The Prisoner Project

NINE

"I live for the hunt—my life."
—David Berkowitz, the Son of Sam.

NINE

I WATCHED AS HE avoided my gaze, his eyes trained on the handcuffs that circled his bruised wrist. Where did all his bruises come from? I cleared my throat for the thousandth time and picked at my fingernails. When Banshee had come in today, he hadn't said his familiar cultured Hello but instead he had sat down on the chair before me and stared down at the table. I had found it strange at first and maintained the silence, but it was getting to me.

I didn't want to be the one to start conversation but it was seeming inevitable. Come on! I mentally challenged him, but he did nothing. I truly would have preferred it if he cussed me out or threatened to kill me. At least then he was saying something that I could tell Mirabel. If I walked out of this room empty, everyone would think me redundant. I was defeated.

Resting my head against a balled fist on the table, I asked.  "Aren't you going to say hello?"

Silence.

Long seconds of silence.

And then a slither.

"Does that irk you?" He said, without lifting his head. "Does change irk you?"

If I needed him to be honest with me, I was going to be honest with him too. "Frankly? Yes. I've watched you switch personas back and forth like you have in the last two days but the Hello has been constant."

Slowly, he lifted his head.

His face was serious, revealing his hollowed cheeks and distraught jaw. I had practiced the skill of looking at anywhere but his eyes. He muttered, through his thinned lips. "And why, pray, does that matter?"

I shrugged, biting on my bottom lip. "Your hello makes for a decent icebreaker."

Banshee tilted his head to the side and rose a brow. "An icebreaker?" He lifted a lone finger to his lips and smoothed. "That means you want to talk to me?"

I nodded. "Yes."

"No." Banshee deadpanned in his smooth voice.

"No?"

"Yesterday, I terrified you." He said, without a break in expression. If I was to take a reach, I'd say he was looking at me like he was confused that I had even showed up. "You looked like I was holding a gun to your head and all I had done was talk to you. So forgive me if I don't want to do that again."

His words took longer to sink in because I found them utterly ridiculous. Was he serious? These words were coming from the mouth of a serial murderer. "Aren't you used to people being terrified of you? The people you brutally murdered per say?"

A nerve had been struck and his eyes blazed. His garish eyebrows melted to a deep, dark, scowl and I instantly felt the familiar rush of blood to my face. His voice came out like it was being pushed through a grater. "That doesn't mean I like it. Don't piss me off, Aria."

It soothed me to think that he didn't mean that he didn't like it when I was frightened, it was that he didn't like how it made him feel when people feared him. It was a selfish thing. He couldn't possibly feel empathy for me. Psychopaths don't feel empathy.