The Hunger Within

Trigger Warnings (DO NOT SKIP THIS SECTION): graphic violence, misogyny, cannibalism, spirits, religious imagery, abuse, and death. Depending on how this is interpreted, there may be more. None of these topics are intended to be romanticized, this is not a love story. Don’t read ahead if you think any of these things will trigger you. Get proper help if needed. Thank you. 

October 30, 1966

Dear Diary,

Tomorrow will be the day he comes back. I know it. I dread it. The manor is haunted by many spirits. They’re not evil, just hurt. I want to help them, but I’m afraid it’s not my place. They’re always cold, so I can feel them as I’m passing by. They recognize me, and they don’t attack me.

This place is horrific, I’ve been here for three years starting tomorrow. He’s almost here. I want to leave, but they won’t even let me out of the room until it’s time to eat. The night is eerily silent. But when he comes, It’ll be filled with the wails of despair. I find solace in the fact he can’t read; as you, my dear diary, are my only friend whom I trust. 

With much love, Dotty Paige.

The next day, however much I willed it away, did come. Theo came to get me ready. I would have preferred a woman to see me in my most vulnerable state, but women could feel the sympathy that men didn’t, according to them. They believed that we couldn’t be trusted.

My husband was very possessive. He did not like anyone looking at what was his— let alone touch it. But Theo was his advisor, his most trusted man. 

“How do you feel about your husband, Dotty?” Theo asked. As one of the butlers of the manor, he knew my answer. I repeated it anyway.

“I love him,” I said. “He’s my salvation.”

My husband could hear me. I heard him, too, crawling through the floorboards. He was here. I felt it through my veins and in my beating heart. The air turns colder when he is here; the spirits, though unaware of the day, feel his presence. They feel uneasy, I feel the same.

I looked like a saintess, with a veil over my eyes and a white dress that draped past my ankles. He prefers me when I look like this— akin to a woman on her wedding night. He tells the butlers to adorn me with holy symbols like rosaries and crosses. As if I were a sacrifice. There was an almost holy glow around me, a sort of halo. My pale skin stood out starkly against the dark walls of the room. Long, beautiful blonde hair cascaded down my back like a waterfall of liquid gold. I had finished getting ready. Theo smiled at me and left.

It was time.

I hovered outside the dining room, anxiously waiting for permission to enter. He called out to me, beckoning me inside. I obeyed his call, though I prayed silently he would not be there.

When I saw him at the dinner table, he smiled and my heart sank. His real form was not this man. I don’t know where this human form comes from but I know it’s not his. He’s within the walls, the shadows cast upon them.

I smiled back. He seemed pleased to see me, like he did the first time. He stood up and embraced me. I wanted to melt into his hug, as I’d done before. I couldn’t convince myself, however, that this time would be different.

“Hello, my Dot,” he said. “How are you?”

“I love you.” I responded. Every word out of my mouth was a prayer. He caressed my cheek and I leaned into the touch. His hands were gentle, loving. I wished it would last.

He brought me to the floor. His hands plunged into the depths of my corpse, tearing flesh and cracking bone. As he feasted upon me, the crunch of marrow and the chewing of entrails– the lapping of blood as it poured from me– it was all I heard. He ravaged and devoured with no heed of the scorching pain within me. His hands were on me like air, encompassing everything simultaneously. They grabbed greedily; gaining, never giving.

He ate quickly, yet his hunger never seemed quenched. Like an insatiable beast, he always wanted more from me. I sat, submitted to his will. A helpless prisoner to his desire, I needed it to end.

“I love you,” I told him. I needed him to stop. Finally, he did. He pulled away and looked at me. His dark eyes glinted in the moonlight filtering in through the window. He looked like a predator as blood dripped down his chin. I wanted to run. He wiped his face, stitched me up, and kissed my face and body like I was a fragile, delicate thing. My dress was torn and bloody. The red liquid clung to my hair, making it matted and sticky. 

“Who did this to you, my love?” he asked.

 “It was me, dear.” I responded, as always. He loved my suffering, he loved my pain. But I saw his expression. He looked bored. He never looked bored.

For the first time, I realized something was different. I don’t know why I didn’t notice it before. He wasn’t satisfied with me, he needed something different. New prey to hunt, not a sacrificial lamb. He craved resistance, to exert power over someone else. I knew what was coming.

“I love you,” I cried urgently. I didn’t want to die. I couldn’t die here, I’d be trapped. The spirits knew this, too.

They were, after all, his first victims. They surrounded me, I felt their frosty sensation turn warm. They were comforting me. We bonded over shared torment. These women had been here long before I’d been born. They had all felt it before; the love, the fear, the pain. The eventual abandonment.

And now it was my turn.