Her Collection

Prompt: For tomorrow, please scare the soul out of your judge with a story that starts with the line: It was her thirteenth birthday

Please don't forget today is Flash Fiction Day, and that means a 500 word limit to your story.

It was her thirteenth birthday, and it had been her favorite thus far. The birthday in question had belonged to a child. He’d been turning eighteen, but he’d been a child nonetheless. She had been more of an adult at his age than he ever would have been – even if she had given him the chance to grow any older. She always had been ahead of the curve.

There was something very intimate about killing a stranger. It was a feeling that despite her high IQ and natural eloquence she had never quite been able to put into words. Sliding a knife into someone she’d only met once, feeling their blood on her hands, knowing she would be the last thing they saw, seeing who they truly were in a moment of pure impulse, watching for the exact second the light faded from their eyes – it gave her a better understanding of them than even their closest friends and family. There was something excitingly honest about it all. It felt better to her than any extreme sport of the adrenaline junkie, than any substance abuse she could imagine, better even than sex -though she had enjoyed her fair share of that as well.

The only thing better than taking the life of a stranger, was to do it on a special occasion. She had found that killing and sentiment go hand in hand, after all. Choosing dates important to her would have left a trail that could have eventually lead back to her however, and she was far too smart for that. She liked what she did, and had no intention of ever being made to stop. It was her determination to not get caught that had ultimately given her the idea for her collection.

Choose dates important to the victim and take nothing but memories. That was her motto.

Since then she had taken an assortment of important days, weddings, anniversaries, graduations, one or two funerals, and of course, thirteen birthdays.

Important Author's Note About Reviewing:

This piece was written specifically for a contest entry and is being submitted as a rough draft. I'm trying to learn to get better about showing my work without stressing quite as much about it being polished and SCREAMS!!! is really teaching me to do that. In fact, I haven't edited this particular piece at all before submitting, it is 100% rough draft. I'm aware that it could be polished up more, I'm sure there are probably a lot of typos and some grammatical errors. The point of this is not to be perfect, but rather to be comfortable with posting imperfect work written within a 24 hour time period.

If you have read the piece and would like to send me your comments, I'll happily take them, but please keep in mind that this particular version of the story is not likely to be edited or polished. What would honestly help me the most is general feedback about the premise, style, and length, and whether or not you personally think the piece is worth revisiting and revising outside the contest rules. That's the sort of feedback that would be most helpful for my SCREAMS!!! entries. Thank you!
-Cat