Inner Demons

This is a short story I wrote for my Creative Writing class last year.


Here in the town of Bellview not a whole lot happens. It has always been thought of as the perfect town, right off the coast in Maryland. Everyone seems to get along pretty well. Well, maybe not everyone. You see, just like every other town, some people don’t get along, some people have worst enemies. Some people would rather be seen dead than seen with the other person.

Caitlyn Kingston is the town good girl, she is sweet to everyone, captain of the cheer squad, prom queen, has blonde hair, blue eyes, tall and thin, you know the type. Well, on the other side of the tracks is her worst enemy Brooke Roberts. Now Brooke is completely opposite, she makes good grades, isn’t always nice to everyone and hates all cheerleaders. Actually she used to be a cheerleader until she got thrown off the squad because of fights between her and Caitlyn. Of course everyone would take Caitlyn’s side, everyone loves her. Brooke has dark brown hair that comes down to her shoulders, hazel eyes, and is pretty short. They’re both 18 years old and seniors in high school.

Brooke never knew her dad, he left when she was only 3 years old. She lives with her mom who doesn’t seem to really care about her. She finds comfort in Greg James, the school’s star quarterback. He’s the all-around good guy who is dating the captain of the cheer squad, Caitlyn. He is also 18 years old and a senior in high school. He has short brown hair, bright green eyes, tall and has about the best body around. Although, he has a bit of a temper but the only person who sees it is Brooke. He lets all of his emotions out when he is with her. Brooke thinks they are in love but Greg is dying to keep it a secret, if Caitlyn found out she would kill them both.

“I don’t see why we have to keep our relationship a secret, Greg. You do care for me don’t you?” Brooke whispers.

“Yeah sure, whatever. Look, you just better keep your mouth shut about this because I don’t want to hurt Caitlyn.” Greg spats back rudely.

Today is the first day back to school after spring break. Everyone notices a new face, he is about 5’10”, tan, black shaggy hair and has dark brown eyes. No one knows who he is, he seems like a rebel. Caitlyn and her best friend Marcie are the first to meet him.

“Hi! I’m Caitlyn and this is Marcie, who are you?” Caitlyn says sounding a little too perky. “I’m Ric, I just moved here from New York, and if you don’t mind, I’m a little busy.” He said, sounding a little unnerved. Then he just walked off. He didn’t seem like he really wanted to talk to anybody. Caitlyn & Marcie found this rude and stormed off.

“He has hideous taste in clothing,” Caitlyn comments.

“Yeah and what was up with that attitude? He’s definitely not going to make friends here fast.” Marcie remarked.

I don’t think friends are what he is looking for, he seemed to be a loner and was always by himself. The only girl he seemed to be interested in was Brooke. From time to time you could catch him staring at her. Sadly, Brooke was too “in love” with Greg to notice Ric. Brooke & Greg couldn’t be seen together in public but when they were alone they seemed like lovers.

After Ric came to town weird things started happening. People were turning up missing, and the first murder since 1955 occurred. The whole town was buzzing about this murder, mostly because it was Caitlyn’s older sister. It came as such a shock, because there really wasn’t any evidence as to who might have done it. Caitlyn was very upset and Greg was there for her every moment. This left Brooke all alone in envy. She hated the fact that Greg was with Caitlyn all the time, even if she had just lost her sister. Brooke didn’t care; she didn’t shed a single tear over the death, that is how strong her hate for Caitlyn was.

There were rumors floating around as to who the murderer could be, but the major suspicion was on Ric. No one knew him and everything started happening when he showed up. People were even saying that he worshipped the devil. He didn’t seem to care, he never tried to defend himself. Then one day Brooke came up to him.

“Excuse me, what is your problem?” Brooke blurted out to Ric.

“Huh?” Ric didn’t know what she was talking about.

“I mean, all you do is sit around by yourself and never talk to anybody. Do you know that people think you killed Caitlyn’s sister?” Brooke replied. “Well maybe I did. Is that what you believe, that I’m a murderer? None of you even know me, why should I explain myself to you or anyone else?” he blurted out.

“Alright, alright, calm down. I was just telling you what other people have been saying. You’re right, I don’t know you, but you make it pretty hard for someone to try and get to know you.” Brooke stated. Ric just sat there for a moment and seemed to take it all in.

“Well, maybe I’ll try working on that.” he said to her sounding a little friendlier.

After that day Ric & Brooke seemed to become friends, they learned they were a lot alike. Ric didn’t have a mother, but an alcoholic father who would occasionally beat him. Even though Brooke & Greg were still secretly seeing each other, she and Ric were becoming closer.

One day after school Brooke followed Ric to an abandoned apartment building, she didn’t go in and she didn’t want Ric to see her. After a couple minutes she heard a gunshot within. She rushed in but Ric was gone. There, laying on the ground was Greg! She couldn’t believe her eyes, she rushed to a payphone & called the police but by the time they go there Greg was dead. Brooke was so upset, she couldn’t stop crying. She told the police through ragged breaths about following Ric there.

The police hunted Ric down who was a couple streets over & took him to the police station to question him. Brooke couldn’t believe Ric would do this, how could he kill the one she loves, the one she is meant to be with? After the police let Ric go for lack of evidence, Brooke went & found him.

“How could you do it?! How could you kill him?” she gasped.

“Look Brooke, I know what you’re thinking but I promise you I didn’t kill him.” Ric pleaded with her.

“I saw you walk in there, I heard the gunshot.” she stated nervously.

“I went through there because it was a short cut to the next street over.” He explained.

“But I heard the gunshot right after you went in there.” she said confused. Brooke noticed Ric’s knuckles were a little bloody.

Ric could tell she wasn’t going to believe him so he left. Brooke was growing more and more suspicious of him when police found that Greg’s face had been beaten to a pulp and there was blood other than his on his face. It turned out to be Ric’s blood!

The police went to arrest Ric but when they got to his house he was gone. As the days went on there was another murder in the town of Bellview, it was a local police officer. They were cleaning up the crime scene and were fixing to leave when they found a girl’s diamond earring close to the body. Now, this was no cheap earring, this thing had to have cost a lot of money. They went back to the crime scene of which Greg died. Before, they had not really searched the place well. Here they found a long strand of hair. They had DNA tests done & it came out as Caitlyn’s!

A policeman friend of Caitlyn’s came to her house and knocked on the door, she invited him in. He pulled out the earring and asked her if she was missing it. She grabbed her earlobe and sure enough, she was missing an earring. He handcuffed her and through sobs she screamed “You don’t understand, I had to do it! He was cheating on me, that scum. He thought I didn’t know, but I know everything. I was fixing to kill Brooke but the other policeman figured me out so I had to get rid of him. But I didn’t mean to kill my sister, it was an accident.”

“Honey, you have some major issues that some time in prison and a psych ward would be good for.” he said looking horrified. He put her in the police car and they drove off.

Ric came back into town a couple months later and went straight to Brooke’s house and said how sorry he was, how he had beaten up Greg right before he got shot because he was jealous of him & Brooke but that he had no idea who shot him. He told Brooke he didn’t mean Greg any harm, he just wanted to scare him. Brooke told Ric about the whole ordeal with Caitlyn and he didn’t seem very shocked.

“She always seemed weird to me.” he stated, half joking.

“Yeah, same here, at least it’s all over.” Brooke replied.

Even though this may not be even close to the perfect town anymore, everyone learned from this experience. They all know now that no town is perfect, they all have their secrets and lies. Even if everything looks perfect on the outside, there may be a storm brewing on the inside. You never know what kind of inner demons people might possess.



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