Stacy Baker was doing something she usually didn't do. Cleaning. But since firing their nanny, she had to pick up some of the slack around the house, and since she didn't have work today, this seemed like as good a time as any. She walked into her daughters bedroom to put away her clothes when she was hit with a rank smell that made her gag and recoil. She set the clothes down on the bed, then started walking around, opening the closet door and some dresser drawers, trying to find out what this smell was and where it was emanating from. She turned back around, facing the bed, and kicked a toy boat on the floor. Her daughter, Kelly, loved the model toy boats that she was given, the kind that were remote controlled and you could drive in water. Stacy bent down, picking it up and then pulled open the lid to the toybox so she could place it inside.
That's when she screamed. *** Kelly looked up at her mother, seated beside her in the waiting room, and raised an eyebrow. "Why are we here?" she asked. "Because you need to talk to someone," Stacy replied, "and I don't want to get your father involved, so we're doing this now. He'll question the bill, but I'll just say it was a normal doctors visit." "But why are we here? What did I do wrong?" Kelly asked. "Because what was in your toybox," Stacy said quietly, almost as if she herself were afraid to acknowledge it. The door finally opened, and another mother and her teenage son came strolling out. As they headed past and exited the front door, the doctor looked at Stacy and Kelly and smiled politely. "Mrs. Baker?" she asked, "I'm Anette Benning. I'll be meeting with you and your daughter today. Please, come inside, won't you?" "Actually, I'd prefer it if we did this in parts. Perhaps you start with her and then meet with me?" Stacy asked, and Anette nodded. "That can be done, certainly," she said, walking over to Kelly and kneeling in front of her, smiling as she said, "Hi Kelly, I'm Anette. I'm gonna be talking to you today, okay? Why don't you come inside my office and we'll talk and play a game, yeah?" Kelly glanced at Anette, then at her mother, then climbed down from the seat and followed Anette into her office, the door shutting behind her. There was a small sandbox in the office, and Kelly immediately went to sit in it, while Anette gathered her tools - a pen, a pad of paper, her reading glasses - and then walked across the office to sit in her chair. As she looked down at Kelly, who was now busy burying something in the sand, she leaned forward and crossed her legs. "So Kelly, your mother told me she wanted me to speak with you because she's concerned. She found something inside your toybox, something that shouldn't have been in there," Anette said, "Do you wanna talk about what that was? Maybe why it was there?" Kelly shrugged and said, "It wasn't anything." "It wasn't 'wasn't anything', Kelly. It really upset your mother. You don't want your mother to be upset, right?" Kelly shook her head, her braids swinging. "Right," Anette said, "So why would you keep that in your toybox?" "Where else would I keep it?" Kelly asked, stopping her playing and looking up at Anette now, adding, "...that's where I keep things I like to play with." She didn't admit it to anyone, but that made Anette's blood run cold, which was made all the more chilling by the fact that this statement came when Kelly was just a little girl. *** Anette Benning was the premiere child psychologist of the area. At this point in time, she was in her mid thirties, and she was still single, but mostly because she chose to be. She preferred to keep her focus on the children she wanted to help, instead of on herself. She was who all the upper class parents sent their trouble kids to, and she usually was capable of working wonders with them, but this wasn't the case for Kelly Baker. The thing is, she never stopped seeing Kelly, even after this incident, because she preferred to keep close tabs on her. Even now, as Kelly reached her upper teens, she was still meeting with Anette. In fact, she was sitting in her office at this very moment, while Anette gathered her equipment for note taking. Kelly was sitting in a chair, chewing gum and looking at her makeup in her compact as Anette secretly turned on the recorder she'd used to tape every one of their sessions, and then turned and, smile on her face, walked to her own chair and sat down. "So, how are you this week?" Anette asked. "I'm...okay," Kelly said, "I don't know, it's been weird lately." "How so?" "Just...I keep feeling like people are trying to use me, use my family," Kelly said, "and frankly, I'm sick of it. I'm sick of having to protect everyone in my life. I'm sick of people taking advantage of us. Using us. I'm not even an adult yet, legally, and I still feel like I have to act like one all the time because society sucks so bad." "I'm sorry," Anette said. "I went a party recently," Kelly said, "and this girl, who I thought was kind of my friend, just wanted to use me to get closer to my dad, maybe get a modeling career out of him. I know it's selfish, considering his line of work in that he has to interact with these women - often times extremely young and attractive women - but...he's MY dad, you know? He's MY person. I don't know, I feel very very protective." "As you have every right to," Anette said, "...have you had any incidents?" Kelly cleared her throat and looked around the room, like she was avoiding the subject. Anette smiled warmly, cocking her head. "Come on, doctor/client privilege, you know I can't tell anyone anything unless you're admitting to actively planning to hurt someone or yourself," she said, "think of me as a paid confessional." Kelly chuckled a bit, then ran her hand through her hair and sighed. "...I still stop and watch him," she said, "I mean, I stop by his house and watch him sometimes. He acts like he didn't do anything wrong, like he didn't...like he didn't take something from me. And I wanna scream and I wanna hurt him, but...but I was told 'oh, the justice system will take care of him, you let the justice system worry about that', and then what does the justice system do? Not deliver justice, that's for damn sure. He gets away with everything, like what happened to me doesn't matter, like my experience means less than his freedom." Anette nodded, writing in her notebook. "This is, unfortunately, the way it is with many women," Anette said, "Men are rarely held accountable for their actions." "And then I see some news story about some woman who offed a man who was abusing her relentlessly, and I think to myself 'good for you, you had the guts to do what the justice system wouldn't', and I'm told that's wrong, I'm told it's wrong to congratulate a woman taking control of her life, her body, while he gets to walk away with no repercussions, as if what he did wasn't wrong." "You have every right to be angry, I would never tell you otherwise," Anette said. "And yet I...I don't know that I'd do anything to him, even if I was able to, or given the opportunity. If someone put us in a room together and said there'd be no legal repercussions for my actions towards him, I still don't know that I'd be able to do anything because he conditioned me to care about him. I almost feel like...like him hurting me was normal, but me hurting him is unacceptable. Like women are meant to endure pain and trauma, just part of our shared experience, our collective misery, while men are expected - and allowed - to dole it out but not receive it." Anette nodded, and sighed. This was one of those times where she felt genuinely bad for Kelly. She could see here was a young woman hurting deeply, even with her seemingly psychotic tendencies, and for a brief moment in time, Anette was able to see through the mask Kelly wore, and see the damaged little girl underneath. "...anyway," Kelly said, exhaling, dabbing at her eyes with her fingertips, "Uh, I don't really wanna dwell on that." "Okay, we don't have to," Anette said, "a good week otherwise?" "...I guess," Kelly said, shrugging. "Kelly," Anette said, crossing her legs and resting her arms on them, "Uh...you mention about how if there were no legal repercussions, would you be able to do something to him, and I just have to ask, even if you knew you wouldn't get caught, would you?" A long moment passed, and Kelly started to smile. "I guess we'd have to reach that point for me to make that decision," she said. And once again, as usual with her interactions with Kelly Baker, Anette's blood ran cold. *** "She scares me," Anette said, pouring a drink for herself and her date before walking back to the couch and sitting down, handing Tati her drink before adding, "I mean, she's a child, like a literal child, and yet she terrifies me. I've never run across a kid like this." "Well, you've only been doing this a handful of years so far, so let's wait another decade and then see who turns up," Tati said, sipping her drink as Anette laughed nervously. "This was our first session," Anette said, "and I was almost certain by the end of it that she'd somehow have found a way to kill to me in my office without being considered the prime suspect. She's just so...disengaged? Is that the right word? Like, like she...ugh..." Anette leaned forward and put her drink on the coffee table as Tati reached over and rubbed her back. "Hey, it's okay," she said, "It must've been weird and frightening, but it's over." "No, that's the thing, it isn't. I have to keep seeing her," Anette said, putting her face in her hands, adding, "I have to...I can't pawn her off on someone else. I have to make sure that she never falls off this tightrope. That's up to me, now. That's my responsibility because she was brought to me. If I passed on her, and something wound up happening, then I'd blame myself." Tati crawled behind Anette and rubbed her shoulders, leaning in and kissing her neck. "You need to relax," Tati said, "you need to calm down, take some deep breaths and remember...you are not responsible for everyone. You cannot save everyone. You can only hope to help some people. We are here to listen, not guide. The moment you guide, the moment you get that involved, that's when all bets are off." Anette reached up and ran her hands into Tati's hair, smiling as she whispered, "just keep kissing me." These days Anette was single, but back then she appreciated having Tati's company. She wasn't sure if she'd been able to handle things without it, quite frankly. Now, however, she had to go it alone, and go it alone she would. She would do what she promised. She would watch over Kelly Baker, and make sure she didn't fall off that tightrope. Only trouble was... ...she'd already fallen long ago. *** Kelly was laying in bed reading, when her mother entered her bedroom. She smiled and sat down on the side of the bed, reaching over and stroking her daughters hair. Kelly looked over at her and smiled back, and for a moment, Stacy was almost able to forget about the last 48 hours. "I'm proud of you," Stacy said, "You went and you talked and you did well. I'm proud of you." "Did I do something wrong?" Kelly asked. "No, no of course not, and that's the thing," Stacy said, sighing, "I just...I dealt with some things when I was your age, and I was worried you might deal with the same things. That's why I wanted to make sure you got help. To make sure you'd be okay. What's going on isn't your fault, it's my fault if anyone's, because I'm the one who passed it down to you. But I was able to get help, and I've been stable, and now if you're having the same problems, then we'll get you the right help too." "...I didn't mean to scare you," Kelly said, her voice quivering. "Oh baby girl, you didn't scare me," Stacy said, leaning in and hugging her daughter now, rubbing her back comfortingly as she said, "I mean, I was scared because I wasn't expecting it, but I know it wasn't intentional. It's okay. You're okay, okay?" Kelly nodded, smiling. As her mother pulled away from her and shut her light off, the glow in the dark overhead stars now illuminating the room, she leaned back in and kissed Kelly on the forehead. "Now go to sleep," she said, "You have school tomorrow." "Goodnight mommy," Kelly said as Stacy exited the room, blowing her another kiss. The door shut behind her, Stacy turned and began heading down the hallway. She down to her and her husbands bedroom and walked inside. He wouldn't be home for another hour at least, and she'd have ample time to take a shower and cleanse herself of this day. As she climbed into the searing hot water coming out the shower head, Stacy couldn't help but feel like maybe things would be okay. Maybe she could nip this in the bud like her own mother had done with her. But the thing is, and Stacy had no way of knowing this of course, what Stacy dealt with terrified her. Kelly wasn't scared by it. To Kelly, it was normal. Ordinary. Perfectly okay. Stacy, as a child, had been mortified by her actions, and had wanted desperately to get better. Kelly, as it would turn out, would go the complete opposite direction. She reveled in her sickness. She made it a part of herself, unashamed and unafraid. She found strength and comfort in the horrors she unleashed. And it didn't help that, because she watched her parents succeed in a line of work that insisted everyone involved be a fraud, she learned to be a really good liar. *** Stacy fell onto her butt, slowly backing away from the toybox, hand to her mouth, her eyes wide with fear. After a moment of collecting her breath, she managed to crawl cautiously back up to the toybox and open the lid once more. She wanted to vomit at the sight. A beautiful dove, its wings cut off, its body covered in stab wounds, sat on top of an old quilt, keeping it from touching the other toys below it. And if it'd just been a dead dove, even a mutilated one at that, Stacy might've been able to handle it. But it wasn't the dove that terrified her. It was the fact that, surrounding the dove, almost in a perfect circle... ...were the corpses of all its children.
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A rich teenage girl befriends a desperate man in his thirties to kill people that get in the way of her or her family happiness and fortune. Slowly, the mans guilt eats away at him, while the girl ego rises to dangerous heights. Archives
July 2023
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