Your knees shake, legs giving out from under you as you collapse on one of the hard, uncomfortable benches on the train. The Militsioner’s voice is still booming, pleading, searching when you drop your head into your hands, prop your elbows on your knees and try to force in a shaky breathe while your heart threatens to burst out of your chest.
In, hold- it breaks into a coughing fit, desperate panicked gasps- exhale, inhale- not too fast-
You raise your face from your hands, casting a weary, relieved look out the window as you watch his large form turn away, lower to press himself closer to the buildings nearby, a critical eye scoping every crack, every crevice, every alleyway as he peers in. Pleads for you to return in a booming voice, in velvet wrapped promises that he’ll pardon you for good behavior, he’ll lessen your sentence.
You slump back against the back of the seat, hands clutched together as you try to will them to stop shaking. Because you hadn’t done anything. Because you didn’t deserve a parole or a sentence at all! Shouldn’t have ever wound up here in the first place, under critical eye of the law, hissed at for a crime you never committed.
You scrub your face, pulling sweat soaked locks from your face, hair wildly out of place from your desperate scramble and the cold sweat that had poured down your back, from the terror of being caught. The Militsioner had turned softer, kinder, when you’d gotten to know him, when you’d traded compliments and soft, casual, honest conversations. His critical eye had crinkled with a smile and you had seen his form curl inwards, closer to you on his palm, less tense. Shoulders drawn inward as though he were protecting you from the outside world.
But who would protect you from him? From the eye of the law that had befallen on you, a gravel knocked against wood and a finger pointed before you had even done anything? Who would protect you from being trapped in this town, herded backwards with a large palm and the trial that would follow? Everyone had seemed so certain you had committed the atrocity, and though you were an optimist at heart, you wondered if you’d even be allowed the choice of a lawyer to defend yourself.
The Militsioner has grown quiet, likely given up on his search of you, or perhaps so engrossed in it that he had shifted further away. It’s what gives you the confidence to shift yourself lower, peer out the window, if only to cast a quiet, mental goodbye at his back.
And it’s what gives you a full view of his face, crouched nearby, eyes locked on your form.
Y/N yelped, suddenly airborne as a pair of hands easily wrapped around her midsection. Large enough to span her waist completely, as she was easily placed on the cool countertop.
The female froze, wide eyes staring up at her kidnapper-Konig, he’d insisted- in front of her, his eyes crinkling underneath the hood of his mask. He shifted to lower himself, Y/N’s heart in her throat as she cautiously raised her arms as he moved in.
He pressed his face against her stomach, large arms, capable of so so much more than just lifting her as if she was a feather, wrapped around her back ever so cautiously. As if she would break at the tightest squeeze.
Y/N swallowed thickly, trembling arms lowering, hesitating, before she placed them on his head and back. Konig melted underneath her touch, shuddering as Y/N petted the top of his head.
There’s someone following you. The slight scuff of a boot against the pavement- you whirl around, heart in your throat- nothing. An empty street. Deserted. Despondent.
You swallow thickly, curl your hand together over the strap of your handbag. The other pawing anxiously at the pepper spray inside, finger curling and uncurling over the trigger.
They want you to know they’re there. A scuff of their shoes, a sudden misstep, allowing you to hear two pairs, not just your own heels clacking against the sidewalk. Enough to keep you on your toes. Enough to make you raise your speed, attempt to cast discreet glances behind you.
But nothing. Each time you’d peer at a passing store window, glancing at the other street, behind you as far as you can see. Every time you’d be so bold as to whirl around, catch the creep off guard. Nothing. No one.
Only your heavy breathing echoing in your eyes and the dim streetlights flickering in warning.
It’s late. You need to get home.
Your hands slip from the pepper spray to your phone, curling around its cool plastic frame. No police, no emergency services. What would you even say? I think someone’s following me but I can’t see anything? Describe the suspect? No, no I don’t know.
No phone calls. They’d hear. And you need to be able to hear them. Catch when they lurk too close. React fast enough. You glance inside, hand clammy and sweaty, the phone attempting to lurch from your grip.
A cab. An Uber. A Lyft. Whatever comes first. You’re too exposed on the street. You’d rather take your chances up with one creep in a car. One you can see. And actually hit. You swipe away- just for a moment, a split second- your location first, to a friend. Just in case.
Probably was obsessed with a guy in high school who didn’t return her affections (obviously). Did the whole nine yards, online stalking and constant messaging, physical stalking, leaving photos in his locker. Weekly love notes and threats to any female classmates who had to group up with him for a project. The guy was just annoyed, and pissed. He only gets high school once and she’s ruining it?
I assume it’d be taken lightly if she doesn’t have any weapons. Maybe she’s just not the type for that, or maybe she knows that she could get into actual trouble then. But everyone brushes it off. She’s just romantic, can’t you tough it out? You know, I’d consider myself lucky to have a girl interested in me like that, I can’t even get one girl’s number.
And then- maybe he leaves for college as far as he could. Maybe she’s a year younger so she can’t exactly just *follow him*. And yandere girl just… kinda eventually snaps out of it. Realizes she put so much of her identity on him. Made herself to be what he’d like, made herself better. She kinda realizes that she doesn’t really… know anything about herself outside of her obsession over him. Does she… like any of these hobbies? Or did she pick them up just because she thought it’d impress him? That it was his type? That he’d suddenly see her and be swooning over her?
So she throws that all away. Works on herself. Dresses differently, does her hair differently. Starts attending a variety of clubs, community events, tries out concerts, a whole variety as she tries to understand what she actually likes.
And then, at her favorite coffee shop, a guy suddenly bashfully sits at her table as she looks up in surprise. Maybe he’ll use the excuse that all the other tables are full, while she glances around at obviously empty ones. Maybe he’s more honest and, with a raging blush on his cheeks, admits he’s seen her at the cafe a few times and finally mustered up the courage to talk to her.
She’s older, more mature, into her early twenties by now. Hasn’t gone for another guy since her obsession because she’s half terrified of sinking back into bad habits. But this guy is persist, in a cute, nice way. Seems to pick up on her likes and dislikes incredibly fast, such a gentleman, that drapes his coat over her if it’s chillier than expected or starts to rain. His sweet smile is disarming and she finds herself smiling bashfully back, her cheeks heating up. They click so well together.
Well of course they would, he’s her high school sweetheart. Had come back to his hometown from college with a groan at the expectations of his stalker flinging herself at him again, glued to his side and matching every step. Though he can’t quite deny.. that it had certainly given him an ego boost that he’d never admit to. Him? Regular him of all people? And she’d gotten obsessed? Try as he might- none of the flings in his college were as interesting.
But look, oh look. She doesn’t come. One day, two, a week. He waits, taps his foot. Eventually he sees her in passing. Almost doesn’t recognize her at first sight. She’s changed, is so much more calmer, so much prettier, so much more sure of herself. Starts eyeing her, hovering nearby in the grocery store as she doesn’t notice, or in some retail store. Just to watch her next move, he tells himself. And she never does. Moved on. Forgot about him.
The tables flip now where he is the one constantly stalking her now. Starts seeing aspects of her that he brushed off before or considered annoying. Had her laugh always sounded so cute? Did she scrunch her nose like that in high school too or had he been too focused on rolling his eyes to see? And, well, finally approaches her in the coffee shop. Maybe he’d taken on a completely new look, a disguise, to mark their new life together. Maybe she blocked her memories of him and burned every photo so she doesn’t recognize him older now.
She’d pick up on the cues too. Feeling like she’s being watched, is he being possessive when he leans as another guy passes by? Did she hear a camera shutter just now? But she brushes it all off. Is certain it’s in her head. And doesn’t want to fall into bad habits.
This is her first relationship, with a proper, nice guy. She doesn’t want to ruin it with ghosts from her past and her shameful history.
So you’d have an incredibly funny picture of him doing the most blatant stalker, yandere stuff, damn near appearing in her second story bedroom window, as she brushes it all off and blushes to herself over her new boyfriend.
Y/N blinked, trying to peer at the ceiling through the darkness. She’d been tired before crawling into bed, happy to fall into the comforting embrace of sleep clawing at her. But- now-
She couldn’t sleep. No matter how tightly she screwed her eyes shut, or counted sheep until she’d lost count in the three digits, or tried every trick she could recall- nothing. Nothing to do but lay in the dark, blinking and trying to trace shapes onto the ceiling.
Before, perhaps, she would have considered it a positive loss and fumbled for the lamp on her dresser. Would have pulled the book resting nearby onto her lap as she’d shuffle into a comfortable position, preferring to engross herself in a good story before it would inevitably slip from her hands and she’d wake with a crink in her neck.
Now however? Y/N shifted slightly, trying to turn onto a shoulder and try again, find some way to will herself to sleep. The pair of arms around her chest and stomach tightened suddenly, triggered by her motion. She was yanked back, pressed flush to a broad, warm chest as he rumbled something sleepily and pressed his nose into the crook of her neck. Y/N froze, fighting to not curl into herself on instinct- it would only make his grip tighten- halting her breathes.
She waited until her perked ears finally caught the sound of his breathes evening out, waited for her heart to stop pounding in her head until she breathed a sigh of relief. She slumped listlessly into the soft mattress, blinking into the darkness.
Now she didn’t have much of a choice when her kidnapper demanded they sleep in the same bed, would curl around her as if she were a life sized teddy bear for a needy, clingy child. Would nearly squeeze the air out of her, paranoia triggered by each movement.
Y/N blinked into the darkness, forming shapes that curled in the empty space and hovered over a fence.
“I want to go home”, Y/N whimpers, hardly louder than a breathe, knees curled so close to her chest it hurts to breathe. She shuffles slightly to pull the blanket further over her form, like a child hiding under the covers from the monsters.
But there are no imaginary monsters under her bed, there are no stuffed animals or night lights to stave off the dark. And no matter how much she closes her eyes and tries to will herself awake from the nightmare, she opens them to the living horror of being trapped in an unknown basement, huddled into the corner of a mattress on the ground.
A hand falls on top of her head and Y/N flinches violently, before freezing still, breathe trapped in her throat. The calloused hand pats her on the head, slow strokes to soothe her, calm her, before the blanket slips slightly from the motions. His hand presses over her hair for a moment, warmth that makes Y/N’s skin prickle as she sits motionless. Then it falls away.
