Winter's Story Pick, Week 16

Madeline's story this week made me sit up at the first line and open my mouth. I was TAKEN. By disgust, partially, but by originality, mostly! And I'm still wondering about that ending... enjoy!

Perfect Has a Death Sentence

I pulled the fork out of my mouth. Sitting back, I chewed.

Yeah, that was woman. Definitely woman. It didn’t crunch the same way as male did, it was much more delicate. Besides its tenderness, it just didn’t taste the same as man did.

My obsession burned as I stuffed another piece of meat into my mouth. There was barely a taste anymore, the flavor washed away with age, leaving me with a lacking piece of meat. Times were hard and I was living off whatever was in my pantry. The freshest meat was probably a week or two old, while everything else was about three months and older.

Of course I didn’t eat the hearts. No, I would never do that.

A while ago she left me empty. The drugs didn’t seem to help, either. I couldn’t shake the feelings I didn’t want to feel, and I couldn’t drown them out.


Sooner or later I came to my senses. I realized that there was no point in drowning the feeling out when I could feel once again. Why not fill myself with other’s hearts? Sure, it would be artificial feeling, but it would be feeling.


After a lot of secret prowling around and asking, I learned it takes about twenty three hearts that don’t belong to him to fill a guy up.


Ever since then, my cupboards had been growing with person meat and people hearts. It saved quite a lot of money eating the people you killed. I hadn’t stepped foot out into a grocery store for ages.


Quite frankly, I hadn’t gone anywhere in ages. I preferred to stay in my apartment, watching everyone that passed.


You see, there was a little catch. One of the twenty three hearts had to be perfect. The more perfect the heart, the better.


Being the procrastinator I took pride in being, I had left the perfect heart to be number twenty three.


Pushing my chair back, I listened to the metal legs scrape across the tile floor, cringing at the sound. I walked over to the window and sat down. Rush hour had just begun and people swam like fish below.


I smiled, content with the moment. Who would I see today? There was one girl in particular who I saw walk on the street below often. From above she always seemed to be glowing with perfection.


They told me perfection was something that could not be mistaken. Once you find someone with a heart you deem perfect, all other hearts’ perfection is negated.


On cue, a petite girl with long brown hair walked by, a messenger bag slung over her shoulder and a stack of books cradled in her arms.


I sprung up from my chair and flew out of the door.

I jabbed at the buttons on the elevator a few times, but the door did not open.


Growing impatient, I bolted down the stairs. I nearly tripped a few times, and I cursed at my bad knee as I stumbled onto flat ground.


As I weaved in and out of people, I tried my best to look unsuspicious and casual.


I’m pretty sure a man in his early forties dashing through a crowd of people in an apartment lobby isn’t exactly defined as “unsuspicious”, but hey, I was trying.


The spinning doors were rotating by themselves as there were already plenty of people inside. On the way out, I stubbed my toe on the door.


She was waiting at the end of the block, waiting for traffic to stop before she could cross the road.


The cars, buses, and taxis all came to a halt.


I stepped forward, keeping my eyes glued to the back of her head which was just a few people in front of me. It sure looked undeniably perfect.


She walked for a while on, her steps short and brisk.


Anticipation tingled in my knuckles and palms. My mouth watered as I followed her down the streets.


The crowds began to thin out and she was straight in front of me.


Cautious of who was watching, I slowed my pace down a bit, but was careful not to lose track of her head.


Finally, when she stopped walking she was in front of a small complex. She walked up the steps and knocked on the faded red door adorned with a rusty gold knocker.


Breathlessly I watched as I pretended to talk on the phone, making it look a bit more normal for stopping in the middle of a sidewalk.


A man came and opened the door, embracing her.


“Hey, Sellhare,” the man said as he nibbled her ear.


She pushed him away. “It’s Kate!” she giggled.


Good. She has a heart that’s already loving. She’s perfect.


And she’s Kate Sellhare. Sounds very perfect to me.

He laughed, too. “Let’s go inside,” he offered. She nodded and took his hand. The door closed behind them and I longed to go with her.


I was too happy to feel forlorn, though. I snapped my phone shut and walked back down to my apartment, trying not to sprint out of sheer excitement.

When I got in the door, the phone was ringing.


I ran over to pick it up. “Hello?” I answered.


“Ah, Paul. How are you doing today?”


I straightened up, even though he couldn’t see me. “I’m doing fine, Officer Jonah.”


He chuckled. “Good. . . Good. Listen, there’s been some commotion going on, and we were wondering if you would happen to know anything about it?”

“Me?” I said, trying to sound surprised and offended. “Why would I have anything to do with it? Why would I know anyone who had anything to do with it?”

“I’m not sure,” Officer Jonah said into the phone. “It was a murder, a murder of a young, young man by the name of Kurt. No one has found his body.”

“So how do you know he’s dead?” I asked wittily.

“It’s New York City we’re talking about,” the officer replied. “Tell me he’s been kidnapped with no ransom, and he’s still alive.”

I shrugged. Officer Jonah was right, Kurt was dead. More specifically, he was floating through the New York sewage system right now, if you know what I mean. Child meat was always the best, and with Kurt, I just couldn’t resist.

“I know nothing about it, officer,” I finally managed to say.

“Alrighty then,” he said. “Thank you for your time, Paul. You’ve been quiet good lately, so I’ll have to take your word for it.”


“Good bye,” I smiled as I hung up the phone. Another crime that slid right over my head.


I walked to my bedroom, still smiling. I shut the door behind me, it was getting late and I was tired.


The shrill ringing of my phone woke me up at 9:17 A.M.

Grumbling, I rolled out of bed and walked to the living room where I fumbled for the phone among a pile of keys and papers. “Hello?” I answered groggily, wiping the dried saliva off the side of my mouth.

“Paul! Good morning to you!”

“Officer!” I exclaimed, perking up a bit. “How are you?”

“Good, good. . . Look, I know I was a little suspicious last night, and I apologize.”

“S’kay. No hard feelings done.”

“I know I left the matter alone last night, and I’m sure you were thinking that I believed you.”

“I drew that conclusion, yes.”

“I didn’t trust you one bit. I just wanted to say that I was sorry for suspecting you to be the criminal.”

“Oh?” I asked, surprised.

“We found the culprit last night,” the officer informed me. “She was at her boyfriend’s house. She was charged for many things, one of them being the murder of Kurt.”

I raised an eyebrow. “I know it’s none of my business, but who, Officer Jonah?”

“Kate Sellhare. We found her last night at her boyfriend’s house, actually just a few blocks down from your apartment. There’s no need to worry, she’s in jail now and has received a death sentence.”


Perfect had received my death sentence.


"Once again, I hate to be nosy, but what led you to believe this?"

"There was billions of evidence," he mused. "I suppose this is the end of a perfect soul. I think she was going to be your twenty third heart, right? Too bad. . . You're never as smart as you think."