As you now know, Shellville was a small town, but not nearly as quiet.
Street corners buzzed here and there accompanied by police sirens which zoomed through the city-like lifestyle on a Saturday afternoon, as Oliver sits and eats cereal while watching his favorite cartoons.Typically, he would want to be left alone, stay home and mind his own business, but the night that which slowly shoved the sun down beckoned him to partake, and who was he to say no?One after another his boredom had gotten the better of him as he huffed out smoke from his hand made joints that which he mixed with other things, his excitement made him fidgety, he wanted more than that.Something was going to happen tonight, and Oliver would hate to miss it.The night before to him was peaceful surprisingly so, but that wasn't what he was going for. Oliver thought as he blankly stared at the clock on the wall, which he thought was broken, and waited for the short hand to fall on the six; it was not for any reason in particular, seeing as they were just minutes passing by; but he'll be damned if he's caught in broad daylight.Being the type of person that enjoyed the cloak of night - and in quiet rooms, would find trivial things to do while he'd talk to himself within said cloak; but what differed from him and a reasonably healthy minded person was that someone else always answered. It was a quiet voice, she was always gentle and he named her Becky; that was the name of his first girlfriend and first victim.He kind of hated her;'Where could I get pills?', he asked as he tapped his foot and stared at the cartoon on TV.' Don't you have some in the nightstand?', she answered.'Oh yeah, right.' , he thought, slowly sinking into his couch and melted to the dusty carpeted floor like an ice cream on hot concrete steps.He hated that he couldn't feel nothing.'Why so sad?', a question his better half genuinely asked him as he crawled to his bed in another room of his quaint yet affordably luxurious apartment."Because of you."'What have I done?'" Don't play stupid. I don't need this shit right now. And where are those fucking pills!?"'Night stand...'She at times had a way of making him feel bad about the things he had done once all the fun was over, he could sometimes feel her eyes all over him as she silently judged and scrutinised him while he did his work, Oliver could feel her right then and there as he now laid down on his unmade bed and remembered that his sock's sole was soaked from the milk he had spilt on the floor earlier in the day and smiled through his numbness;'You're always fucking crying over spilt milk.', he stated his retort subconsciously, he never did allow her to say anything much, there was very little she had to say in order to make his brain hurt, for he knew what he did and what she would say, but he didn't let her say it because it was all he could think about...all she made him think about, but he could care less about it;'Just shut up about it... You entice me with sweet words and poetry, then shame me with those damn eyes...', he thought,'You always were a fucking tease...Just-'" Shutup, shutup, shut up...", he continued to say like a mantra.As he then closed his eyes hoping that she'll join him in the silence, hoping that sleep would come to him before her thoughts would if he lay a pillow over his eyes and listened to the loud bangs and bops and kabloowees of the cartoons, as he tuned into the outside world like white noise. Silence was a waking nightmare with her, recalling the eyes of those far away strangers.Resisting the urge to hold his breath until he felt a head rush or until he passed out, but he loved himself too much to die.He knew what he had to do to feel alive...Three hours had passed by...9:09 pm.Oliver was so intoxicated by the narcotics that he slept like a child. Finding himself wrapped in his sheets and practically drooling, waking up to the sound of cartoons that he couldn't recognise playing in the background as well as miscellaneous sounds of the outside which were carried by the stale wind of the town's streets up to his third and final floor apartment.Oliver lied there just a while longer, merely saddened by his boredom. He really was itching to do something... Anything at all to keep his mind busy, to keep it from squirming like a writhing worm in salt.So he thought for a while as he now lay skyward and came up with an idea for a rush of exhilaration.Grabbing his spring coat and boots and marched out the door on that note with nothing more than his wallet, butterfly knife and sudden determination to kill his boredom, wherever that would leave him.And he felt that tonight he needed to do something drastic.Walking the windy pavements of the town and passing by street walkers and other sketchy characters that earned no attention from him. Oliver was admittedly looking for a fight just to warm his blood or someone vulnerable or huntable that he could just kill and leave for dead to fill his apatite, but that seemed like something to end the night with; he then turned a corner and walked into a convenience store at first, for a pack of cigarettes but figured a few other things wouldn't hurt to steal.He strolled down aisles and suddenly desired a change of hair colour and stuffed a tube of black hair dye in his large coat pockets as well as some candy bars in order to stop his ever growing craving for change.Or in some cases chaos...He got to the counter and before the cashier could turn to face him, he had swiped a pack of gum before handing the money for only the cigarettes to the pizza-faced brat who looked as though he suffered from some form of mental atrophy, while looking at a muted television screen with a picture of a missing girl in her mid twenties that Oliver recognised as he then grabbed his change and newly purchased box of smokes with a vacant smile on his face.Oliver then turned to take leave on his way to the entrance slash exit, looking down as he unwrapped his cigarette box of it's sealing plastic before his eyesight slid up momentarily to a glimpse of a gentleman walking towards him in the same aisle.And with the box now half open, he took a look again...He had a confident sway in his walk as his eyes trailed and flicked through the items in the isles, his hair was black, voluminous and well groomed and it shone from the light above, his chiselled yet elegant face shed an androgynous light on the stranger, the likes of which Oliver had never seen in this town before as he watched him tighten and flex his jaw whilst he browsed; donning dark and fashionable semiformal attire and a leather jacket to match.This stranger clearly had somewhere to be, but the whole ensemble made Oliver's jaw ever so slightly slack within his mouth - urging Oliver to pick his head up for a better look while he took out a cigarette. And although he tried so hard not to look at him as he would momentarily look down at his feet from time to time as he put a cigarette into his mouth, he believed this stranger's presence was personable, as they walked straight towards but past one another.It was an awkward moment that Oliver felt he had felt alone, the short stack aisle seemed to get longer and longer until Oliver felt as though he could recall the stranger if ever they met again, but unbeknownst to himself he was just slowing down in pace. The stranger's face now etched into Oliver's brain by his sharp and chiseled features.But he didn't really want to meet him officially, people have a away of spoiling things when they speak...'But, maybe I could tail him... Who in perfect hell is this..?', Oliver kept a straight face as he too flexed his jaw as he stared the stranger down, horsing around with the ideas in his imagination of fooling around with someone like him; watching someone so beautiful fall away from life after possibly fucking his brains out first, whether he wanted it or not.He could already imagine his hands around his beautiful neck...His breath then caught in his chest and his thoughts stopped dead in their tracks once the bright eyed stranger's eyes lifted and turned their attention to Oliver.He couldn't even recall what he was thinking about, as those piercing blue and frosty eyes gave him such a start that his heart jumped as if he'd tripped unsuspectingly or as if he was submerged into ice water. And they both held each other's gaze on one another.Oliver couldn't stop staring at his eyes, they were as if the actual colour blue, a weird personification of the colour's meaning; they were cold but calming, bright but endless as Oliver couldn't quite spot where the pupil started and where the iris ended, as they rested behind lowered eyelids and on a straight face, as Oliver took notice of a scar that parted his left eyebrow once the stranger got closer. And there was a strange feeling of losing himself in the strange gentleman's eyes from what he could see, forgetting that those stormy oceans looked back at him.The stranger then did the strangest thing, he smiled at Oliver in a gentle yet unapologetic way, almost as if he was well aware of what he was thinking. That he was graciously flattered but had better places to be, it was sort of sly in a way that then began an uncontrollable tingling sensation in otherwise strange places.Ultimately dispatching their one-sided secret conversion as he coolly walked passed.'Damn, that was Fucking...tss.', was all Oliver could think to say. Trying to shake off the feeling left behind by the attractive stranger.He had to follow him...Related Chapters
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So Oliver waited just outside the convenient store until the dark stranger came out and walked by him seemingly without any knowledge of his presence. He first waited a bit before he then dropped what was left of his cigarette and crushed it as he quietly tailed the stranger, keeping his distance while he eyed his surroundings and watched as the stranger turned a corner after a block away from the convenient store. Oliver picked up the pace a bit to catch up and see where to next... But the stranger was gone. He walked on a little further down the street and found a club shnob at around a minute past ten and decided to go inside, only after being roughly stopped by a large black woman by the door who asked for his ID. It was a good thing he had his wallet...Looking for the nearest public bathroom he could find to splash his face and change his apparently dull red hair to what the package said was midnight black, he went straight to the men's room. Hoping that this was the place that
DeVil in the Details. Chapter three: Groen Fingers
Humdrum neighborhoods down on the coast in the somewhat very last sweet drops of summer. Bring out a certain type of sunlight for the occasion and which stand out to some individuals who seek a specific asceticism in their lives, such as of beach palms and vast panoramic views of seemingly endless oceans.Especially to one individual in particular, whose backdrop consists of all these perfect little things.This individual is named Rowland. And to further identify this amateur photographer, slash graffiti artist; who would spend most of his time defacing walls and billboards where ever he could get a chance as he walked the sandy streets on his own, being one of many of his favorite pass times. Being a young messy-haired, fair and yet dopey looking coconut *coloured kid from South Africa, he lived in a quaint apartment with novels and comic books and strange nit-picks that which he fancied, staked about him and plastered on walls.Working for minimum wage at a café and carrying the b
DeVil in the Details. Mesembryanthemum
Once he found his allusive lighter, he resumed his recreational activities on his shabby balcony overlooking the horizon, now black-blue with pale moonlight unfortunately cloaked by street lamp lights below. It was going for two in the morning, but he simply could not sleep. Sound of the music and the sound of his thoughts mingled peacefully, enjoying the ambience. Sinking to the floor and following gravity as he sat down on an old lawn chair he found...comfortable. Thinking of a story he heard on the news of a another missing persons case the day before and wondered if wandering the streets was worth the risk considering how far he was from anyone he knew, he was certainly a long way from home, home being on an entirely different continent.He had decided to go anyway, out on the town. Rowland at the time believed that he needed the excitement, staring at the waning moon through the bars of his balcony like a prisoner would through his only window - a morose pale blue with the wi
DeVil in the Details. Chapter four: The Hardest Button...
With only three hours of sleep under his belt, the morning was filled with the sounds of clinking plates and screaming chefs in far corners of this dainty kitchen that somehow echoed internally in his very own coffee dunked mind. Now, only ten in the morning and the sun was fierce with it's heat as Rowland scrubbed and piled plates blankly in a small scullery tucked behind everything except a mostly empty staff parking lot behind the building which entailed nothing other than a few cars and a large rusty old garbage bin. With breakfast rush hour almost over to Rowland's relief a small break was sorely needed as he finished wiping and scrubbing the extra pot or pan that lay dirty.Once done, he picked up the garbage bags he had left earlier in one hand and put a cigarette into his mouth with the other. And as he put the bags beside the steps that lead out the back door someone called after him:"Hey, don't let me catch you smoking in my kitchen, young man.", a round man of average hei
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Turning the same corner at the end of the corridor, he skipped steps as he climbed the stairs to the roof top three floors up, hoping that Nick would be there waiting, which to his relief was true. Still panting heavily from the unexpected cardio workout it took to reach him, Rowland muttered a breathless 'hey' before bending over to catch his breath.'Fuck! I'm unfit!', he thought, shaming himself for his sloth."OH!", Nick exclaimed with nonchalant attitude, "You came." while lighting two cigarettes, one of which he gave to Rowland once he recovered from his sprint. Which to a confused Rowland seemed odd; "You were expecting me?", Rowland asked, now standing beside Nick who leaned on the brick wall facing the horizon. He noticed that Nick carried a scent of rosewater or a rather sweet yet earthy musk from where he stood, as if dried roses were thrown into a fire. Rowland turned, now both facing and overlooking a decent horizon, seeing as though it was partially blocked by office b
DeVil in the Details. Chapter five: Some Dead Oak
The last hours of the day before were...abrupt, and on this particular morning, it decided to heavily rain, a rather perfect day to Rowland, who enjoyed the smell of rain and felt most calm under the dark clouds that lay over head. The lively colours of summer were waving their goodbyes as a light yet chilled breeze blew them away along with a few damp leaves from trees not evergreen and with of course some litter. It was five in the morning, Rowland lay awake on his bed even after his alarm had sounded, and while listening to the rain as it hit the balcony, he concentrates on a few drops that trickle and then melt into nothingness, subconsciously drifting back to the events of yesterday and on how normal the first half of it felt to him and yet how that very night seemed to be it's polar opposite. The conveyance of Nick's arrival and the opportunity that came with him, seemed all too strange to Rowland but the idea of what type of proposal Nick would bring to the table made him fee
DeVil in the Details. Testicles, Spectacles, Wallet and Watch
His demeanor was sullen, his expression was still. Nullified by the sobering thought and the agent of pain that came with it. Exhaustion always played a darker role in his mind, his whole world slowing slightly to a stop, wanting nothing more than to sleep. As he reached his final destination for the next two hours or so. Now walking up the stairs and through the now quiet hall way filled with doors that which opened to the individual lives of the working class citizens that own them. Rowland reached his, opening it only to be welcomed by it's familiarity and the essential oil infused candles that which his girlfriend bought for him and their aroma still lingering in the air. He was taught that heterosexuality as a male was no crime and that a woman would always be grateful for a man who can handle himself in the household. His mother had taught him the necessities and corner stones of hygiene in every way possible around his home, some would say compulsively. But he had been accustom
DeVil in the Details. Chapter six: Silver Spoon Cool
The morning after was excruciating, Rowland woke up in a small puddle of his own drool, his neck aching from the position he had found his body in when he had passed out. But thankfully in his own bed, he half expected Charlotte to be next to him as; to his knowledge he had left with her. He sat up and immediately hated himself for it as he felt the jar of ants that which replaced his brain, holding himself accountable for the drinks he had; wincing at the light that was cast by his phone screen which was on full brightness. He turned it down and finally took a look to see the time which flashed thirty minutes past seven. Rowland shot up faster than any man would be able to in his intoxicated condition and did a clumsy speed walk towards the door to the bathroom on the other side of the flat; resisting the urge to piss himself almost tripping over his own feet. Feeling the jar of ants slosh angrily with every move. 'A Fucking hangover on a weekday, Rowland...really! 'He thought, cu
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- DeVil in the Details.
Yesterdays, Todays and Tomorrows
His stomach churned as the door knob turned and creaked with sinisism he thought he could feel in the air, but what he saw, who he saw once the door was open...he almost dropped the gun. And as he put his arm by his side, he was tempted to hide it. The door was open and Nick came eye to eye with Rowland as the door creaked wide over the sound of the radio;"Row...", the way he said his name was a whisper with that voice of molasses that still gave Rowland chills, but this time it was more like the chills you get when you feel or see something supernatural. He might as well have said 'no', for Rowland didn't believe it either...What does a ghost say to another ghost? The fucking thought made him feel like his life was just some fucking joke and that pissed him off, but before he could react with anger, Nick marched toward him and then did the strangest thing - he kissed him. It was full of impatient passion but all Rowland could justify was the taste of bitter-sweet cherry cola on hi
- DeVil in the Details.
Vivamus, moriendum est
Ever meet someone that just screams chaos, but you go for it anyways...If you answered yes, then I know you're lying. Because you never see it coming until they carve the fucking words into your forehead with a piece of your own fucking rib...****Bitter Truths " That ain't nothing but the Devil!""...Sometimes horrific events come into our lives. We get fired from our jobs. We get ill. A loved one dies one. Scrolling through the news we are overwhelmed with murder and natural disasters, as Mother Nature and our fellow humans seem to be in race to see who can kill us off first. Hate surrounds us.It is only human to look at these thinhs and wonder "why." Why do they hate us? Why do we hate them? Why does so much horror have to happen in this world?The "why" is the origin of fear. The "why" is the unkown, and people fear the unknown. This fear of the unknown, of things that lurk in the dark, that threaten our existence...It is where horror is born.Some people will look at the hor
- DeVil in the Details.
Chapter twentytwo: Mr.Goodbar
{Yesterdays todays and tomorrows} -Flashback- When in Rome.Nick lay face up upon it with his Clearwater eyes in sunlight as his mind was lost in the ceiling; he couldn't remember what they were talking about but he knew it was something about angels and demons, and the beginning and end of the world.he had read somewhere, that there are no archangels... But merely they are the brothers and sisters of mankind... And to this day he just can't put my finger on it... And told Rowland once he came back from the bathroom, Nick chimed in the silence with a baritone of concern. "Well...maybe, the brothers and sisters of mankind are too the archangels we know,... instead of contradicting the belief it's the chicken and the egg. Both exist as both one and separate, I mean a chicken can't come from thin air and neither can the egg, right? I mean I probably didn't first come in the same guise as the egg we've come to know, that's how we know that evolution is possible. But I th
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*I'm no Flower Child*
CaliforniaThe next few days, weeks, months felt sort of normal to Rowland, he hadn't the joys of finding out the side effects of antidepressants just yet. But it was like if a cheery whistle and song played in the back of his mind like a cheesey theme song from a musical, singing in the rain after a storm he felt was still right behind him but to him for the time being he felt that things could get sunnier - would get sunnier and damn well should.And yet such a polarisation didn't scare him, he finally felt the better side of nothing...He had visited home every so often to keep his mother sane, checked that off his list like a chore out of love - incidentally promising that he would come back for his birthday, but otherwise things felt better. He even painted freely in between brakes of editing Olivia and his' work making the executive decision including her help create a punk/goth culturale magazine starting with the Rainbowradioactive kids; the thing was, that he noticed everythi
- DeVil in the Details.
Los Angeles
RainbowradioactiveIf salt were a physical feeling it would taste of a wound, he split his lip on a smile a while ago. Licking the gash as he waited...He had a few days off, so he figured that when he got home he would do that thing he really didn't want to do.So he found himself in the waiting room of a private psychiatrist's office next to a ficus plant just as stiff and stoic as he was in that moment, as he realized he'd admitted defeat to Elizabeth he tuned into the receptionist's radio in the background to the ambiance that which all hospitals and clinic had, though to Rowland it was more like a dentist's office... He could just hear her now, under the thought of whatever questions he could be drilled with.He tensed his jaw as he waited. He actually got a card from Elizabeth after she called a psychologist to refer him to a psychiatrist, little did he know there was a difference...The difference being that a psychiatrist is a medical grade pusher, to put it simply. Where as a
- DeVil in the Details.
Hong Kong
Working for three days straight on Hong Kong Island and usually he would find Monday was followed by Thursday or you can't believe it's Friday when just yesterday it was Tuesday but now he felt all three - counting every second light lighting fixtures and their positions, tours of causeway bay and placement of the painting while preparing a speech, all he could think about was what he said the day he decided to leave Shellville with Nick as he smoked out his window and watched the sun set change the sky and sea. Rowland thought he found another installation to Dantés nine circles of hell - deliberate ignorance chains you to a writing desk to think you're entire fucking life over. And for some reason he imagined a raven screaming and pecking at you for the Fucking sake of some sick irony.The devine comedy being that humans have no one else to blame but themselves for their damnation... But this made him think of something else as he looked out the window of his hotel room, crushing th
- DeVil in the Details.
Tripping on mushroom clouds
Seeing all of this didn't make it any less unreal for Rowland... In fact, it might of just convinced him that he was seeing dead people. Like it wasn't just in his dreams anymore as he kept repeating a head count of the recently deceased like sheep from sleep he couldn't get in a head that felt full of wool yet never in a warm way. And, forgive him for being cheesey but something he was getting use to was that this fucked up feeling which felt like something else bad and wasn't going away - adding the quiver in the mutton's throat from either anxious fear or the memory of how stupidly choked up he got in front of the Pastor at Charlotte's funeral towards the end of their reverend chat.Her death wasn't the end.He was this feeling's "to let"*...Always having imagined that by using emojis as symbolic to describe specific sounds of a word it would be as much a language as Egyptian or Kanji or any language for that matter - for a letter is simply a symbol of indication... An icon to sim
- DeVil in the Details.
Chapter twenty one:The Reaper wears bubblegum blue
{Cry me sunshine, Cupcake}***"My feet fell on the floor...", When Rowland thought about that typo from an inner conversation that which he couldn't remember, it made him dizzy as he morbidly imagined a body suspended from nowhere ragdoll to the floor...Mind bending when he thought about what that could mean as an actual sentence and that made him fear he'd gone full circle.An idle mind is the devil's playground as "They" say.He watched his paints run dry in a dusty corner infront of a blank canvas, his mind was splayed across the dusty floor boards in piles of loose papers amidst origami trinkets...Hong Kong, Berlin, Stockholm... he still needed to clean up and get a few things done while still somehow giving way to hating himself for not packing a little earlier for his trip to start in China and sitting around in silence despite the work ideas he had and wanted to pen down in his black journal having discussed this in a boardroom meeting, but...no.Just not right then at least
- DeVil in the Details.
Somewhere in Milano
It was like he fucking woke up from death, so tempted to fall off the edge of the bed and sink off the face of the Earth as he held his head in one hand with his elbows on his knees - Death was welcomed. Too tired to show the fucking confusion this all added to his life behind high-nerfing cigarette smoke, spacing out on the smoke streams as he watched ash fall to the Raj patterned carpet over wooden varnished floor as he then heard a soft good morning from behind him as the sheets on Yoko's side of the bed started to twist with movement but she didn't get up and he felt the silence until he went so deep in thought that he stiffened once he felt slightly familiar hands touch his back before a soft kiss was planted at the back of his neck as Yoko got off the bed wearing nothing but his round rimmed spectacles, his undershirt with black thigh high socks, tracing her hand to Rowland's bright blond head of hair and roughly rubbed his head down playfully as she made her way while lazily st