AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Chapter 11
Celeste
Like it or not, consciousness came with a side of fear that clung to my skin as I woke in my bed from the nightmare where my stalker's threats danced on repeat. Gavin’s screams had been the soundtrack to my twisted dreams.
I rolled over, tangling myself in a mess of sheets that I had slept through almost the entire day in. It had been days since I'd heard from the psycho who got off on terrorizing me, but his words were etched in my brain like some sick mantra. The thought should've repulsed me—it did—but it also lit this fucked-up fire inside me that I couldn't douse. Each night, my fingers had become traitors too, straying between my thighs as I imagined the grotesque scene he described. And every time, shame washed over me in waves, hot and cold at once.
I scrubbed my hands over my face. My apartment felt like a prison cell. Four walls closing in, trapping me with the ghost of his threats and the memory of Gavin's touch.
The ding of my phone pierced the silence, and I flinched. Not now. But it wasn’t him. It was Gavin—sweet, clueless Gavin—checking in because I’d gone radio silent since our last fuck fest. His message was a simple 'Hey, you okay?'wrapped in genuine concern.
"Fuck," I whispered, the word a puff of air in the too-still room. It would've been easy to text back, to reassure him. But I knew better. Dragging him deeper into this shitshow was signing his death warrant. I couldn't—I wouldn’t—be the reason he got pulled apart by a madman with a god complex.
So I did what I do best: I ghosted him. Left him hanging like a piece of art no one wants to look at. I tossed my phone aside, the thud against the carpet sounding like a gavel. Judgement passed; sentence served.
Sorry, Gav, but this is one mess you're better off out of. I was the queen of pushing people away, building walls so high even my own emotions couldn't scale them. But as I lay there, staring at the ceiling, all I could think about was how much I ached for something, anything, to feel real again.
"Fuck it," I decided, throwing the covers off with a huff. If I was going to be stalked, haunted, and royally screwed in the head, I might as well get some fresh air while I'm at it.
Islammed the trunk of my car, the clang resonating through the empty parking spot that overlooked the riverside. It had been years since I'd set up shop here, so to speak, and the idea now felt as foreign as the thought of a wholesome night in with a rom-com and a tub of ice cream. But the four walls of my apartment were closing in on me, smothered in the scent of turpentine and bad decisions.
Nature's cure for the deranged artist. I hauled the easel and canvas towards the riverbank.
Fuck it, I was half convinced this might actually be good for me. My sneakers crunched over the gravel path, finding a secluded enough spot where I could pretend I was alone and not smack dab in the middle of Chicago's beating heart. Ignoring the joggers and the occasional dog walker, I set up my makeshift studio with brisk movements, like a ritual to ward off evil spirits—or at least the ones that weren't already squatting in my mind.
The first stroke of the brush against the canvas was supposed to be cathartic, but instead, it scratched an itch deep inside, one that had been festering since I was a naive teenager painting by this very river, thinking life was as simple as choosing the right shades to blend.
Who knew the palette of my life would turn out to be fifty shades of fucked up?
The riverside hadn't changed much; the water still flowed with the same disregard for the trials of those it passed by. But the girl who once sat here, dreaming of a future as bright as her acrylics, had been replaced by a woman whose very soul seemed to be smeared with charcoal, shaded with the heavy strokes of betrayal and a stalker's twisted obsession.
"Ah, inspiration, you cruel bitch," I whispered, my brush dancing across the surface, guided by memories I kept locked away, each one a muse more demanding than the last.
Paint the pain, Celeste, paint the fucking menace lurking in your shadows. I urged myself, feeling the familiar pull of darkness as my art began to take shape, a visual echo of the depravity I both feared and craved.
Art therapy, they call it. More like exorcism.
The laugh that bubbled up was sharp, cutting through the tranquility of the setting sun. But there was no peace to be found in these strokes, only the raw edge of a past that refused to stay buried beneath layers of oil and regret.
Because really, what did it matter if the world saw my madness splashed on a canvas? It was already a grotesque exhibit in my mind's gallery, open 24/7 for an audience of one particularly persistent voyeur.
The chill of the breeze off the river cut through my sweater as I dabbed my brush into a shade of blue that could only be described as 'screw you, I'm sad.' The water before me rippled with the secrets of the city, and I let each stroke on the canvas soak up the whispers of scandal and sin that Chicago cradled in its concrete arms.
I glanced around at the sparse passerby who were too caught up in their own bullshit to notice mine. But this public display wasn't for them. No, it was for the eyes that I felt burning into my back, the gaze so intense I could almost feel it peeling away the layers of my clothes—and fuck if that didn't send a shiver down my spine that was part thrill, part terror.
"Enjoying the show, are we?" I muttered under my breath, knowing he was out there, lurking. My stalker, my unwanted patron of the perverse arts. The thought should have had me packing up faster than a one-night stand at sunrise, but instead, I found myself rolling my shoulders back, my posture more open. Embracing it like the fucked-up muse he was.
As my brush swirled over the scene, creating turbulent waves out of calm waters, my phone buzzed, its vibration against my thigh both jarring and expected. It was him. It had to be. It always fucking was. Normal people texted. He infiltrated—my phone, my life, my goddamn libido.
For a half-second, I considered throwing the device into the river, watching it sink and take his twisted words with it. But no, that would be letting him win, wouldn't it? And Celeste Holloway didn't play to lose.
"Fuck off," I whispered, not bothering to check the message, because what did it matter? 'I see you' or 'You look beautiful in despair'—it was all the same mind-fuckery.
"Nice try, asshole," I said louder, to the empty air or maybe to him, wherever he was. "But you're not getting under my skin today."
I let out a snort of laughter, bitter and biting as the wind that whipped past, carrying my defiance along with it. Yeah, I was a piece of work—a frayed, filthy masterpiece—but at least I was the one holding the damn brush.
But, the brush in my hand was a liar. It painted serenity—a calm riverside, with gentle greens and blues that whispered peace to anyone who'd glance. But the hand slipping down the front of my pants, fingers dancing over the heat there, told the truth. There was nothing fucking serene about this.
