Short Stories

Company

 He was young, innocent, naive even. She had that glistening smile, the glimmer in her mesmerizing, vibrant, grey-blue eyes, and the rich creamy cocoa color of her luxurious skin. Her gorgeous, wavy, brown hair fell just above the center of her back. She was no doubt stunning, charming, and manipulating. Within minutes she could have any person naive enough wrapped around her finger. That's what she wanted though. That was always her goal.

The girl casually strolled over to a man in the coffee shop they were both in. She noticed his glances in her direction quite a few times in the past five minutes. She plastered on her charming smile and put a sense of pip in her voice, ready to flirt... ready for the kill.

"Hi, my name is Zeresh.", the girl smiled to the man who spotted her.

Caught off guard, the man nervously responded. "O-oh hi! Uh, I'm Lucius."

"Nice to meet you, Lucius." Zeresh smiled and held out her hand for Lucius to shake.

Lucius hesitated then shook her hand and said, "Nice to meet you too."

From there, Lucius was caught with little hope left to escape before it was too late. That day, they exchanged numbers and from there the two went on numerous dates, getting closer and closer. After a few months, Lucius had become fully entrapped in her sick game of charades. She had finally overtaken his mind and there was no reverse. That day, Lucius asked Zeresh to be his girlfriend of which she said yes.

It didn't take long before her game got interesting. It had been a year since they met. Zeresh had already begun her clingy ways. It started slow at first. She just didn't want Lucius hanging around girls by himself. Overtime though, it got worse. It changed to he couldn't hang with girls at all. Then it was he couldn't even be around them. Afterwards, she started to go after his other friends. She made it so that if they wanted to hang out it had to be at her house while she was there. Lucius' friends didn't care for that idea and eventually just slowly started hanging out with him less and less. However, Lucius hadn't noticed. He was too busy caught up in her looks and her words to realize what she was doing. It always happened that way for every victim of Zeresh's.

Another year passed and Zeresh convinced Lucius to move in with her. She wanted constant supervision over him, her obsessive ways starting to take over. Lucius, still being naive, was oblivious to her behaviour. It wasn't until tragedy struck that he began to notice, but couldn't escape.

First it was his friends:

"Hey, Mike, it's Lucius again. I was just wondering where you and the gang went. I can't seem to get ahold of anyone. Look I know you guys don't like my girlfriend, but c'mon she's really a good person. Just... give me a call back when you can. Alright, um, see ya, bye."

"Hey, James, it's Lucius again. I, uh, I haven't heard from you and the guys lately. Just wondering where you all disappeared to. Look, I have a feeling this is because of my girlfriend, but she really is a good person. Just give her a chance and gimme a call back when you get this, I guess, and I'll, uh, I'll talk you later. Bye."

"Hey, Jake, it's Lucius again, just curious to where you and the guys went. I haven't heard from anyone in a while. Um, if you could just call me back when you get this, that'd be awesome. Um, yeah, bye.

Lucius hadn't been able to talk to anyone except his girlfriend for the past couple months. She had completely cut him off from family, friends, and strangers. All that was left available to him was to lounge around the somewhat large house Zeresh owned and watch t.v. or talk to her. One day he had slouched himself deep into the soft couch, indulging on t.v. to pass time. Nothing else had been on, so Lucius flipped the channel to the local newscast watching with only half focus. It wasn't long until a story had caught his eye though.