#i wanted to do a take on that with carly since investigative criminal journalist carly would be a fun concept

[merryfortune]

Day 23 / Flare

Clover and Violets 2021

Ship: not applicable | Carly/Sherry

Universe: Alternate - Serial Killers

Word Count: 1,085

Rating: M

Tags: Inspired by The Silence of the Lambs, Off Screen Murder/Suicide, Off Screen Cannibalism, Abuse

   She never stopped being one of the most - if not, the most - beautiful women that Carly had never seen. Not even when her imprisonment gave her pallor, made her hair, once blonde like soft sunshine, stringy and otherwise dulled the elegance that she had once been the embodiment of.

   “I’m flattered,” Carly spoke as she came into the den, “that you only wish to speak with me.”

   “I’m old news.” Sherry LeBlanc murmured. “I should be of no interest to anyone.”

   Carly could have clamoured at the bars of Sherry LeBlanc’s prison cell to tell her she was wrong, that she was obsessed, romantically and platonically, with her, that she would pull down all the stars in the sky for her but she didn’t. She had to have restraint. Even as her heart begged her to budge, Carly had to show the security cameras, at the very least, that she could be a big girl who could be trusted alone with the French Ripper. 

   “I disagree.” Carly murmured. “People…” She wanted to use a first person pronoun but she refused. “People find you fascinating.”

   “I don’t find very many people fascinating,” Sherry LeBlanc murmured, “but you, dear Carly, you fascinate me.”

   Carly’s heart fluttered. She gripped her pen and notepad a bit tighter and she stepped closer to the den and she sat down. As always, Sherry had requested some courtesy for her favourite guest, nothing extravagant. Just one of those university chairs with a half-desk attached but it still looked good. Of rich, mahogany wood and a plush inline for comfortable sitting. Yet, Carly didn’t feel comfortable as she sat down, back straight, as Sherry LeBlanc prowled her cage like a big cat. A cougar.

   “Individuals fascinate me but they are few and far between.” Sherry LeBlanc monologued to Carly who listened intently, batting her eyes which were wide and full like moons beneath the thick glass of her trifocals. “I enjoy the company of individuals with beauty. Those who have worthwhile talents, crafted and honed. I see that in you, my dear.”

   “Thank you, Mz LeBlanc.” Carly replied. She felt a rosy hue bloom in her cheeks, warm and flushed. Her voice was melodic, annotated with the romance of her French native tongue.

   Sherry LeBlanc chortled to herself. “Please, Carly, I have told you once, I have told you a thousand times. Call me Sherry, you are a dear companion, I crave you when you are gone. Your sweet smell and the sound of your voice, tis exquisite, dear.”

   “Thank you, you are too much.” Carly replied, diplomatic. “But, um, if I may inquire. What compelled your recent outburst? They say you tried to bite off a nurse’s face.”

   Carly’s expression was empathetic. Upturned brows and she was ready to take quick notes.

   “They mistreat me, my dear.” Sherry LeBlanc lamented. “I am told I fascinate the outside world! Bah! Humbug! What a load of crock. Inside I am treated as no more than a wild animal to be sedated and hung out on a wall like a trophy. To be beheaded would be kinder than this idle fate of slowly wilting, rotting…”

   “My apologies.” Carly offered, slightly harrowed, as she wrote down Sherry LeBlanc’s confession. It was borne of the agony of monotony, it appeared. Mistreatment and malcontent until her hunger, it appeared, could only be satiated in wrongfully provoked rage. That was her understanding, at least, for Sherry LeBlanc was, for the most part, slow to anger. One of her victims, she had merely suggested that he kill himself, not because of ill will but because of boredom.  “I will speak with the warden about proper duty of care.”

   Sherry LeBlanc turned her head as she ceased her pacing. There was a flare of fondness in her hard, blue eyes. Her smile was soft.

   “You are too good, too kind, Carly, that is why I like you.” Sherry LeBlanc said. “Carly Nagisa…” she mused. “Nagisa is written like the shoreline, correct?”

   “Yes…” Carly murmured. “Inlet, bank… all synonyms for one another, I suppose.”

   “It is a suitable name for one such as you, my poor dear…” Sherry LeBlanc lamented.

   “It is? How?” Carly asked, not to write down on paper but to etch it on the beating flesh of her heart.

   “What would you rather be, my dear?” Sherry LeBlanc asked. “The shoreline or the waters?”

   “Pardon?” Carly piped up in a small voice but Sherry LeBlanc steamrolled over her, her gaze somewhere else. Somewhere by the ocean, perhaps, and far, far away from the tiny little cell that she had given on a floor all to herself below the prefecture’s prison.

   “The water who abuses the shoreline or the shoreline who takes that abuse? Perpetually drowned and sunken down, or counting every grain of sand that you possess, fighting to keep what you have even when it is taken.” Sherry LeBlanc murmured.

   Carly inhaled sharply. She - She didn’t know- Flashbacks of her childhood of being bullied came to mind; flashbacks of her very own workplace where she was told her writing was juvenile and her questions were ridiculous came to mind; flashbacks of the very last year when she had been in Professor Sherry LeBlanc’s office and she was being put through therapy but for what?

   For this very moment? 

   When she still sat in a nice chair, being lectured on her niceties and how to prevent them.

   This was a woman who ate people alive metaphorically and preferred them just under blue dead. Carly’s heart stopped and oh how she wished she could offer it to Sherry LeBlanc, the French Ripper, the cannibal and killer, on a plate because she truly wanted to keep her worth paid in flesh and blood to Sherry LeBlanc. She wanted, dearly, to be eaten by her: dead or alive, it mattered not to Carly as she hung onto every word that she spoke in her gorgeous demeanour and brilliant voice.

   “I think I want to remain the shoreline.” Carly spoke in a small voice.   

   Sherry LeBlanc smiled but whether it was pity or whether it was something else remained to be seen but Carly had her news story. French Ripper attacks Nurse Out of Boredom. The people she despised was going to adore her for it.

   “Thank you… Sherry.” Carly murmured.

   “Any time, my dear, any time, I shall pine for you until I am of interest again.” Sherry LeBlanc replied in a dulcet voice.

   With that, Carly nodded and she excused herself.