The Ladies of Horror
Picture-Prompt Writing Challenge!

Just Desserts
by Lydia Prime

Samuel had been doing this for decades; step, crunch, drag. Step, crunch, drag. He stayed hidden in his remote mountain area where he’d created a home for himself overlooking a lake that froze every winter. He was nearing his late sixties and was becoming too weak for his repetitious task. Step, crunch, drag, Step, crunch, drag.

When he was a young man he’d loved an incredibly beautiful woman that had been just as interested in the outdoors as he was. Unfortunately, as beautiful as she looked on the outside, she was rotten to the core on the inside. He‘d caught her cheating on him time and time again – always forgiving, he believed her promises that ‘this was the last time’. One day, Samuel finally had enough and took his love out to the great lake for a boat ride. Step, crunch, drag. Step, crunch, drag.

He’d chosen to confront her one last time. As he rowed toward the middle of the lake her lies spilled out like a broken record; he couldn’t take the heartbreak any longer. Samuel saw red as he reached up and wrapped his meaty hands around her neck and strangled her. He watched as the light faded from her eyes and her skin turned from its usual soft, pale beauty to that of a bloated purple corpse. Step, crunch, drag. Step, crunch, drag.

Staring at her motionless body, his heart raced. He’d enjoyed it, and that genuinely excited him. He effortlessly tossed her out of the boat and watched her body sink; her unseeing eyes looking up at him the whole way down.

Forty-or-so years later, he’d developed a taste for stealing the life from women who reminded him of his lost love. As the seasons passed, he would hide in the thickly wooded area and watch young couples on the lake. Any woman he deemed ‘disgusting’ or ‘unworthy’ of their man, he would discretely pluck from the world. He kept them at his home for months, as he’d learned the joys of a slow death taught them their lessons far more satisfactorily. At the end, he would dismember them. A sort of ‘just dessert’ in his mind – to pull them apart physically as they had done to their men emotionally. When winter rolled around, he would trudge through the snow coated ground to the lake where it all began. Step, crunch, drag. Step, crunch, drag.

It was time for Samuel to dump his decidedly final victim. He arrived at the lake, cracked the ice and dropped the bags into the icy water. “Samuel…” He heard a sing-song voice whisper. Unsure of where the sound came from, he was unable to pinpoint it. He froze, unsure of who was there and how much they’d seen. He waited, shivering in the snow for almost an hour; no sound came to his ear. He chalked it up to paranoia and decided it was time to start making his way back home. Step, crunch, crack. Step, crunch, crack.

“Saaaamuel.” The voice finally called again.

“Who’s there!?” He shouted trying to cover his fear. “Face me, show yourself!” he demanded.

“Samuel!” His name was angrily whispered from all around him. This startled him even more, in his fear, he’d misstepped and had backed onto the ice. He slipped and fell forward, his face looking directly into his freshly made hole. “Saaaammuel!” he heard one final time before feeling dozens of hands crush his body against the ice. His eyes widened with fear as he saw his former lover’s face quickly rising to the surface.

“We’ve missed you, Sam.” She sang out as she and his other victims dragged him below the ice to his own watery grave.

Fiction © Copyright Lydia Prime
Image courtesy of Pixabay.com

More about Lydia Prime:

Lydia grew up in a small, ‘Mayberry,’ sort of town, in New Jersey. She thoroughly enjoys gummy bears and laughing through the darkest depths of life. More often than not, she writes about demons and monsters, however, being a recovering addict tends to turn inner demons into fearsome foes to be fought beyond the constraints of the mind. ‘Sometimes,’ she states, ‘what’s inside, is scarier than anything reality throws at you.’

Please visit Lydia on Facebook for more info.