the master of evading detection. Even you wouldn’t have found me if I hadn’t lured you here, hmm?”
Lydia looks up at him, her eyes wide. Impressed. No, awed. Sell it. Make him believe. “How…”
“By the time they arrive, we will be long gone. And this house, full of… bitter memories, will be nothing but ash.”
“And then?” Lydia sounds desperate, as though she really wants to believe.
“I will make you a master of disguise,” Finley purrs, “like me. You can be whoever you want to be, wherever, whenever. You can kill whoever you want to kill, any way that you can dream of. I will help you fulfil your potential, and,” he cradles her cheek in his hand, “in time you will become beautiful and terrible. The angel of death.”
Lydia’s heart swells. Her breath catches as she gazes into his wild eyes. Is she still pretending? The desire, the hunger, it feels so real. And before she knows what she’s doing, she is kissing him passionately, their arms around each other, hearts pressed tightly together, beating as one.
Then they break apart, and Finley doesn’t notice that she is holding his gun until the first shot rings out. The euphoria on his face turns to surprise as the bullet rips through his chest and he staggers backwards. Lydia fires again; once, twice, three times. Finley’s body hangs momentarily in the air, suspended in time, then crumples to the floor with a sickening thud.
Lydia drops the gun and dashes to Alex, kneeling down and touching his face gently with her fingertips. “I’m so sorry, my love,” she whispers, a single tear rolling down her cheek and falling onto his bloodstained chest. “This was all my fault.” She strokes his hair tenderly.
The thumping and thrashing of Finley’s death throes fades to silence, as Lydia leans down and kisses Alex on the lips for the last time in the cold midnight glow.