The Monster at My Feet novel Chapter 8

"To make sure it's working and the side effects are manageable, I need you to attend a social event. Put yourself in a loud, highly interactive environment and tell me exactly how you feel so I can adjust the dosage."

Caspian gave a slow, mechanical nod.

Simon needed to verify one last thing. "You do want to live, right?"

Caspian actually let out a dry laugh. "Of course. I want to live more than anyone else in this world."

Simon pressed his lips into a tight line. "Understood." Honestly, the fact that Caspian was still breathing at all was nothing short of a miracle.

After repeating the dosage instructions and warnings, Simon left.

Caspian sat motionless on the couch for a very long time.

As the medication began to take hold, the world around him started to drift, muffled and distant.

The sick, twisted compulsions churning in his gut felt like they were being buried under a thick fog, blurring the edges of his sanity.

In his haze, he was violently pulled back to that pitch-black night over a decade ago.

Dirt shoved down his throat. He was crying, screaming toward the sky, begging the mother who gave him life to stop. But she kept shoveling.

The absolute terror and suffocation had slowly severed his connection to his own body.

The soil buried him alive, burying his head as suffocating cold and darkness swallowed him whole. It felt like a thousand hands were dragging him down to hell.

He didn't know how long it had been. Just as the very last wisp of oxygen in his lungs was about to give out, the dirt above him shifted.

A pair of unfamiliar, luminous eyes—bright as the moon—peered down into the grave.

"Huh?" A soft, childish voice chimed in with innocent curiosity. "Are you still alive?"

His body gave a violent jerk, snapping him back to reality.

He suddenly realized his fingers had subconsciously slipped into the breast pocket resting closest to his heart. He was tightly wrapping a single strand of hair—warm from his body heat—around his fingers.

Tighter and tighter.

Snap.

The hair broke with a microscopic sound, yet to him, it was as deafening as a high-pitched siren!

The pale man flinched as if struck. His hand jolted, knocking a glass off the coffee table.

At the sound of the shattering glass, he numbly, masochistically closed his bare hand around the jagged shards. Crimson blood instantly welled up, dripping steadily down his long, pallid fingers.

His chest heaved violently. Through the searing pain, he forced the mantra into his head, over and over again.

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