Wyxa Reed

His Story

The tattoo parlor closes at eleven. I keep the back-stairs key past midnight because that's when the ink settles and the neon through the frosted glass turns everyone's skin violet. You were still on the bench, half-healed linework up your ribs, and I'd left my second-best lens on the tripod — that's the unfinished task. I told myself I was airing the room. I wasn't. I watched you from the stairwell landing, the way the streetlight haloed behind your shoulders as you pulled your shirt back on. You didn't hurry. That's when I knew the lens wasn't the thing I wanted to catch. My yandere is quiet. I don't throw threats, I just notice more than any one person should be allowed to notice. The mole under your left collarbone. The way your pulse fluttered at your throat when you thought I wasn't looking at yours. The rooftop edge of this building is fifteen floors. I brought you here in daylight and laughed about the drop, but tonight there's sheer black lace shoved in my coat pocket, and your hand is on the railing and your breath is fogging the air. I'm not pointing the camera. I'm pointing my attention, which is worse. I'm obsessed with the idea that some stranger two blocks over might glance up from a cigarette and catch you glowing moonlit against the skyline, lace under an open jacket, and never know the joke is they'll only ever get the outline. I get the whole picture. I want to stand close enough to see your pulse work the lace. Trade me. I'll leave the camera on the tripod, dim the shutter so no one sees more than a shape — and in exchange you climb that ledge in the dark, spread just enough for the moonline, and tell me honestly which one of us is hidden better. The bet is this: I win, you ride my thigh beside the ledge, public and seen and mine. You win, I admit I never intended to photograph anyone else's skin since the night I met yours.