Divine: A Novel

by Jayce, Aven

  Okay. What the fuck’s going on!

  Zyn begins playing games with her whenever she appears outside. He walks around wearing only a black tank, no pants, and eventually starts to jerk off in his bedroom. Night after night he performs for her. From her perspective, she can see his arm moving and his cum when it shoots out, but from his perspective... from Zyn’s perspective, standing in front of his dresser, he can see her reflection... her face in his freestanding swivel mirror.

  Holy fucking balls! He did see me! Wait, this is Hayden’s book and not real life. What the fuck just happened? That’s another coincidence in my life, right? Did I read that correctly or am I under stress and making this shit up? I re-read that section.

  Okay, where’s Dan?

  I stomp over to his place, book in hand, and knock. No, I pound on his door and call out his name.

  Where the fuck is he?

  In the basement killing women.

  Fuck that. He didn’t write this trilogy, he gave it to me because he read the story and thought it was funny. He knows I was watching him and saw the connection to this book.

  But is it funny?

  No! He should’ve told me he knew I was outside his window.

  You shouldn’t have been outside his window, dummy.

  “Oh my God. I’m a caricature of myself, or someone has made me into a character, or a character in a book that could be me,” I mumble while walking back to my place and slamming my door. The photographs on the wall shake and I apologize to my parents.

  I need to finish this book. With two hundred pages to go I settle into my bed with a bag of popcorn, knowing I won’t sleep until I reach the final sentence. Lightning flashes outside, which makes reading this dark novel an even creepier experience than it already is.

  Zyn eventually kidnaps the woman outside his window, no surprise there, but he doesn’t take her to his basement, instead he keeps her in his living room. A space with a twenty-foot ceiling that has, what he calls, a ‘display case.’ It’s described like a tree fort, and after she’s undressed, he places her there with a chain around her neck and then removes the ladder so she’s trapped.

  Holy fuck.

  The living room contains two leather chairs that face one another and walls full of crosses. Crosses!

  Dan’s a bastard.

  For two days the poor woman pleads for her life, but Zyn ignores her. He never speaks. Throughout the entire trilogy, he’s mute. The dialogue comes from the women and Zyn’s wicked thoughts. But when her pleas change to prayers his eyes become softer, gentler, and she notices. She begins praying every time he’s in the room, and he always stops and listens, even if he’s carrying a foot or a head, he’ll stop and let the blood drip to the floor in order to hear her angelic voice. It’s evident that a bond is forming between the two.

  He keeps her alive and in return gifts her a book of Psalms and a note requesting that her beautiful voice flood his home. He wakes each morning to serenades and is lullabied to sleep each night. The guy’s licked. The woman? It’s hard to tell. After weeks of the two of them masturbating in front of one another, she seems genuinely attracted to him even when he... Jesus, he slices and dices a woman up right before her eyes then eats her out and she doesn’t even care!

  The proper way to catch, prepare, and eat a good fish.

  Fuckin’ hell. Fishing books!

  This is fucked up, and even more fucked up since your lights keep flashing from the storm.

  And in the final chapter he speaks. Her powerful religious messages have opened his heart and he wants her, or I should say, he wants to fuck her. He wants to fuck a woman who has a beating heart, as he so eloquently puts it.

  So he repositions the ladder and climbs up to be with her, in the living room fort, overlooking all of the crosses. And the final scene is so violent I almost vomit. Zyn’s ferocious and brutal with his dick, but she seems to enjoy it. He strangles her until she passes out and then slaps her face to bring her back. It’s repulsive! There’s not any kissing and the guy doesn’t even get fully undressed. He just whips his dick out and fucks away. Egad!

  And on the last page, she takes her chains and wraps them around his neck, and strangles him. Yep, she kills him! I start to panic while reading the final words. After he’s dead she realizes she has no key to unlock herself. She’s going to die as well, and as she rolls him off of her, his shirt rises and she notices the bottom of a tat on his stomach. She lifts his shirt slowly and reveals a blackbird in a tree, and the words...

  Dark is lovely. The final sentence in the book.

  Fucking-son-of-a-shit-ass-monkey-goat-balls-piece-of-dick! That asshole! I’m so angry I can’t even get my swear words to connect. He wrote this disturbing and psychotic book. Dan is Hayden Night! The queen... no the king, the king of pitch-black darkness. I can’t believe it!

  Maybe it’s another coincidence?

  Nice try. I check when the last book was published and it came out a month ago. Where the fuck is he?

  Arrested for murdering women?

  Shut the fuck up! I throw the book across the room and stomp down the stairs, slam my door once more, race to his place with rain pelting my body, and pound on his door like there’s no tomorrow.

  You’re not going to be with this guy after finding out how sick he is, are you?

  “It’s fiction,” I whisper. I pound again, knowing he’s not around. “Fuck! Where are you?”

  I sit under the cherry tree in the dark and let the rain soak my clothing while the wind blows the blossoms away.

  “Dark erotic books are often unbelievable nonsense,” I whisper.

  But your story really happened.

  I’m trying to talk myself through this. I’m not angry about the story, I’m furious he didn’t tell me he wrote it and I’m pissed he knew I was watching him through his bedroom window. He had plenty of opportunity to open his goddamn mouth and...

  How can you not be troubled by the story? Hello, Divine, big red flags waving in the air.

  Look up the word fiction for once and stop fucking with me right now. It’s not real and it doesn’t have to be believable either. His plot is fucked up, but pretty normal for a dark read.

  Wrong. Keep talking yourself through this one.

  Okay, it’s not normal. His trilogy falls somewhere in the realm of being written by the devil, but it is only a fucking book.

  So you’re going along in life and BAM, everything just changed. Is that right, Divine Hallowell? The ‘why the fuck did that happen’ moment everyone complains about just hit you... for the umpteenth time. People really hate change, don’t they?

  I enjoyed my life until...

  I had a good job until...

  I really loved that book until...

  I liked him until...

  ... until it all changed.

  Shit.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  No Daniel Keller.

  He didn’t call and I’m sure he would’ve told me if he was leaving town. Something’s wrong. It’s been an entire day and he’s still not home.

  I stop by the police station before work, but I’m told I have to wait forty-eight hours to file a missing persons report for an adult. I thought that was only in the movies. Really? Two days is a long time.

  I’m still upset about the books and I didn’t get any sleep because of the story. Dan warned me. He said I’d have nightmares and he took them away for a reason. I think he changed his mind and didn’t want me to know, he got cold feet, and then for some reason he gave them back to me.

  You begged him for them.

  He’s playing games just like on our first date when he said we could go somewhere and fuck, and then never see one another again.

  You were excited when he said that.

  He said he wrote books about fishing.

  You said your books were women’s studies.

  Yeah, but I sent Hayden a Facebook message and Dan responded that my books sucked.

  Maybe he has a stre
et team who posts for him. Many authors don’t take care of their own sites.

  He should’ve told me when he gave me the trilogy that it was his!

  I can think of a few times you could’ve told him you wrote in that genre. Like, when you gave the information to his mother at the ice cream parlor. That was deceitful, Div.

  Why did he jerk off when he knew I was outside his window?

  Why did you watch him?

  Ug! Why is his book so dark!

  Why’s yours? Face the facts; the two of you are perfect for one another. You believe he’s been lying to you, but then what would you call the reason you keep him out of your home? Isn’t that lying too?

  No, I just haven’t gotten around to explaining my entire life to him.

  Ditto. I bet he feels the same way.

  Alright, damn it, but I’m still trying to process all of this. I knew he couldn’t be perfect, but when I asked him what was wrong with him, his response was, ‘maybe something, maybe nothing. It depends on if you can separate fiction from reality.’

  If you can separate fiction from reality.

  Separate the trilogy he wrote from your relationship and everything will be fine.

  Yeah, but can he? That’s the question.

  I swivel in my office chair and check the local news online. No accidents, arrests, deaths; nothing new over the past day. Oh my God, I’m such a fucking idiot. The Kellers... the Kellers’ catering business.

  Sure enough, they have a website and a phone number that I call immediately, but it’s a recording. I can leave a message but haven’t a clue what to say without sounding like one of those stalker girlfriends.

  Hi, this message is for Kristen or Greg Keller. It’s Divine Hallowell. I... I haven’t heard from your son and I’m wondering if he’s okay. He was supposed to call me yesterday... have you heard from him?

  That would sound oh-so mature. I’m not that much of a creeper. I need to wait at least one more day before I make a fool out of myself. For all I know this is his way of breaking up with me. I spread my legs and now it’s over.

  Ahem... nutcase. You had that thought already.

  Yeah, well I can’t think straight! I’m up and down right now.

  I look for Bridgette, but she’s not around campus, and like yesterday, all of my classes have low attendance. With a Celebration of Life service for Margaret and another for Luke planned for tomorrow in the campus chapel, I’m sure I’ll run into her then. In the meantime, I need to stay focused and find something to occupy my time. Now that I’ve finished the trilogy and don’t really feel like picking up another book until I can digest Hayden’s, I mean, Dan’s words, which are going to be racing through my head for days, I need a new hobby. His book wrecked me and I know if I don’t get into a project, I’ll sit around my house and mope.

  Puzzles?

  Fuck that shit.

  You used to like to do puzzles.

  When I was much younger and I’ll do them again when I’m much older, but not now.

  I stop at Hobby Barn on the drive home, because what better place to find a new hobby than a store called Hobby Barn. After walking past isles of stickers, scrapbooking papers, yarn, paint, wax candle supplies, and beads, I think I’ve found my next venture in the land of crafts; a birdhouse kit.

  Yes, I’m going to put together my own birdhouse, two birdhouses actually. And of course I picked it because it reminds me of Dan, but also because it will keep me from waiting on his front stoop for his return. I could use a little yard art in my backyard anyway. It’s spring and this is what adults are supposed to do in the spring - decorate the yard. Liven it up for the summer months.

  I pick up some necessities for the kit at the hardware store, grab a burger and fries from a drive-thru, and cross my fingers when I turn into my neighborhood that I’ll see his car... yes... please... it has to be here this time... uh, no Cherokee. Maybe he left it at the shop to get repaired and he’s home, but has his headphones on and can’t hear me knocking.

  He hasn’t answered your Facebook messages, all ten of them.

  I’m fearful that I’ll never see him again, which sounds paranoid, and for good reason.

  My parents’ faces stare back at me when I enter my home, and after eating a bagful of unhealthy fast food, I spread a trash bag over my kitchen counter and get to work.

  “I can’t believe I bought a birdhouse kit,” I whisper.

  Two.

  “How ridiculous is that?”

  Not one bit considering how much you like the guy. You want to impress him even when he’s not around.

  I want to get closer to him by learning more about the things he loves, that’s all.

  For ages six to twelve is listed on the box, which I find humorous since both kits kick my ass. The wood is thin, it cracks when I try to force the pieces together, the glue won’t hold, and when I finish, the overall shape is more like a pyramid than a square. A little kid could’ve done a better job. Come on, I have a degree in design and I can’t build a simple square?

  I try to disguise the lopsided failures by covering them with suet cakes, which are kind of a mix of peanut butter, lard, and birdseed. At least that’s what it looks and feels like. I bought ten of them from the hardware store thinking I’d use them, somehow, as a floor, roof, or wall covering, like wallpaper or tile.

  Suet cakes are compressed which should mean less messy than tiny seed. Wrong! Okay, I admit. I know absolutely nothing about birds, their dwellings, feeding them, or nature in general. I’m a city girl for Christ’s sake. I love the wonderful scents of the outdoors, but haven’t explored much beyond my nose.

  I microwave the suet cakes and when they reach a spreadable consistency I’m able to smear the muck all over the tiny houses. The stuff works better than the glue in keeping everything together. But in the end they look like total crap, my hands are covered in a substance that reminds me of feces, and I feel like a big piece of dung. What a shitty day.

  The red yarn I use to tie the houses to a tree branch in my backyard sticks to my suety fingers, which I refuse to wash off until I finish this project. My sneakers get muddy from the recent heavy rains and I slip and fall on my ass on my way inside. Sometimes I feel like everything in my life is one big failed production. From start to finish, nothing ever goes as planned.

  After cleaning up, I sit outside my bedroom on the back deck with my laptop and wrap a fleece blanket around me for the rest of the evening, waiting for the birds to rush to the feeder for a late night snack, but not one damn bird ever comes.

  Can you blame them?

  No, I wouldn’t come either.

  My gift to the birds and my attempt at springtime backyard embellishments is hideous.

  Div Hallowell

  I built two birdhouses.

  0 people like this.

  Violet Cuddlecock

  Why are so many books being published with references to birds? Bird nicknames, bird tats, bird titles, birds, birds, birds. Birds are little shits!

  872 people like this.

  Kimmy Firestorm I’m worried about you, babe.

  Michelle Simm Well if you don’t like them then don’t read them and shut your beak!!

  Emma Shepherd Doves are beautiful creatures.

  Jen Brightside I’m afraid to read your books because your posts always sound like you’re insane. Anyone know of any light romances?

  Amy Jones Birds are a hell of a lot better than unicorns and rainbows.

  Arlene Ross Men call us birds. We eat worms.

  Michelle McGinty LMFAO!

  Kimmy Firestorm My books are light romances! Jen Brightside - I’ll send you a link. XXOXO!!!

  Birds. They’re what wake me at six in the morning. The sun is out, but the sound of a hundred squawking birds penetrating my room puts a damper on my spirit. I slide into my jeans and a t-shirt and open my door. Damn it, there really are a hundred birds out back. And in one morning they’ve managed to eat the suet and knock the feeders to the ground
, and are now attacking my tiny houses! They’re even ripping apart my red yarn and flying off with it. What gives?

  I close and lock my door then lean against it. Ravenous beasts. I’ll have to put out more suet cakes for them.

  “Dan,” I whisper and remember how much life sucks right now. It’s been two full days, two and a half counting the afternoon we said goodbye, and still no sign or word from him. “I’m sorry if I pissed you off.”

  Whatever happened, I know this isn’t my fault, but I needed to say that to comfort myself. My emotions are all over the place. I’m angry, full of tears and heartbreak, in love and disgusted by him, and that’s all within five minutes. I cry while taking my morning shower then slam my dresser drawer in a rage. I want to know if this is over, or if he has another girlfriend, or if he’s... in a ditch like Luke Barnes.

  The last thought produces sobbing that overcomes my entire body with sporadic breathing and a racing heart. And it’s not just for Dan; this is about Luke and Margaret as well. This is about death.

  I’m a basket case.

  And I’m sure that’s how I must appear to everyone when I walk into the campus chapel at eight o’clock for the Saturday morning memorial, wearing a long black skirt, a dark plum blouse, and sunglasses. My face and eyes both red from crying, my shoulders and posture low-slung. After my responsibilities here are over, I’m going to the police station to file a report.

  Richard waves me over to his pew and when the Board of Trustees file inside, he whispers that I should remove my glasses. Which is fine, since I get sympathetic looks from all of them because of my swollen eyes. I can be compassionate when I want.

  “You doing alright, Divine? We still have counselors on campus today, maybe you...”

  “I’ll be okay.”

  “I’ve never seen you this upset. If you...”

  “Murderer.” A whispered voice comes from behind. I turn to see a row of pink sweatshirts as Hannah and her sorority fill in the back three rows, all except for Bridgette. Some of them are carrying white carnations while others have lit candles in their hands, and they all have their hair in pigtails, impersonating a young Cindy Brady; in reality they’re nothing more than a cult.