You Don't Like Me?

CW: This story contains graphic violence, including mutilation, abduction, and murder.

"When you look in your mirror, surely you tell yourself you are beautiful. Oh, I am very sure you often tell yourself that. Do you admire your fit body after the gym and tell yourself you are perfect? Or at least think you are?

* * *

The feeling of rejection followed him throughout his life. It was there when school children pushed him and laughed at his looks. His face wasn't horrific, but it had imperfections—a slightly crooked nose, uneven skin tone, eyes that always seemed tired. The children called him 'monster,' mocking him mercilessly. He wore glasses and a fixed brace for his teeth. He never had any friends. He always sat alone in the back of the classroom, trying to hide from a world that didn't want him.

His mother was the only person who loved him, or so she claimed. She told him not to listen to what others said, that people are cruel. But her words were not enough. When she died, he was left alone. Loneliness became a constant in his life, deep and heavy like a stone choking him.

Years later, technology offered him a new chance. On social media, no one needed to see his face right away. He could carefully choose his words, write messages that were thoughtful, kind. For a moment, he believed he could find someone who would understand him.

But the responses were always the same:

"Sorry, you're not my type."

"Please, don't message me again."

"You're creepy."

Each message was another blow. He tried again, each time hoping for a different outcome. But they all rejected him, and their words were like poison chilling his blood.

One night, as he sat at his computer reading another rejection message, something in him snapped. His hands trembled as he closed his laptop.

"Why?" he whispered, addressing the empty room. His voice was quiet, but it trembled with anger. "Why me?"

The world didn't want him. That was now clear. But he no longer wanted them. They had made him this way, and he would no longer beg. He didn't have to belong to their world.

The idea was faint at first, like a shadow on the edge of consciousness. But as the days passed, it became clearer. He began to imagine a perfect being. Someone who would never reject him. Someone who wouldn't see his imperfections.

In his mind, everything became clearer. Every woman he had ever seen had something special—eyes, smile, hands, legs. He could combine all those perfect parts into one being.

* * *

The first victim was a girl he had watched in a store. Her eyes were incredible—deep blue, almost unreal. He had followed her for days, studying her habits. He noticed she always took the same path home, a dark alley behind a building.

One night, as the rain lightly fell, he waited in the shadows. His heart raced as he gripped the knife in his pocket. When she appeared, her steps were quiet, but they echoed in his head. He approached from behind, his hand trembling as he drew the knife.

It all happened quickly. Her body fell onto the concrete with a dull thump. He carried her to his basement, avoiding street lights. His body was tense, his heart pounding in his chest, but he felt something akin to excitement.

In the basement, under the dim light of a bulb, he sat at a table. Her eyes were fixed on him, lifeless yet still perfect. With surgical precision, he removed them and prepared them. When he placed them on the face of the doll, he experienced a joy he had never felt before.

"Perfect," he whispered, looking at the doll that had just received its first aspect of perfection.

His obsession grew with each new victim. After the first, he felt an indescribable relief. The doll, although still incomplete, now had eyes that radiated perfection. But it wasn't enough. He knew he had to continue.

Every night he left his house, choosing carefully. Each woman had something he deemed worthy. Sometimes he sat in cafes, quietly observing passersby. His eyes focused on the minute details—the shape of fingers, the line of a neck, a perfect smile.

* * *

The second victim was a woman with beautiful hands. Her fingers, long and delicate, were like instruments that captivated his attention. He followed her for several days, studying her habits. He realized she always went to a small shop at the end of the street on Thursdays, always alone.

The preparation was perfect. That evening, he waited around the corner, where the lamp's light didn't reach. When she walked past him, he quickly grabbed her. Her body was light, her resistance weak. Her hands were now part of his puzzle.

When he returned to the basement, he felt joy as he assembled parts of the doll. The fingers fit perfectly onto the body he was carefully constructing. He sat for hours, watching his work.

"It's getting closer," he whispered to himself.

* * *

The third victim was a woman with a smile that captivated him. Her lips were shaped as if always ready to smile. He followed her as she walked her dog in the park, noting every detail of her face.

The basement windows were closed, covered with layers of old newspapers and sticky tape. Light only came from a single bulb hanging on a cable above a table covered with bloodstained cloths and scalpels arranged in perfect order. The floor was covered with a plastic sheet that crackled under his steps. The basement was his refuge, a place where the world couldn't find him.

In the basement, his work began to take shape. Each body part was carefully chosen and joined with precision. The doll now had eyes, hands, lips, even hair—all parts of his vision of perfection.

Every evening, he sat beside her, talking to her. His voice was quiet, almost gentle, as he recounted events from the past. He told her about school days when he was the subject of ridicule. About days when he was "invisible" to everyone except those who wanted to hurt him.

He had to continue to complete his creation. He enjoyed the company of his perfect masterpiece. Soon he found many more victims to add even more perfect female parts. He was captivated. With a smile, he talked to her about life. She listened silently and watched him with her deep blue eyes.

His steps echoed through the quiet streets. As he watched passersby, every detail on their bodies was potential. The shape of hands, the line of a jaw, the curve of a neck—all had the potential to become part of his vision.

His latest target was not random. She was a woman he had seen at the bus stop every evening. Her hair, light like gold, fell over her shoulders, and her hands were gentle yet strong. In her eyes, he saw the peace he lacked.

He followed her carefully, from a distance, studying every move she made. In her, he saw the key to completing his creation.

The basement had become everything to him. The thick, cold walls retained the scents of his deeds—the smells of decay, chemicals, and metal. On the table, tools lay in perfect order. The scalpel was the most important—sharp, precise.

As he worked, he felt like an artist. His hands were steady, his movements careful. The doll was becoming his only truth, the only thing that gave him a sense of purpose.

* * *

As he sat in front of his creation, he felt he had reached the pinnacle—but that perfection did not bring peace. His pain did not disappear. The doll could not speak, could not provide what he truly lacked—love.

The decay was unbearable. The doll, his masterpiece, began to decompose before his eyes. The smell seeped into every pore, and the body parts, once perfect, now became shadows of what they had been.

"Why?" he whispered as he sat on the chair, head bowed. "Why can't I keep what is perfect?"

As he sat beside his doll, he watched as the light from the bulb fell on her unnaturally white eyes that once were blue. He spoke to her softly, almost tenderly, as if to someone who understood all his pains.

"You are the only thing in this world that is true," he said. "But the world does not allow perfection. Everything that is beautiful, everything that has value—they destroy it."

* * *

The light went out, but the silence didn’t bring peace. The doll remained motionless as the darkness of the basement enveloped its body. In that darkness, the only sound was his breathing—uneven, heavy, as if each breath carried the weight of years of pain.

He sat across from the doll, leaning on a chair that creaked under his weight. He looked at it, at the eyes he had chosen so carefully, at the hands he had joined with precision, at the smile that once seemed to him like the answer to all his unspoken prayers. But now, in the darkness, the silence gave him no solace.

“Why is everything I touch doomed to ruin?” he muttered, his voice hoarse with exhaustion.

The silence didn’t soothe him. On the contrary, it grew louder. In it, he could hear every unspoken reproach of the world that had rejected him. He heard the voices of the girls who mocked him, the whispers of children who ridiculed him, the words women sent him on social media.

“You’re creepy.”

“You’re not my type.”

“Please don’t message me again.”

Those words, buried deep in his mind, echoed as his hands trembled on his knees.

The doll was now complete, but the emptiness within him grew larger. He felt that space devouring him from the inside, as if even all the body parts he had so carefully selected couldn’t fill what he lacked.

“You are everything I ever wanted,” he whispered, addressing it. His eyes were full of tears that couldn’t fall. “But why do I still feel this way?”

He raised his hand and gently touched its face. It was cold, rigid, motionless. There was no life in it.

“Is this all I have?”

The silence didn’t answer.

That night, he sat in the basement as hours passed. He stared into the darkness, thinking about every moment of his life. About every glance that passed over him as if he didn’t exist, about every judgment and every rejection.

“If perfection doesn’t exist,” he said quietly to himself, “then what is left for me?”

He closed his eyes. His hands slipped off his knees, and his head fell back. The darkness enveloped him completely as his world grew quieter than ever before.

Several hours passed. The basement was filled with silence, but it was no longer the same. It was thicker, heavier, pressing down on every part of his body. His breathing became slower, quieter, as he silently repeated the sentences he often said.

“You are everything I ever wanted,” he whispered. His voice was now lifeless, as though it shattered against the basement walls and immediately vanished.

He reached out toward the doll and touched its face. The surface was cold, almost hostile, and for a moment, it felt like it was rejecting him. He pulled his hand back, like a child recoiling from a flame.

“You were supposed to love me,” he said louder. His eyes, now dry, stared into its eyes—empty, lifeless, full of reflections of everything he had lost.

In the doll, he saw himself. Every piece had been chosen to create perfection, but now he understood—that perfection was nothing but an illusion. His creation was a reflection of himself, stitched together from fragments that could never be whole.

“I gave everything for you,” he whispered, lowering his head into his hands. “Everything I had, I gave.”

But in the silence of the basement, he began to understand the truth. The doll couldn’t love him because it had no soul. And she, like him, was nothing but emptiness.

Memories began to flood over him. He saw his mother gently hugging him, telling him not to pay attention to what others thought. He remembered her smile, the last smile he had ever felt as genuine.

“Where are you now?” he whispered into the darkness.

But that smile had been lost long ago, just like everything else. The doll couldn’t love him, the world couldn’t love him, and he... he could no longer love himself.

The silence became unbearable. The emptiness inside him was too vast. His hand moved toward the light switch but didn’t turn it on. Instead, he sank to the floor, leaning against the wall, and closed his eyes.

As he sat in the dark, he realized there were no more answers. The doll, his only companion, stood motionless, a shadow in the darkness.

His sigh rose softly, but it wasn’t a prayer or a threat—it was the end.

“You think you are perfect?” he said for the last time. His voice was weak, almost extinguished. “You are wrong. Perfection doesn’t exist.”

The world remained silent, and the basement was finally filled with complete peace.