Withered Love (Jeff the Killer x Jane the Killer)

Chapter 2: One Hellish Paradise

I spent the next couple of days playing video games with Jeff and Liu. Mr. and Mrs. Woods usually left home for work early in the morning so right after I finished my breakfast, I would go over to their house. We got so addicted that sometimes we even forgot about lunch. When we didn't play video games, we would watch horror movies. Jeff had this craze for suspense and mystery. Liu wasn't so fond of scary stuff. He would always look away whenever a killing scene came on the screen. Honestly, I had so much fun with these brothers. They were...just different. Especially Jeff, he was more mature than I thought. He liked things no one else would even lay an eye on.

We got caught one day by Margaret. We usually played until dusk but that day, she had an early shift and returned home before we could tidy things up. She was so mad that she threw away Jeff's consoles. She kept scolding her boys for playing these 'revolting' and 'mind-twisting' games.

At least, she didn't tell my mum. She didn't think it was my fault either. She blamed Jeff. Liu cried after being yelled at. Jeff didn't even budge.

"Jane, I thought I told you to keep them occupied and away from these things," Margaret sighed. "Don't ever do this again. These games aren't appropriate for you all. You can always find something better to do to kill time, right?"

"I guess so," I replied, giving her a slight nod.

So, there went Jeff's collection. Down into the rubbish bin. Perhaps if he hadn't shown his games to me, nothing like this would have happened. Seriously, I felt bad for Jeff. I didn't know how much he had spent on those games but there were some I really liked.

Without video games, I wasn't sure what I could do to deal with my boring holiday. I stayed at home for two days before Jeff showed up at my house one morning. I was surprised because I knew he was still in a pretty bad mood losing all his games. When I texted him after Margaret shouted at us that night, he didn't even bother to reply me. I thought he was angry.

Anyway, he was standing on the porch, hands in his pockets as usual. Sometimes, I wondered what he was hiding inside those pockets.

"Hi, Jane."

"Hi."

"Wanna do something fun?" he asked.

"Like what?"

"I don't know. Anything you want."

"Where's Liu?"

"Mum sent him to the Reading Club across the street. It's organised by some playgroups, I think. She said it's time we're doing something more...educational and productive."

"Oh, I thought those are for kids."

"Well, they have a senior group actually."

"And why aren't you with Liu?"

"Because I sneaked away," Jeff laughed. "You can't imagine me sitting with a bunch of nerds reading some silly books, right? Liu is just different. He likes reading. He always listens to Mum."

"Nah, that's worse than going to school. So, what do you have in mind?"

"Do you want to show me around the city?" asked Jeff. "I still haven't seen everything yet."

"Sure, why not?"

We took a shuttle bus and travelled down to the market. There was basically nothing much to do there but with Jeff, I believed we could figure out something.

"So, is there anything in particular that you wanna do in the city?" he asked.

"Not really," I mumbled. "You can decide what we do."