Foxglove

To exist in prison is to be suspended in a jar of formaldehyde—preserved, observed, never quite alive. The cell is a mausoleum, and I its most charming corpse. The walls, jaundiced with the stains of a thousand sleepless hands, close in at night like the jaws of some ancient beast. My reflection in the polished steel of the sink is a study in contrasts: a face too handsome for these surroundings, features carved with the careful malice of a Renaissance devil—angular jaw, lips soft and misleading, eyes pale as a winter sun, quick to flicker with amusement or hunger. Even my hair, dark and obedient, seems to belong to another world, the world of velvet chairs and soft laughter.

Cooper, the morning guard, shuffles down the row, his keys clattering like the bones of small, unlucky animals. He pauses at my cage, his gaze lingering as if he suspects I might, at any moment, slip between the bars and vanish into myth.

“Mail, Rowe,” he grunts, and slides a thin envelope through the slot.

I study the thing as one might a rare moth—fragile, almost luminous against the filth. The handwriting is round, earnest, a child’s balloon drifting dangerously close to a flame. I tuck it away, a seed to be planted in the loamy darkness of night.

_ _

March 3

Dear Mr. Rowe,

I hope you don’t mind a stranger writing to you. My name is Cassidy, and I found your details in the library, tucked between the pages of a book about unsolved mysteries. I suppose that’s a sign, or at least an invitation.

I love stories that slip through the cracks—ghost tales, locked-room puzzles, and the kind of truth that hides in shadows. My classmates don’t understand; they prefer their lives bright and ordinary.

Do you read much, where you are? I imagine nights must be long in such a place. Do you have a favorite story?

My teacher says I am “too curious,” as if curiosity were a sickness. But I think it’s the only way to see what lies beneath things.

If you wish, write back.

Yours in curiosity,

Cassidy

P.S. My favorite flower is foxglove. It is beautiful, and deadly, which seems only fair.

_ _

How exquisite, this intrusion of innocence into my ossuary. Cassidy—such a name, soft as cake, yet inscribed here in the ledger of criminals and carrion. I imagine her: a schoolgirl with a heart full of riddles, a mind tuned to the pitch of secrets. She writes of foxglove, that most poetic of poisons—how fitting. She is a flower pressed in a book of autopsies, a ribbon of sunlight snaking through the high, grimy window of my cell.

The envelope trembles in my hand, as if aware of its own peril. I read her words again, savoring their naïve bravado, their trembling invitation to the abyss. The world outside has sent me a lamb, all softness and scent, and I am licking my lips.

_ _

March 10

Dearest Cassidy,

Your letter arrived like rain on parched earth—unexpected, intoxicating, a brief baptism in a place where nothing grows but regret and memory. I confess, the sight of your handwriting (so round, so eager to please) startled me from the torpor that prison breeds, that thin gray crust of indifference which forms over the soul like dust on a coffin lid.

You ask about my nights. They are long, yes, and haunted by the slow drip of dreams. Here, one learns to cherish the smallest trespass of beauty—a shaft of light, a moth battering itself to death against a bulb, the scent of rain through a cracked window. I read, when I can. Poe is a companion, his stories a comfort; I am fond, too, of the old detective tales, where the guilty prowl in velvet slippers and justice is a dagger in the dark.

You mention foxglove, darling flower—how I admire your taste. There is a certain pleasure in touching that which can kill, in loving the edge as well as the bloom.

You wonder if curiosity is a sickness; I think it is a kind of hunger, and there are worse hungers, trust me.

If you send your likeness, I promise to keep it near, a talisman against the rot.

Yours,

D. Rowe

_ _

And with her next letter, I tore the seam apart carefully.

Her photo is a relic, a fetish, a scrap of flesh pressed into paper. I keep it hidden in the lining of my pillow—my secret, my spoil. I study her face as a wolf studies the throat of a lamb: the softness beneath the jaw, the eyes too wide, too trusting. At night, I slide the photograph out and let my gaze crawl over her skin, mapping the places where bruises would bloom, where a blade would whisper and open her up like fruit.

Her letters come, regular as a pulse. Each is a molted skin—shedding innocence, layer by layer, for my inspection. She sends what I ask for. Her hands, small and pale, clutching a daisy. Her feet, bare against the faded rug of her bedroom. Her hair, untamed and spilling, as if she were about to be dragged underwater. With each new image, I dissect her; with each new pose, I imagine how easily I could twist her, break her, ruin her.

I write back with careful poison, each word a slow drip into her ear. I thank her for her trust, tell her she is safe with me, that only I can see her as she truly is—a secret thing, a thing that needs to be hidden. I ask for more: “A picture of you just before sleep, the lines of your body lost in the gloom—there is nothing more pure in this world than what is half-seen, half-hoped for.” She delivers, always with a note of apology, as if she knows she is being led somewhere she shouldn’t go, but can’t help herself.

I instruct her how to think, how to feel. I tell her her friends are jealous, that her parents could never understand her hunger for darkness. I say, “You are not like them. You are meant for something more.” And she believes me. They always do.

Her letters become my sustenance. I devour her words, chew every sentence until it bleeds meaning. I read them in the light, in the dark, with the stink of men and metal thick around me. I imagine her mouth shaping each word, her tongue wetting her lips, her breath fogging the paper. I imagine my hands on her—pressing, squeezing, leaving marks in the soft clay of her youth.

Some nights, sleep will not come. I lie awake, heart hammering, skin prickling with the sick sweetness of anticipation. I imagine her flesh: the warmth, the give, the veins blue and trembling beneath a sheath of innocence. I see her throat, white and slender, and the vivid flash of red that would spill, sudden and perfect, if I ever let myself go too far.

She is everywhere now—in the scrape of a spoon across metal, the drip of water from the pipe above my bed, the wheeze of dying men in the next cell. I want to hollow her out, climb inside, wear her skin as my new world.

I am patient. I am gentle. I am hungry.

And soon, she will be mine.

_ _

August 10

My dearest Mr. Rowe,

Night comes early these days, and I find myself thinking of you whenever the wind stirs the curtains. When can I see you? I will tell my parents a story (not quite a lie, not quite the truth)—that I am camping with a friend. No one will seek me by the water’s edge.

I wonder: is it possible to begin again, to slip one’s skin and emerge unspoiled? Perhaps the lake will know. I will carry a secret on me, a secret for you, something I have kept closed for a long while. Hidden. Never touched.

When you find me, I will be waiting, heart in hand.

Yours in waiting,

Cassidy

_ _

In the tomb-like hush of my final prison night, I cradle her letters—fragile artifacts, sweet as bruised fruit, dangerous as a whisper in the dark. I imagine her at the lake: the blue dress, the foxglove smile, the silver locket. I will find her.

_ _

August 18

Cassidy, my love—

Tomorrow, the world unseals itself and I am loosed upon it, a thief in borrowed daylight.

I will come to the lake, as you wish. I will bring the lantern, and perhaps a story or two, if you would indulge me.

Wait for me by the water, one week from now. I will know you by the flower at your throat, by the secret in your eyes.

Yours,

D. Rowe

_ _

Dawn comes, pale and trembling. I step from the cell, Cassidy’s letters pressed to my heart like contraband. The air outside is knife-sharp, tasting of rain and cut grass and the faintest trace of foxglove. I walk for miles, legs aching, the city unspooling behind me as anticipation coils tighter and tighter inside my gut. My house waits, immaculate—each room scrubbed, every surface bare and gleaming, like an altar awaiting sacrifice. Only the thick skin of dust betrays how long I have been gone.

Inside, I move with reverence, almost prayerful. I pull empty my pockets, hands trembling as I uncover my treasures: her letters, her photographs, her secrets. I lay them out on the kitchen table—her mouth parted in a half-smile, her neck exposed and vulnerable, her hands folded as if in surrender. I study each image, letting my imagination feast. I imagine her skin under my hands, the way she’ll shudder when I bind her wrists, the whimpers and cries I’ll coax from her throat. I picture her body, the silver locket gleaming at her neck as she pleads for mercy I’ll never grant.

I whisper to her, to the collection. I tell her what I’ll do: how I’ll make her beg, how I’ll mark her, how I’ll open her up and see what colors she bleeds. I have played at this before—bruises and cuts on other women, the small, private cruelties that never truly satisfied. But this is different. Cassidy is special, chosen, cultivated. She sent herself to me, peeling herself open letter by letter, photograph by photograph.

I savor the anticipation, the sick, sweet ache of longing. I arrange my tools on the bed: rope, gloves, knives, tape, a lantern for the darkness. I rehearse every step—the abduction, the binding, the slow, exquisite unveiling of her fear. I imagine the taste of her tears, the heat of her breath, the music of her despair.

In one week, I will have her. All of her.

When the day finally arrives, the world feels as if it’s holding its breath. I wake before dawn, heart fluttering with a feverish, almost holy excitement. I move through my house in silence, each step deliberate—a ritual of preparation. The bag is already packed: the rope coiled neatly, the knives honed to a whisper, the tape and lantern nestled together like old friends. I check everything twice, hands trembling with anticipation. My mind rehearses the script—how I’ll greet her, how she’ll look at me, the way her smile will shatter when she realizes what I’ve become for her.

Leaving the house, I lock the door behind me and pause on the stoop, drawing in the morning air, cool and sharp against my teeth. Every sense is heightened, every sound magnified: the crunch of gravel beneath my boots, the distant croak of a raven, the hush of wind across the empty road. As I walk, the world narrows to a tunnel of hunger and want. Each step is a drumbeat, echoing in my chest. I imagine her at the lake—trembling, hopeful, ready to be remade by my hands.

The path to the water is overgrown, but I know every turn, every root waiting to trip me. The trees lean in, branches clawing at my sleeves, and the sky hangs heavy overhead, thick with the promise of rain. My mind flickers with images: her wrists bound in the lantern light, my name on her lips a sob or a scream, the heat of her skin as I slice and mark and claim. All the other women were only rehearsal—pale shadows of the masterpiece I will make of Cassidy.

I crest the hill and the lake appears, still as death, black glass reflecting a sky about to break. My breath comes shallow, excitement so sharp it nearly hurts. There—on the dock, a figure waits, half-shrouded in mist. My pulse skitters; I stop, heart pounding, suddenly aware of the throbbing behind my eyes.

I watch her for a long moment, drinking in the silhouette. She stands too still, too solid. Something inside me twinges, a dissonant note, but I press forward, unwilling to let the fantasy slip. My feet move of their own accord, slow at first, then faster—eager, greedy, desperate. The closer I get, the more the world seems to bend and warp. The figure does not turn, does not shift or shrink away; she is a monolith, unmoving, her presence radiating something cold and ancient.

My excitement curdles, turning to confusion. Details resolve: her shoulders are broad, her stance unyielding. The skin at her arms is rough, not the milk-white smoothness I know from the photographs. Her hair is wrong, her hands are wrong, everything is wrong except—except for the silver locket at her throat, glinting like a warning.

I stop a few feet away, the bag slipping from my numb fingers. My mouth opens, searching for words, for explanation, for anything—but before I can speak, she moves, swift and merciless. There is a flash of fist, a boom of pain, and the world snaps to black.

When I wake, I am bound—wrists and ankles lashed so tightly my hands are already numb, the rough cord biting into skin and muscle. My head throbs, lips sticky with blood. The world tilts and spins, the forest a blurred cage of shadow and green.

She is there. The woman from the dock, Cassidy’s imposter, stands over me with a surgeon’s calm, her eyes black and depthless. She doesn’t speak as she begins. There is nothing seductive, nothing romantic, only methodical cruelty. Her hands are deft, practiced. She knows precisely how pain works, how to draw it out, how to make the mind quiver before the body breaks.

She works slowly. The knife traces lines across my arms and chest, shallow at first, then deeper. I scream. She watches, unblinking. I curse her, spit at her, call her every foul name I know, but she only tilts her head, as if listening to the wind. My rage burns out quickly, replaced by panic, then by pleading—please, please, I’ll do anything, I’m sorry, I’m sorry—but she is a wall. My words break against her silence and fall to the earth like rotten fruit.

Every fantasy I ever cherished is inverted. Every image I conjured of Cassidy sobbing, pleading, ruined—now it is me, my body reduced to trembling meat, my pride stripped away, my mind splintered. The pain is relentless, but worse is the helplessness. There is no power here, no control, only the sick, endless knowledge that I am utterly at her mercy.

No one comes. No one hears. The forest absorbs my cries, the birds scatter, the moonlight slowly vanishes and the sun crawls across the sky. She leaves me to bleed, to rot, tethered to the earth like refuse.

I lie there for hours—maybe days—my body broken, my mouth too dry to beg, my thoughts unraveling like old rope. I remember every woman I hurt, every thrill of power, every moment of anticipation. It all returns now, not as pleasure, but as poison. I taste the terror I once inflicted. I drown in it.

By the time night falls again, I am barely human—just a ruined thing, shivering beneath the trees, waiting for death or mercy, whichever comes first. My final thought, as darkness closes in, is not of Cassidy’s mouth or skin or trembling letters, but the foxglove—beautiful, delicate, and poisonous.