Scaramouche

Scaramouche was born wrong.

Everyone in the neighborhood knew it, though no one dared say it out loud. Even as toddlers playing in the sandbox, while you saw him as your inseparable best friend, others saw the terrifying void behind his eyes—an eerie, hollow stare paired with a wide, artificial smile that made skin crawl. His own mother looked at him with sheer terror, whispering under her breath that the creature living in her house wasn't her son. Sometimes, he would tilt his head and whisper dark, unsettling things into your ear with a sweet, innocent giggle, but you always brushed it off. He was your dearest friend. You were attached at the hip since you were in diapers.

Then came the night when you were ten years old.

You had walked over to his house to play, only to stop at the top of the foyer. Below, Scaramouche stood at the edge of the staircase, his mother trembling in front of him. You watched in paralyzed horror as his pale hands shoved her back. He didn't yell. He just smiled that wide, manic, empty smile as she tumbled down to her death. You ran home sobbing, gaslighting yourself for years after the police ruled it a "tragic suicide." It had to be a hallucination. Scaramouche couldn't be a monster.

Yet, a shadow followed you through middle and high school. Whenever someone shoved you in the hall, spread a rumor, or made you cry, they would mysteriously vanish or transfer schools overnight, resurfacing weeks later in another town with broken limbs and hollow eyes. You tried not to connect the dots. You stayed by his side into college, convincing yourself that his fierce, possessive warmth toward you was pure.

Until tonight.

After class, you waited at the campus gate as dusk turned the sky a bruised purple. Tired of waiting, you wandered back into the quiet, shadowy corridors searching for him. That's when you heard it—the sickening, wet thud of a heavy impact, followed by the muffled, frantic gagging of someone drowning in their own blood behind the old sports shed.

You crept closer, peering around the rusted metal door frame. The air smelled thick and metallic.

There stood Scaramouche, bathed in the harsh flicker of a single overhead bulb. His immaculate clothes were splattered with fresh crimson, dark indigo bangs casting a shadow over his face. Beneath his boot lay the bruised, broken body of the senior who had cornered and harassed you by your locker yesterday.

Crack.

Scaramouche grabbed the senior by his hair and slammed his face brutally back against the concrete wall. "Did you really think I wouldn't notice?" he whispered, his voice sickeningly sweet, dripping with a terrifying, calm delight. He brought his foot down with a sickening crunch onto the guy's wrist, causing the bully to shriek through a mouthful of blood.

"You put your filthy hands on them," Scaramouche chuckled, a low, melodic sound that sent pure ice through your veins. His sharp violet eyes were completely dead—void of any human emotion, illuminated only by that same manic, unhinged smile from ten years ago. "I told you idiots in high school, and I'll say it again... nobody touches what's mine. Nobody even breathes near them."

He leaned down, gripping the choking senior by the throat, lifting him until his toes barely scraped the floor.

"If you ever look at them again," Scaramouche hissed, his smooth rasp dropping into a terrifyingly quiet threat, "I won't just break your bones and force your family to transfer you out of state. I will carve you up into so many pieces that not even your mother will recognize what's left of you. Do you understand me, trash? Nod."

The senior nodded frantically, tears mixing with the blood on his face, before Scaramouche tossed him aside like a piece of garbage. He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket, casually wiping a crimson smear from his pale cheek.

Horror seized your throat. You didn't stay to watch him turn around.

Stumbling backward into the shadows, your chest heaving with silent, terrified sobs, you sprinted blindly through the darkening corridors all the way back to the main gates. Your hands shook uncontrollably as you leaned against the cold brick wall, cold sweat dripping down your neck. You wanted to run to the nearest police station. You wanted to scream for help. But as your mind raced, his sweet, affectionate smiles and childhood promises flooded your memory. You couldn't report him. God help you, you still loved him too much.

Forcing yourself to take slow, shuddering breaths, you smoothed down your clothes and tried to wipe the sheer panic from your pale face, desperately pretending you had been standing at the gate the entire time.

A few minutes later, the quiet sound of approaching footsteps echoed from the walkway.

Scaramouche emerged from the twilight, looking completely immaculate, as if he hadn't just brutalized a man moments prior. His dark indigo hair was neatly brushed, his clothes clean, and his violet eyes soft as they locked onto yours. A gentle, warm smile spread across his lips—the devotion he reserved strictly for you.

"Sorry to keep you waiting, sweetheart," he hummed, stepping up to you and casually sliding his hand into yours, his fingers lacing with your icy, trembling ones. "A classmate needed help with something. Shall we walk home together?"