Twisted Love

It was a warm summer night and I laid my body down on the hot sand beneath me. My friends and I had decided to come to the beach tonight to celebrate my birthday. I didn't really care much for my birthday, it felt like any other day, but the boys insisted.

"Karan...it's your birthday...at least act happy!"

I sighed. I wasn't necessarily sad, but I could find no particular reason to be happy either. Another year had gone by and I still felt the same hatred blocking all four walls around my heart.

My friends of course tried various techniques in cheering me up, coming to the beach was the suggestion of one of my best buddies, Aaron. 

He began to chuckle, "hey Karan look at the girls, I'm sure they could make your day". I laughed it off, but internally hoping that they could. 

"Get up bro and go talk to a girl...you're a master when it comes to girls..too bad you forgot all that after that last witch you came across." Again I sighed thinking of that "last witch", she was certainly a lovely witch. But the thought of her loveliness only gave birth to hate. A year had gone by since she had left me and Kavya seemed to have move on...of course she had, she was after all the one who thought I was heartless. 

I finally had to succumb to the pressure of my friends and find a girl to speak to. I pulled my buried body out of the sand, it felt as if I pulled my corpse out of a coffin. 

Her hair was being blown behind by the force of the breeze and her dress also flared in accordance to the breeze. Her smile lit up my heart erasing the hate that once dwelled there. I wanted to speak to her but I had no words, I think I had lost all my confidence to my previous love. 

I reached forth my arm and suddenly grabbed her long flowing hair, holding it tightly in my grasp. She turned around immediately feeling something tugging at her.

"What the hell is wrong with you?," she said pulling her hair away from me.

"I love your hair...you're just gorgeous," I could see my friends snickering at a distance remembering how much better I once was in approaching girls.

"Congratulations then, love it. Now get lost!" 

"I want to keep it...but for that I'll have to take you with me princess" I questioned my own ability at this.

"Excuse me? Seriously!" Her eyes were brimming of hate...I felt as though I was looking into myself for a moment. This was the same hate I felt for Kavya.

"What's your name?" I asked

"It's not your business," she began to walk away trying to run away from me. I could feel her fear...it was just like my own. I feared falling in love.

"My name is Karan!" I yelled at her...seeing a billion faces turning towards us. But my call when unanswered and she drove away in her car.

I returned back to my friends where an awkward vibe had emerged, it seemed as though they regretted ever asking me to approach a girl.

"I'm going to find that girl again," they all glared at me and sighed in disbelief.

"Come on man, let's just go.

.....

A few weeks later, I was elated to see her long tresses again. She was at the gym and her hair bounced up and down as she ran on the treadmill. I decided again to be a maniac and grab her hair. In the moment's confusion and by the restraint of her captured hair, she slipped, and I caught her.

"Let go of me! What's your problem man? I'm going to involve the police if you don't stop harassing me!"

"But I'm in love with you...your beautiful eyes..your long hair..aaah."

"Come with me," she pulled me towards her bag and together we rushed out of the gym onto the busy street. After rummaging through her things for a while, she pulled out a pair of scissors.

"You like me so much right? You like my hair the most...here you can have it," she passed me the scissors, "here cut as much as you want", my jaw dropped, "why are you so shocked, feel free!". Her eyes raged with hate and it seemed like she would soon stab me with the scissors in her hand. 

"Look Miss...I didn't mean it"

"No no, why not? My name is Meera..do you want my address too?" she said all of this while snatching the scissors away from me and into her own hands...She flummoxed me to a point I could not understand. Yet she also shocked me.

She took the scissors in her own hands and suddenly chopped off all the hair resting loosely beneath her hairtie. She picked it up and passed it to me.

"Here you go! Do you want anything else or can I leave now?" I had no words to say to her, instead I stared at the hair I held in my hands as she rushed away. I didn't know if I hated her for cutting off the beautiful hair or if I loved the hate that she possessed in the first place. She had something different to her.

"I hate you," she screamed while she turned the corner, I replied with a whisper of "I love you."

.....

I wasn't decent after that incident though, I became even more shameless. I grew in love with her hate, her power, her courage, she was like my mirror. I searched her up on Facebook and Googled anything I could find. Meera was a mystery I wanted to solve...I wanted her to hate me. And of course, I did find her.

The next she I saw her, she flaunted around in a beautiful bob cut. I wasn't any less though, I had shaved off my hair in tribute to my love, Meera.

She didn't recognize me. 

"Meera, can you not recognize Karan with his hair gone? I still recognize you!," this was the first time she laughed at something I had said. 

"Did you really?," she chuckled.

"Anything for you baby...you did it for me too," I smiled back, "I loved your hair and you gave it, now you ask me for what you want"

She smiled back at me, "I'll let you know soon". I pulled her body towards me and placed my lips on hers, she looked up at me in hatred, but she didn't stop me. A few moments later she slowly pulled herself away from me.

"I know what I want from you," her lips curved into a smile, but her eyes still showing hate, "I want to hate you forever."

I pulled her close to me again and began kissing her.

....

The following day I knocked on her door and she opened the door. 

"You wanted to hate me forever right?" She smiled in approval, "well there's only one way you could do that...you already hate me, let's just make it forever."

 I pulled out a ring and didn't bother to propose, I forced the ring onto her finger and embraced her. She looked at me in shock, her eyes full of love and full of hate. She didn't know how to feel, I didn't know how to feel either. 

"You didn't even bother to ask for my yes or no?"

"I didn't want you to fall in love with me."

"I would have hated you for asking." She smiled.

Written for Chuck Wendig's Flash Fiction Challenge: Twisted Love

(P.S - inspired by a few people, a TV series, and the prompt - all squashed together. Hopefully it worked)

Remote-Control Bride

He drove the car hastily towards Casey's office. The rain was falling almost perilously, and John was already an hour late. He knew that Casey would be brimming of anger, she was waiting at the bus-stop. As soon as he got there, his face was overtaken by a troubling guilt seeing his wife shivering and all drenched in the ice-cold rain. He honked the horn, and waved his hand out the window, beckoning her towards the car.

She reluctantly came inside, and out of the ambush of the rain.

"Sorry I'm late..I had no idea I would be stuck in a meeting so long" he pleaded asking for mercy from his angry wife.

"You're such a terrible husband! How can you leave me waiting for so long... I was worried"

The screaming back and forth soon faded away into the darkness of the night, as John and Casey reached home. Casey ran upstairs and curled her body behind the room door. John knocked incessantly from outside the locked room, his apologies from before still echoing in the solemn air of the cold house. But the echoes evaded the room, and soon all that could be heard were the silent whimpers of his wife, curled up on the ground.

"How many times should I say sorry Casey? You know it wasn't intentional...can't you just get over it...you women are so hard to deal with..I wish you could be controlled with some remote" the words escaped the gates of John's lips and set off a destructive bomb in the mind of Casey. She screamed out loud, cursing him.

John, after a long while of apologizing and begging for his wife to overcome what had already happened, slid away into the empty living room. Why don't they ever understand he thought to himself. Feeling a great deal of frustration, but at the same time grief, a deep sleep overcame John.

-------

When he opened his eyes the next morning, he found the room to be full of a beautifully radiating light. He looked around, in search of Casey, but she was nowhere to be seen. John sighed, and came to the conclusion that Casey had strolled off somewhere in the morning, still upset about the previous night's incidence.

When he walked out of the door to catch some fresh hair, he noticed something quite unusual. Robot? He thought, since when where they so existent in the everyday world. John saw his lazy, plump neighbour sitting on his patio, not by himself, but with a women made of metal.. This crazy man has gotten crazier, John thought to himself.

He quickly scuttled over to the fat neighbour's to interrogate the piece of metal that captured all of his attention.

"Eric, what's that metal robot thing you've got....what new toy is it"..

"It's my wife, Marley... I say you should get married now, how long are you going to be alone. Men of 2120 don't tend to stay alone long..and you are quite abundant in your wealth too, why not buy yourself a wife?

John was a little confused, but was forcibly directed to rush over to the bride shop to buy himself a wife. As he walked into the store of brides, he scanned the room and looked at a few of the new models the store had. Yet his eyes specifically fell on the one that almost entirely resembled his wife, Casey.

"This is Model CASSE-12," a sales person exclaimed.

John stared in awe at the metal pieces that made up his wife... He quickly picked up one of the boxes of this model of bride, and rushed over to the check-out counter.

"I'd like to buy her please," and with that being said the cashier passed over the transaction machine to John who quickly paid his dues, and spoke his vows. Before leaving the store, John decided to ask a question to the cashier. "So ummmm..where did all the women in the world go?"

"Haha what century are you from Mister? They left years ago..anyways.. have a good day sir!"

John still flummoxed made way home with his new robot wife. As he stepped into the door, he pulled in the box with him and started stabbing it with scissors. He pulled open the box and rummaged through the inside.. pulling out an instruction manual. He quickly read through it. Next he pulled out a remote control, adorned with an on/off, volume, and several other buttons. Lastly John assembled his new wife together, and turned her on.

"H-u-llow" the robot said monotonously.

For the next few days John enjoyed his time abundantly with his wife. She never spoke back, never got angry or upset, always did whatever he asked, John was utterly ecstatic with this. John came home from work whenever he wished, and there sat CASSE-12, almost as if she was eagerly waiting for him. Although John did understand that she could not feel such emotions, unlike his real wife Casey. It was relieving, but at the same time disheartening.

Then one night on his way home from his office, John remembered he had instructed his robot-wife, CASSE-12, to wait for him outside by the bank, where she had gone to handle some of his financial work. This reminded him of that night Casey had to wait over an hour in the pouring rain. He chuckled to himself, surely this time his wife would not be upset with him.

When he got there however, his robot-wife seemed beyond upset. In fact she was lying lifelessly, without ever having a life, on the rainy pavements. She had malfunctioned with all the rain that had entered her electronic mind, and could not think to disobey waiting outside. John simply stared at her...Oh great.

.........

The next morning, John opened his eyes to a more beautiful sight, Casey. She sat before him with a face full of life. It was quite obvious to John that all that unfolded for him in the past few days was merely a dream.. or probably more apt of being called a nightmare. He embraced his wife, apologized, and just hoped that he would never encounter a woman made of metal again... He bid farewell to his remote-control bride.

Written for Chuck Wendig's Flash Fiction Challenge: Roll For Your Title.

(P.S - this is my first attempt at writing a story for a prompt)