Little Crafter Ch 01

She worked through the night, again. The studio looked as though it was waiting patiently to be bare and painted crisp white once more. She'd begun a lease on the place the previous year for a small fortune each month, but the building was in an ideal location for her needs. Close enough to the city for work purposes, and far enough out in the sticks to put off potential visitors from making the drive out to see her; she had peace enough to work on her props and scene effects without interruption or prying eyes. She could work her magic here, literally.

The studio was on one floor of many in what had once been a parking garage for a shopping center that ended up being scrapped, and the town had fixed the general landscape when prompted by a sweep-in buyer who proposed plans to renovate the structure into an elegant gallery on the river. The gallery owner had promised an inflow of tasteful tourists, along with tasteful tourist's money, but cumulative poor luck, poor decisions and overly cautious marketing left the investment as a money pit. The structure was well polished and clean, isolated and well lit to stand out against the woods and water at night, but failed as a business so badly that it was avoided by the few locals that quietly shared its semi-private road. A picturesque town was nearby, with high income families enjoying large houses and much larger grounds in the general area with an air of reservation and privacy. No one would be ringing the sweetly-chimed electronic doorbell she'd installed when she moved in, and that was exactly how she liked it.

She sipped her tea and checked the clock without really reading the time. She was tired. And bed was a single foam block away. She'd lay out the shape so it would be prepped for the next day.

"Ellieeehhhh", a disembodied voice whispered, "perhaps you should shape a phallus to fill those wasted holes in your little body". The tone was calm, cold and mocking - it whispered dangerously as it threaded in and out of her perception. The hairs on her arms rose and she blinked, the only visible sign that she heard it - heard 'him'. She was determined to ignore his ghost, believing it would get bored or lose energy and leave her alone one day. It had been with her for a day longer than she'd lived here, but the reverse of her hopes seemed to be coming true. Her old Master's voice was getting stronger and more frequent. And other things, things she wouldn't even dwell on or admit, were happening too. It was becoming unbearable.

Ellie went back to carving the foam block in front of her, and the voice became louder. The shape in the foam she was working on had started coming through with each rush over the material. Bits of foam seemed to jump and bounce to the floor. Little yellow suicides scattering everywhere around her. She rushed on faster, hoping to get this last thing done before she could collapse in bed, exhausted enough to pass out. But the voice was not giving up that easily and called out to her in mock tones of male ecstasy, using his pet names for her, the ones specifically used when he would-

Losing herself as her temper boiled over, the foam lost all meaning and her internal vision was broken, blocked out as she saw something new in her mind's eye. The foam design was now his sickening face. His tongue roved crudely out at her, trying to lace her skin with his saliva. Immediately, the wire brush block in her hand was tearing into its flesh. In her mind, she savaged it. His left eye was ripped open and then out as the hard wire bristles tore through the thin skin, there. Suddenly, his nose and tongue were a shredded mess, with his lips quickly following suit. She ignored the blood spattering out across the white floor, the table, and her worn-out tee.

Her eyes welled up with tears of rage and she caught her own hand she'd been using to hold the foam in place, tearing open a section along her thumb and taking a deep swath of skin away, making it feel like ice and fire were simultaneously eating her hand. The screamed that lept from her throat was full of pain and fury, but she finally dropped the wire block. The foam fell back lopsidedly without a sound but managed to knock over her china cup, adding an edge of normal chaos to the scene that she thought would've been morbidly funny if she hadn't been too drained to raise any humour, and the tea from her cup spread quickly and ran in rivulets down the table legs. Ellie followed it down, dragging along the wall beside her as she slumped in on herself in defeat. The brown of the tea mixed with the red on the floor and she knew only some of that blood was from her own wound.

She sat there for a while, listening to the muted sounds of the river outside, and felt like her stomach was a pit, her limbs were stone, and her head was overstuffed with cotton. She would clean everything thoroughly before she'd let herself sleep. Ellie needed peace.