Freak Show

eighteen

I'm screaming and I can't stop. I'm fighting and kicking and doing everything I can to get to Grayson, but the Strongmen hold fast to me. Manson skips over to Grayson who is shirtless and hanging from the ceiling by his wrists, only the very tips of his toes touching the floor and he's struggling to hold his weight up so he doesn't pull his arms out of socket. Tears are streaming down my face as Manson runs his fingers across Grayson's bare torso, enjoying himself. I feel sick to my stomach.

"Tell me, my dear freaks. Why did you want to leave me?" He sighs, stopping his fingers on Grayson's abdominal muscles. Grayson looks like he could throw up. I don't blame him. I'm about to lose my stomach all over myself.

"What? I-" Grayson begins, voice strained and I wonder how long he's been hanging there. His arms are shaking with effort, but he doesn't seem to have been harmed yet apart from his raw wrists.

"Didn't expect me to know?" Manson chuckles. "Aphrodite told me everything." The sting of betrayal is familiar, and it finds a home in my heart.

"I gave you two everything. You stay in a more luxurious tent than I or any of the others. Rosalie, dear, you haven't had anything but silk clothing since you arrived and moved into this tent. Do you even know how expensive silk is? I have fed you and loved you and gave you a place to sleep and yet, still you want to leave me... My only question is why." He seems genuinely curious.

Neither of us say anything, so he swings the knife back and forth between us. "No takers? Going once, going twice! Sold to the pretty boy hanging from the ceiling." Manson laughs at his own joke, and he moves toward Grayson and eyes him like he's his next meal. Grayson is breathing heavier now, and he's barely able to hold himself up and I want to go to him, to hold him, to help him, but the more I struggle, the tighter the strongmen's grips become.

"Rosalie, b-baby, it's ...okay, ...I'm okay," Grayson breathes, trying to get me to stop crying and screaming. I sob silently to myself now, and Manson looks between the two of us and I try to get Grayson to meet my eyes, but his head is still hung low.

"Well, now you two have just made this so much more interesting. Such saps, too bad I hate romances." Manson sighs.

"Grayson," I beg and he looks up to meet my eyes, and I know that we're both going to die and I know what needs to be the last thing he hears. "Grayson, I love you." I'm not sure how I mean it, or if it's real, but it's what he needs to hear. I'll never get the chance to discover if we even would have been compatible under normal circumstances. I never got to know him.

Manson rolls his eyes, completely annoyed. He steps forward one last time, still twisting the knife hilt in his hand as he draws his hand back and swipes a deep gash across Grayson's abdomen, blood slinging everywhere and all of Grayson's most vulnerable body parts exposed to the world and Grayson chokes on his own blood, gurgling and spitting it until he finally can't go on and his head droops and the life leaves his body.