I’d never killed anyone before. Not until then. They say taking another’s life will unleash millions of emotions within you, feelings you didn’t know you had. It’ll change you, carve the rest of your life around that one instance. And yet, I felt nothing. I feel nothing. I wonder why?
They say that taking another’s life will release million of emotions within you all at once; emotions that you never knew you had. They say it changes you, that suddenly, the rest of your life is now carved around that one moment in time.
At one one point, I never really understood. I’d never killed anyone before. I’d never really killed anything before. I mean, a fly in the kitchen or a spider in the bathroom doesn’t really count. Everyone does it.
And then, in college, I met Beth Parker. She was a young girl, tall and intelligent with bright brown eyes and long, dark hair. We didn’t talk much, only saw each other around campus sometimes and occasionally met eyes in the middle of a lecture. Other than that, she was just another student.
Alan Thomas was as the party kid around campus; He was the high school senior who never really grew up. He was alcohol and smoke clouds and the booming frat house at the end of the street. He was the party boy from the movies; he was the boy who missed lectures because he was too hung over; he was the reason I really met Beth.
If you could really call it meeting, that is.
Alan Thomas threw one of his infamous Friday night parties on September 24, 1992.
She wasn’t drunk. Her friend was drunk. Everyone else was drunk.
She stumbled up to me, her legs seemingly heavy under the giggling mess of her friend, who was using Beth to keep herself standing.
“Hey,” she spoke, “I’m Beth. That’s Em-” She said, causing her friend to erupt into a fit of drunken giggles. My eyebrows cocked, and Beth waved it off, giving me a half-hearted smile. “Emily.” Beth continued. “That’s my friend Emily.”
I gave out a laugh of my own as a very drunk Emily stood their, propped against her friend, giggling at something that probably wasn’t funny sober and giving what sort of resembled a wave.
“Do you want to sit?” I offered, watching her.
“Beth,” Emily hiccuped, giving her friend a sly smile, “Beth wants to sit.” And then she was gone.
Beth scoffed, probably in an attempt to play off the scene. Obviously they’d been debating talking to me at that point.
“I-I do not.” She slurred, shaking her head. She took a step forward, grabbed my wrist, and lead me to the couch.”
“I thought you didn’t want to sit?” I tested, and she laughed.
And then we talked. We talked on the couch while everyone around us grew higher than the sky and drank until their livers turned black. Then there were drinks in our hands, and I slowly found myself just a little bit buzzed. Not enough to throw me off, but enough to make it feel good. It was such a quick escalation, but then her lips were on mine and our hands were running along covered skin and slowly slipping through hair and under clothes.
I stood, and we became a fumbling mess, sharing sloppy, drunken kisses on the way to the nearest possible room. We fell easily back against the bed, suddenly moving faster and more hungrily than before.
I was above her, my hands trailing along her now bare sides as I kissed along her skin. I pulled away for the briefest moment to remove my own shirt when I realized how much power I had over at that very moment. There was no way she could get out from under me if I really sat my weight down, I could do anything I wanted to.
And then I shook it off. I was buzzed; it was just a dumb thought. Everyone gets those sometimes. No one actually kills anyone.
“C’mon,” she urged me, seemingly growing impatient beneath me. Her voice brought my attention back to her, and I turned my focus back to her lips.
I couldn’t shake that feeling, though. It would be so easy. So simple and easy and fast.
And then it was happening.
My hands fell around her neck as if to bring her face closer to mine, and then I slammed her against the headboard. She let out a screech in terror, a cry for help, but we both knew it wasn’t going to work.
It was too loud and everyone was too drunk to hear her.
I don’t remember much of what came next; it all comes as a blur. But I know I killed her, and I made a hasty attempt to figure out my plan for escape.
I couldn’t just leave after that. That was too sloppy. I took a rag and wiped her down, erasing all traces of my kisses and touches from her skin, tossed out the rag, and then got out of there faster than I’d ever moved before, and I kept under the radar for as long as possible.
But as I got home and rinsed myself clean of my crime, I realized I didn’t feel anything. It didn’t release all those emotions, those emotions that I was supposedly unaware I’d had inside of me. It wasn’t anything special. I killed her and now she was dead. That was it.
Now Tyler Hadley is getting into his car, getting ready to leave to his girlfriends house. Or at least he thinks that’s where he’s going.
Maybe this time, for once, I’ll feel something.