Nothing Personal

The Tanner family was just like any other normal family. They had two kids who were successful in school and the parents were well-respected in the neighborhood.

It was a cold night on Halloween with the temperature dipping in the forties. The youngest child has been put to bed with his candy stashed away in the cupboard by the fridge. The parents have gone to sleep for the night but the oldest, Daniel Tanner was still awake. He was watching a vampire movie marathon on the local television station. It was his second time seeing the movie Dracula 2000 after it came on around eight that night.

Outside the Tanner house a girl in a black jacket stood on their front lawn watching Daniel from the living room window. She fumbled with the switchblade knife that was concealed in her jacket sleeve. She eyed Daniel looking at the ongoing sex scene between Dracula and the roommate. It was all too familiar with her.

She reached for her hoodie and pulled it over her head, concealing her face and reached for the sunglasses in her back pocket. She walked towards the door and knocked three times. Daniel shut off the TV and then walked towards the front door. When he opened the door he turned a pale white. Standing before him was Alice Nightingale, dressed in black.

“What are you doing here?” he said hushed. He walked outside the doorframe and reached for her arms to move her away from the house. Alice didn’t budge; she dropped the knife in her hand and pried it open. She slashed at Daniel’s cheek and let out a soft bubbly laugh. Daniel pressed his fingers to the cut and pulled them away with blood on his hands.

“Alice, this isn’t funny,” Daniel said.

“Not was funny as it was when you raped me,” Alice said. Daniel began to walk back into the front door, fumbling for the door handle as Alice crept closer with the knife.

“I take it back, I didn’t mean to I’m sorry.”

“You’re sorry? Is that all you got?”

“Please, it was an honest mistake. I didn’t know you were asleep.”

“You couldn’t tell by all the vomit near the couch I was pretty drunk and passed out? You and your buddies couldn’t take me to a hospital?”

“Alice? What was I supposed to do? If we called the cops we would go to jail and I couldn’t get that scholarship for baseball.”

“So you took advantage of someone vulnerable and had your daddy sweep it under the rug because it would tarnish his role as a police officer?”

“Please Alice, it was all a mistake. I swear I didn’t mean to do it?”

“Was this before or after you had a friend videotape the incident and spread it around the school?”

“What video? I never asked someone to video me having sex with you, I swear to God.”

“I don’t believe you. I don’t believe anything you say. You raped me. You had your dad sweep my rape under the rug because of his reputation in town and you had someone videotape the act so that you can get a notch on your belt with your baseball buddies.”

“None of that is true Alice!”

“Then tell the truth! Tell them you did it!”

Daniel was fumbling with the door, trying to open it. Tears were running down his cheeks. He begged for his life, crawling to his knees and grabbing a hold of Alice’s jacket. Alice stared at the boy; she felt nothing of remorse or mercy at that moment.

“I was trying to get into college on a baseball scholarship. If I had a rap on my school sheet I would lose my scholarship and a chance to go to college. Please, I’m sorry. Please don’t hurt me,” Daniel begged.

She plunged the knife into his shoulder, he let out a scream in which she went behind him and cupped his mouth with her jacket sleeve. She pulled the knife out of his shoulder and slashed him across the throat like the pig he was. He started gasping for air and crying, begging for her to save him. The blood was pooling down his neck and onto his Halloween costume as he crawled onto his hands and knees trying to get away from her while still being conscious.

“Nothing personal, Daniel,” Alice whispered in his ear. She jabbed the knife in his back ten times. When she was finished she opened the unlocked door and crept inside the house as Daniel lay out on the front lawn dead in a pool of his own blood.

Alice looked around the house for the bathroom and turned on the light, the blood stained her jacket sleeve and her hands. She quickly turned on the water and began to wash her hands from all the blood. She took the jacket off and threw it in the clothes hamper near the toilet. Alice looked at herself in the mirror and stared at her reflection. The red tipped knife glistening like a shiny new penny in the bathroom light.

“I guess I’ll just have to keep you,” Alice said to the knife and began to wash the blood off the blade. She concealed the knife in her back pocket and removed her sunglasses to look at her brown eyes reflected in the mirror. Her hair dyed blood red and the black makeup around her eyes. She never used to look like this; all she wished was to go back to normal.

Alice sighed and with a flick of the switch she turned off the bathroom light. She reached for a Clorox wipe in the kitchen to remove the blood in the sink and her fingerprints on the faucet knobs and door handles. She headed back out into the cold night and closed the front door behind her. Daniel was lying on the ground when she walked by him and when no one was around she squatted on top of his head to relieve herself. She blew a kiss at his dead body and then walked down the sidewalk towards the main road.

Alice Nightingale has never killed anyone before, but the taste of vengeance had a metallic taste to it and she liked it. She started humming a song as she walked down the sidewalk that night.

“Nothing personal, Daniel,” she said and let a smile creep onto her face.

Her rapist was dead and the list still had a long ways to go. She pulled out the list from her bra that she carried with her to the Tanner house and read over the names of the people who were at Katherine’s house that night that might have set her up to be raped. She knew were Daniel lived and she knew were Bobby Dean lived. Katherine and one other person lived five miles west of town and it would be a challenge to get to them because her mother always had the car in the shop or at work. She tucked the list back into her bra and pressed the button at the light to cross the intersection.

It has been several months since the incident at Kathrine Sanchez’s house. Katherine and her clique of girls were the most popular ones at school. They picked on Alice and they taunted her for being too innocent and pure. When she handed Alice the invitation she smiled coyly as Alice read the invitation in her hands.

“Tonight we’re gonna party ’till we drop,” Katherine said. Her girlfriends snickered and giggled. Alice knew something was up.

“Thanks, but I have to study for my anatomy test tonight,” Alice said. She handed back the invitation, but Katherine shoved it back at Alice causing her to bump up against the lockers.

“You have to study? That’s so pitiful for a nerd like you,” Katherine said, “I’m going this as a favor of making a truce with you.” Alice looked at her as she winced in pain with the lock pressing against her back.

“Okay, fine, I’ll come for a little while.” Her voice strained with Katherine pushing the books to her throat.

“It’s going to be one cherry-popping night. Glad you said you were going to come.” Katherine pushed herself off the books in Alice’s hands and walked away blowing a kiss. Her girlfriends giggled and followed her like puppies obeying their master.

The party was in full swing with the liquor cabinet displayed wide open. Music and drugs were flowing. Alice wore her favorite blue dress and walked towards the two story house that reverberated with music and fun. She climbed down the honeysuckle outside her window. She left the window unlocked so that she could go through it when she left the party.

She knocked on the door and smiled as Kathrine opened the door and wobbled toward Alice.

“Welcome to my party,” Katherine slurred. The red solo cup in her hand was splashing cheap beer on Alice’s dress. Alice reached for the cup and helped Katherine close the door. Katherine walked to the kitchen and Alice followed suit. Alice held onto Katherine’s beer while Alice watched her pour more from the keg by the sliding doors.

“Have a beer. Live a little.” Katherine motioned to the deer in Alice’s hand as she sloshed the newly poured cup around her kitchen. She wobbled away from the island but slipped on the wet floor and hit her head on the tile. Alice ran over and pulled Katherine up and led her to a chair. Katherine kept pushing her off.

“Let me at least get you some ice,” Alice said. She walked to the fridge and grabbed a cold pack and placed it on the bump on Katherine’s forehead. She went back to the kitchen to clean up the mess when Daniel Tanner showed up near the keg.

“Is Katherine going to be okay?” Daniel asked pointing to Katherine lowering her head onto the table.

“She’ll be fine as long as no one moves her,” Alice said.

“Are you saying that from experience?”

“No, I was taking an educated guess.” Alice didn’t want anyone to know about her mother’s night life as a stripper. The money she made went to the car and the house, but any tips she got were saved and spent on Christmas presents for Alice. Her mother was a single mom, getting pregnant in high school and dropping out. She struggled to raise Alice when she worked odd jobs at fast food restaurants. But when she applied to be a stripper, the money was enough to pay back the bills that were overdue and then some.

“Would you like a beer?” Daniel asked her. She shrugged her shoulders and accepted his offer.

“I’ve never had beer before,” Alice said. Daniel looked at her as he poured her a cup. He handed her the cup and they walked into the living room. He grabbed two shot glasses and a bottle of Jameson as he motioned her to follow upstairs.

“Why are we going up there?” Alice asked.

“What?” Daniel said.

“I asked why we are going up there?!”

“I want to get to know you. We can come back down later if you like.” Alice nodded and followed him upstairs through the master bedroom and led her to the balcony. He placed the shot glasses on the edge and poured her a shot of whiskey and placed the shot glass in her cup. He did the same with his drink.

“Count to three?” Daniel asked. Alice shook her head no. He gestured for her to try it. She took a long sip of beer and whiskey and coughed when she placed the up back down.

“It’s a little strong, but it’s really good.”

“What was that?”

“A boilermaker, it is a shot of whiskey that has been placed in a cup of beer.”

“It tastes weird and nasty.”

“You don’t like it?”

“Well once it goes down it’s alright.” Daniel smiled and clink his cup to hers and they continued to drink their boilermakers. Daniel and Alice chatted awhile. He talked about college, she talked about trade school. They talked for a little bit and then headed back down to the party when Trevor Bufford walked into the house with three bottles of vodka and a plastic bag.

“I got vodka and I got MDMA,” Trevor said, “Let’s get this party going.”

The whole crowd cheered and applauded. The bag of MDMA was passed around the group of party people and the vodka began to pour. They lifted their shots of vodka and held the MDMA in their hands. The group counted down to three and then placed the MDMA in their mouth and took the shot of vodka.

Alice shuddered after taking the vodka and then began to feel warm and hot inside. The world around her buzzed, the hum of people and music felt like ants crawling on her skin. The MDMA and vodka were churning inside her body; her heartbeat was fast and alive. She took several more shots of vodka before she began to feel sleepy and tired. She crawled up on the couch and fell asleep, vomiting in an out of sleeping off the drugs and the alcohol.

The party ended around midnight. People were dispersing, throwing their cups on the ground outside and on the balcony. Some of them passed out on the ground, others were asleep throughout the living room and family room. Alice was asleep when Daniel crept up from behind her and started kissing on her neck. She tried to push him off. He started to reach for her breasts and she tried to muscle him off her body. But she was weak, tired, and drunk.

“Stop, please,” she said. She wasn’t giggling or playing around. But Daniel placed his legs on her knees and she struggled to crawl away. She clawed at him and she pushed him. He punched her hard in the face and her body became limp.

Daniel unbuckled his belt and unzipped his pants. Alice was breathing shallow and weak. Her eyes were still closed. Daniel pulled a condom from his back pocket that he took from his father’s drawer the other day. His mom was not on birth control, so she made his dad wear condoms if he didn’t want to get a vasectomy.

He put on the condom and then slowly took his time trying to manage his way in. A couple drops of blood seeped onto the fabric on the couch, nothing that some stain remover or oxy-clean could handle. He finished fifteen minutes later and got off Alice. He zipped and buckled up his pants and flung the condom into the garbage can in the kitchen. Katherine had her head on the table, barely breathing. He rolled her head over to the left side and then walked out the door.

When Alice woke up the next morning, her underwear was pulled down and there was a spot of blood on the couch. She pulled her underwear up and then ran out of Katherine’s house. Tears were streaming down her face as she headed towards the small house off U.S. 19. It was a single story home built on a platform for flooding and hurricanes which happened in Florida. The screened in porch was hidden by the red hibiscus flowers blooming in the summertime. She would wake up in the morning and see red at the bottom of the window of the kitchen.

Alice walked behind the back of the house and crept up the honeysuckle near her window and climbed back into the bed. She let out a muffled cry and tried to shake what had happened to her at Katherine’s house. She fell asleep plagued by nightmares and haunted by Daniel’s eagerness. The way his eyes were soulless and how he stared at her from above. It was sickening.

Alice walked up to a small home near the end of the road. It was yellow and white with little nautical accents around the front door. The door was a bright sky blue. She knocked on it a couple of times before she heard someone shuffle inside.

Barney Stanford was her only friend since she moved to the Saint Petersburg area in middle school. Her friends back home in Tampa were going to the same middle and high school that she dreamed of going to have more time with them.

Barney opened the door and took a giant look at Alice standing at his front door.

“Alice, what are you doing here?” Barney asked. He glimpsed his way into the kitchen and the neon green light on the oven read 11:35pm. It was close to midnight.

“Would you tell anyone that I was here all night?” Alice asked.

“You showed up here close to midnight, what were you doing?”

“Nothing that concerns you, except telling and selling the story I was here all night.” She walked into his house and flopped on his couch. She reached down for her Doc Martens and started to kick them off. Barney was rubbing his eyes. He went to bed around eight and then two hours later, Alice woke him up to see if he would say that she was at his house all night.

“I’m gonna make some tea.” Barney yawned. He walked into the kitchen and grabbed a box of teabags. He reached a little further into the cabinet and pulled out two mugs. Barney walked to the sink and poured the mugs full of water and stuck the teabags inside the mugs before turning the microwave on. He grabbed the mugs and sat opposite of Alice on the other side of the couch.

“Weren’t you cold tonight?” Barney said gesturing to Alice’s missing black jacket.

“A little, but it wasn’t so bad,” Alice said. She placed her mug back on the table.

“But why did you want me to say that you were here the whole time when I know you weren’t?”

“Can you keep a secret?” Barney gave her a look. He was the one who helped her get a kit, he was the one who helped her get her incident to the police and notify the important officials. But he also felt like he let her down when the police chief was a close friend of the Tanner family and did not look to press charges saying that it was a moment of weakness and blame Alice for what happened to her.

“I killed someone tonight,” Alice said. Barney’s face turned white. His palms began to sweat and his heart began to race.

“I don’t want to hear anymore,” Barney said. He grabbed Alice’s hands and gave them a pat, “I think it is time you leave and go head home.”

“You don’t believe me do you?”

“No, it is the fact that I do believe you after what happened to you that night at Katherine’s party and I know what you are capable of.”

“So then can you tell me the truth and pinky swears that you would tell anyone I was here the whole night?”

“I can’t lie to officials,” Barney said. Alice extended her pinky finger. Barney sighed and then wrapped his pink finger around hers and they shook on it.

“Thank you for understanding,” Alice said. She wrapped her arms around him and gave him a big squeeze. She grabbed her Doc Martens and pried them back on. Barney opened the door and watched as his best friend walked out of his house to head back home. She walked up the street and made a left at the first stop sign. She headed up to the nearest drug store and bought herself a bleaching and hair dye kit. She picked a shade of blue that had silver tint inside the dye.

Alice paid for the items in cash and walked outside and headed down the street to her house. Barney and Alice’s house were right behind each other. A single fence gate allowed her in and out between their homes.

Alice reached her house and reached into the pot for the small silver key that stuck up from the soil. The hibiscuses looked orange in the yellow light of the street lamp. The moon showed its dim light as the stars twinkled in the sky. The hum of cicadas was long gone as fall began to curl its cold fingers on the wind. Alice walked inside her house and took off her Doc Martens by the door. The cold tile from renovating their home felt honest below her feet. She walked towards the bathroom nearest to the laundry machines and turned on the water.

As the water ran that night, Alice grabbed the bottle of bleaching kit and began to brush it into her hair. The kit came with some gloves and there were extra latex gloves left over from the renovation. She shook and brushed her hair with the bleaching kit and left the mixture inside her hair for as long as the bottle instructed her to do so. She hopped in the shower and then washed the bleach out of her hair with some mild soap that her mother made for some extra money when the craft fairs were in town. Any of the samples that didn’t look well-made were often kept at the house. The smell of roses and honey left a perfume to her nose. The heat from the water hugged her body like a warm blanket.

She stepped out of the shower to grab the bottle of blue hair dye and then walked back into the shower to apply the dye directly onto her hair. The steam from the shower made the liquid melt down her neck making blue streaks like paint strokes appear down her neck. She read the bottle of blue dye and waited as long as the instructions said she could. The blue dye left some of her eyebrows blue and brown. She didn’t care. As long as she could get rid of the red, no one would know the difference. They would just think it is a new style that she wanted to take on.

Alice used to have hair the color of rose gold. It was blonde with hints of red. Her mother said that is where her Irish heritage came from, that little bit of red. She wore it with pink streaks of hair or had temporary pink hair dye put in her hair. The shimmering reddish blonde and pink hues matched her innocent charm. Her wardrobe has hues of blue, purple, and pink. She never liked anything that was not blue, purple, or pink.

Ever since that night, Alice had changed. She was withdrawn and isolated. Everyone picked on her more. Barney pulled her into the bathroom and showed her cellphone video someone took from the party showing her and Daniel having sex. Daniel’s old girlfriend cornered her one day at her locker and began to punch and kick Alice to the ground. Both Alice and Daniel’s girlfriend were suspended for ten days. She had to take ATOSS to catch up with the missed work.

After going back to school from suspension, Alice took out all her old clothes, the ones from that were bright and childish and sent them afire in the backyard. Her mother was furious when Alice burned all her clothes. It would cost one year’s worth of salary of get all those clothes back.

“Maybe you should just try black,” Alice said and walked away from her mother in the living room to her bedroom. The white walls with pink bows were replaced with a dark red. Purple Halloween lights were around the curtain and headboard on her bed. They were little bats. The change was drastic and shocking.

When Alice went to school with blood-red hair, black clothes, and a face covered in white and black makeup, no one in the school bothered her ever again. Except Katherine who tried to get at Alice and watch her squirm. Alice never budged; her newfound wardrobe and lifestyle were as cold as the midnight air that Halloween night.

Alice stepped out of the shower and grabbed a hairdryer than a towel to dry her new blue hair. The hum of the hair dryer muffled the sound of the front door opening and closing. Alice assumed it was her mother who usually comes home later around two in the morning. Alice didn’t have school tomorrow, so murdering Daniel was perfect timing on her behalf. The hair dye got on her hand and arm as she grabbed and shook the hair to get rid of any excess blue dye. The white laminate floor was stained with blue dye. She could grab the mop and clean it up tomorrow. The dye on her arm and hand could be removed with some soap and water.

Alice turned off the dyer and flung her head back and felt the warm blue hair frame her face. The best thing about dark colors is how much heat they can retain. She looked towards the doorframe and found her mother staring at her, rolling her eyes and then gesturing her hand to say goodnight. Alice knew her mother would speak to her tomorrow about the blue hair.

Alice walked into her bedroom and turned on the purple lights. She was going to go online for a couple of minutes and then go to bed. She stayed up watching music videos, listening to the vocals and the beats of the drum. It would awake her primal instinct. She reached into her dresser drawer and pulled out the oxycodone from her mother’s surgery to fix her broken nose one time a bouncer accidentally bumped her in the face as she was exiting the club.

She took one pill and then she reached for a bottle of bourbon that she stashed under the pull out keyboard. She took a swig of bourbon and closed her eyes at the relaxing feeling overwhelming her body. She shut off her computer and curled up in bed, lulled into a deep and peaceful sleep. It was the first night she was able to sleep soundly and she enjoyed every minute of her slumber as she dreamt of a more colorful and happier world.