Mister Truth - TG

The lamplight flickered fitfully, alternately casting the alley into darkness or lighting it bright as day; generally it did neither, simply casting the space in pools of shadow and light. It was the sort of alley most people would choose to enjoy, where a barking dog three feet away could appear an inch in front of you within the blink of a single light. It was also where Nathan happened to live.

Nathan took a log drag off the cigarette in his hand, something he had bullied out of a passing kid; the brat shouldn't have been smoking anyway, he reminded himself, smiling a little. He always smiled when he thought about one of his "community services," the more so when it had been done unexpectedly. Taking the kids allowance in the process had simply been a wonderful donation for his actions as a "good Samaritan." "They should give me a Fing citation for this," he muttered under his breath, breathing out a puff of smoke with a small smile. He could already imagine his name written in golden letters.

The light flickered again , shadows replaced by darkness, in turn replaced by a flash. He thought he saw a little girl in it, smiling at him from a distance, then the darkness came out again. He nearly screamed when it came back on, that same smiling face barely two inches from his own, until the darkness left. Nothing.

"Fing imagination," he muttered, flicking the lighter on and  peering into the shadows despite his words. "Need to get out of this Fing alley, and back into a real house…" He could do it; he could buckle down, get a job, beat a little spending money out of some snot nosed executives, impress everyone well enough to get a real home with a real television and a real bed. It just sounded like too much work to him; he preferred his dark alley and his stolen cigarettes.

"But you don't really believe that."

He flinched at the voice, high pitched but soft, a little girl's whisper half an inch from his ear; nothing there, not even when he swung. "Fing Halloween night is getting to me," he muttered to himself; he'd forgotten it was Halloween. He always forgot it was Halloween, especially on moonless nights when he couldn't see an inch in front of his face and no brat with candy was stupid enough to wander where it could be taken away.

"That's not true. You always remember Halloween. Forever and ever and ever and ever. And then some more, right? Or am I supposed to keep that secret?"

He twitched, finger reaching for the belt where he kept his knife. It closed on wood, the rough grains practically bruising his finger as he gripped it, pulling it out. A small clang rang in his ears, as a bar of metal fell from a block of wood.

"Metal and wood… That's all there is, don't you know? All there ever is to a piece of wood, and a piece of metal. Eeeeeverybody knows that, right! 'Cause it's true." She giggled as she spoke; there was something off about that voice.

"Where the F are you?" he muttered, brandishing the wood as if it was still a knife.

"You look scary, Mister," she whispered. The light flickered on, temporarily revealing a grinning face. He lunged at it, before the light returned to its normal medium mode; his hand passed through nothing. "Is that how you looked when you killed her, Mister? That lady you were staying with? Was she your girlfriend Mister?" Another flicker; another lunge; another armful of nothing as his head slammed into the alley wall. "Is that how you looked when you cut off her breasts, and bathed your hand in her blood on a moonless Halloween…. Mister?" The giggle was gone from her voice.

There was no girl when the light flickered on again, but he tensed up anyway; he thought he could almost feel little hands running along his spine, freezing cold gripping onto his heart and only partially battled by the heat. "I have no idea what you're fing talking about! You can't prove anything!"

"Your girlfriend disapproved of your cursing, Mister. Is that why you never fully say the F word? Because she wouldn't be happy with you? It wasn't enough to stop you from slitting her throat was it, Mister? Or cutting her breasts off and smuggling them under your shirt?"

"That big tittied witch was always using them to control me! She was always going on about how I had to do Fing this, or Fing that, and wiggling those things under my eyes until I couldn't tell up from down!" He waved the block around, swinging in a circle as he tried to find her. His wall slammed into the wall as he moved closer to it, bruising it enough that he let go, but there was no girl; he heard the clatter of metal and wood hitting the street, glancing down at the fully formed knife again when the light flickered back on. There was a girl's face reflected in the blade; she wasn't smiling.

"Do you know why you killed her, Mister? The real reason you killed her… Mister?" she whispered, an inch from her again. He could see her now, pale blonde hair pushed fancifully behind her ear, serious eyes couched in a six year olds face as she tilted her head at him. "You killed her because you wanted to be her."

"No! You're a Fing maniac! I didn't do it!" He was babbling; it would look bad if she recorded this. He wondered if the police ever sent in six year olds. She couldn't prove anything; she couldn't.

"You killed her because deep down inside, you wanted those breasts for your own. That's why you put them under your shirt, Mister. That's why there's blood on your hands."

His hands were drenched in him. He could see it, red droplets dropping to the street, flinging from his fingernails as he shook them. One hit him in the eye, half blinding him in pain, but none of it hit the girl as she stared at him. Why the F did she have that serious expression?

"You killed her because you envied her, Mister. You obeyed her because she had what you wanted, and you only told yourself it was sex. You killed her because there's a little girl inside of you, and she's struggling to come out."

"No," he whispered. He could see it; long hair sliding down to his waist, little hands clasped against his head. His own head; a male head. "No!" he repeated, firmer than before.

"Yes," she whispered. Soft and definitive, it rang through the alley as tears burned down his face. They were sliding down uncontrollably, his faces melting under them, shifting as the cheekbones seemed to grow more fragile. He felt his manhood sliding up inside of him, the wriggling piece of satisfaction like rancid meat in his newly narrow stomach. The breasts came last, sliding out beneath his shirt as the neckline dropped. There was a mole on the right upper side.

"Those are her breasts, Miss. The breasts you always wanted.  The breasts you cut away from her."

"No!" Her hand moved without thinking, thrusting her hand against the chest, scraping through the meet of his breasts and plunging it past bone. She coughed up blood as she dropped to his knees, and fell down to the floor without breasts to keep him up.

The little girl watched for a minute as the blood drained away from him, the knife he'd supposedly dropped to the floor fading from existence. She watched as he let out a last rattling breath; and then she giggled.