Sinister Tales

Trouble

Trouble (Part Two of The Babysitter)

2014 © All Rights Reserved

Martha and Laura are back and things have gotten more hectic than ever.

Martha sat on the couch, paranoia scratching at the inside of her mind. Her skin crawled with bad feelings, every few minutes she would recognize her nails scratching at her arms. When she realized what she was doing, she'd stop only to start back up a few minutes later. It was a continuous cycle until she could feel the skin on her arm tearing. Martha looked down at her arms, redness showing on her pale skin. She looked at her nails, dead skin lodged into her nails until she picked it out.

Martha got off the couch and checked on what her mother was up to, hoping it would be a distraction to her inner thoughts that could drive her off the deep end.

She walked through the house, checking each room to find her mother. Finally, she found her mother in the basement, where she usually was most of the time.

"Hey sweetie. You're here just in time to see my finalized piece of work." Laura said as she seen her daughter walking down the stairs.

Martha didn't see what was on the canvas until she reached the bottom of the stairs. It was a black background with the bones of the fingers they've cut off from their victims making a shape of a tree. The bones were glued to the paper, connecting together to make the trunk of the tree. Crushed up pieces of the bones scattered on the paper, making up the leaves on tree.

"You used the bones to make a tree?" Martha looked at her mother with a questioning look.

"I call it the Tree of Life." A smile grew on Laura's face, admiring her art work.

"So you're a comedian too." Martha mumbled, continuing to stare at the tree.

Her mother stared at her daughter. "What's that suppose to mean?"

"I'm just saying it's kind of funny you name it the Tree of Life when people had to die so we could get these fingers. Is this really what we're doing it for? Art?" Attitude came out in her voice, stunning her mom for a second.

When she found her words, she responded, "I thought you understood my creativity, but I guess not. Something has changed in you, Martha. I don't like it."

Martha sighed, sitting down on the stairs as she looked at her mother's creation. "I'm sorry, I've just been really on edge lately. Those kids I killed, I can't help but shake the feeling the cops are going to find us. Their mom knows what I look like. She knows what you look like. They're gonna find us mom and I'm not ready to go to prison. I'd get killed within the first week."

Before Martha could continue on with her babbling, her mother hushed her. "Stop talking. We're not going to get caught. I need more bones for my next project so go give Hensley more fingers. She loves them."

Martha scoffed. "If she loved heads, would you cut off the heads of our victims and give them to her?"

Without missing a best, Laura replied. "Yes I would. She's my little girl and she deserves the best."

Martha felt a ting of pain in her heart. "What about me? I'm your daughter too. Doesn't it matter what I want?" She stood up, ready to go up the stairs.

Laura walked over to her daughter, cupping her face in both of her hands. "Of course it matters what you want, but Hensley is little. Little kids need attention. You, you're not needy." She paused, taking a look at her daughter. "At least I thought you weren't."

"I'm not needy." She yanked her mother's hands away from her and marched up the stairs with feelings of frustration.

Martha walked into the kitchen, opening a red cooler filled with ice. She stuck her hand in the ice, numbness taking over her hand as she pulled out fingers. The cold flesh rested in her hand as she walked towards her sister's room. She didn't bother knowing or warning her she was coming in, she opened the door and Hensley turned around with a look of excitement as she saw the fingers in Martha's hand.