I can't think of anything worse after a night of drinking than waking up next to someone and not being able to remember their name. It's an awkward situation to say the least. I know that our time together could be defined as pretty intimate and I want to say that I wanted to be inside her at one point but I’m not quite sure how far I got. Sure I'm being a bit crude but I’m simply trying to express how awkward the following morning can be if you can't remember the name of whom you went home with mere hours before. Now I'm sure she couldn't remember mine either, but to be fair, I wasn't exactly honest since I didn’t tell her my real name. I'm not Blake Rogers, a telecoms specialist for big business. I'm David Carroll and I'm an independent contractor. Why the need for the deception, well let me explain how the evening devolved into what it is now and you be the judge.
I had just gotten a call and knew I had to hit the bar/club scene ASAP. I considered going to one of my regular dives but decided against it. I was worried that I was frequenting them too much for me to be comfortable and I didn't want trouble following me home. Instead, I decided to go to some place new where I haven’t been seen before. My normal stomping grounds are bars and clubs with fairly dim lighting, so that it’s harder to get a clear look at me.
Now, not to sound vain, but I'm a good looking guy and that can be a problem. I like to be presentable but forgettable. I try not to stand out, because anonymity is something I welcome. I like to make an impression but not a lasting one. Just enough to grab one’s attention and then after I leave, my face is just like anyone else. I'm not tall or overtly fit, I'm not short or ginger. I don't have any visible tattoos and my clothes are nothing special. I just try to be an average guy. Average was good. Average was useful.
The bar I found was decent, dark, and full of college students. It was a prime hunting ground and I was certain that I could find someone to take to a no tell motel for the night. Now finding the right person wasn’t a matter of gender. It could have been a woman or a man. Frankly it didn’t matter as long as it was the right person. The bar was full, so the odds of me taking someone back to the motel that I paid for using a prepaid debit card was high.
Now from someone who is in his mid-twenties, going to a college bar left something to be desired. From the frat boys and the sorority girls to the obviously under twenty-one crowd with fake IDs, I had to be careful about who I chose. I could go after someone who was already drunk but carrying them out would grab too much attention. Plus, it's just such a hassle. It’s better to gain someone's trust so they would come with me quietly. Kicking and screaming is the last thing I need.
The next problem is finding someone who isn't in a large group. The larger the group, the easier it would be to ID me. As I said I prefer false names and false memories. So obviously large groups are out of the question. Which means that both frat boys and sorority girls are not an option. They often stay clustered together and bring a lot of attention to themselves. As an added side effect, I have also noticed that this is often a deterrent for me picking up a man. From my experience, openly or even closeted gay men were less prone to frequent straight bars full of frat boys. Now I’m not saying that frat boys are homophobic or that they couldn’t be gay or at least bisexual. It is simply an observation.
Now it was pretty easy to figure out who were and were not Greek. The shirts and tattoos were dead giveaways. Upon seeing them I tend to steer the opposite direction, trying to avoid them. On more than one occasion I caught someone's eye unintentionally and from then on the evening was ruined. As I said, I am good looking, not as a boast but just to demonstrate that I walk a fine line between memorable and unmemorable.
Once I was in the bar, I moved to the back to scope out my prospects. There were a number of women to choose from but I had to find the best. There was a blonde sipping a green cocktail of some sort with another red head who had her own beer. The blonde was far too thin and not my normal type. The red head was thicker and fuller, but I noticed that every few seconds she would pick up her cell phone to text or Snapchat or whatever. It was impossible to keep someone's attention when they were on the phone so damn much. I turned away from them and saw another duo, a man and woman. Around my age they were obviously a couple, or rather were a couple. They were in the midst of an argument that would no doubt end in singlehood for both of them. I could try my hand at her but the emotional rollercoaster that would be driving her actions would be impossible to predict and getting her back to the motel room could prove to be difficult, if not impossible. You may not appreciate my pickiness but I have my reasons as to why I do what I do. Path of least resistance.
As I sat and watched the crowd, the waitress approached me. She was lean and fit, someone who could give me a run for my money. She was definitely my type but the issue was that she was a waitress. Her memory would be far too good and the last thing I needed was the cops knocking down my door because she described everything in detail from my face to my inseam. Also she was an employee and that would be just foolish.
She took my order, a beer, and left me to my devices. We engaged in a brief conversation but I saw by the way she held herself, she was interested in me. This would be normally flattering, but it was ultimately counterproductive. I could definitely see myself taking her home but I was dedicated to my task that night and could not let my own personal feelings get in the way. To avoid any obvious signs of rejections that may allow her to remember me, I adjusted my mannerisms ever so slightly and spoke with more of a lilting quality. Given the noise in the bar it was easy to slide this in without her noticing and in seconds I portrayed myself as gay. I didn't want to do it too much or else I would become a walking stereotype and, yes again, more memorable. I was certain my deception worked since I saw her interest shift to disappointment. As they say, all the good ones are either taken or gay.
A few minutes later the waitress returned with my beer and we had a brief exchange of pleasantries but she left shortly thereafter. During that time I saw the girl I was looking for. She was looking at her phone, but with an air of disappointment around her. The slight tells of her face, the micro expressions that few can read were all I needed. She was waiting for someone but it looked like they canceled. Now this is where the dance really picks up tempo. I needed to know if she was expecting someone to arrive separately or was someone expecting her home like a roommate.
This I could not divine by observation alone. I would have to engage. This would not be the easiest, since I kind of shot myself in the foot minutes earlier. The waitress thinks I'm gay, so to appear as straight would elicit a memorable reaction from her and trouble would ensue. I would have to keep an eye on her to make sure she didn't get in the way. It looked like the girl was in another waitress's area so I had a workable buffer. Beer in hand, I went over to make a new acquaintance.
"Is this seat taken?" I asked. The girl looked up to me and grimaced slightly. For the sake of the story I will call the girl Anita as in ‘I Need A’ girl. Anita looked up at me a little confused, but disinterested in what I had to say.
"Um, sure... I mean no." She said. I smiled slightly and took a seat anyway.
"You alright?" I asked. Now it's something to note that bars are not like they are in the movies or TV where you can sit and have a nice conversation. On most nights, in college bars anyway, you have to shout to be heard. It's not like a club where even that is barely audible. So our "quiet conversation" was a bit louder than I would have liked, but it's really the only place I can operate without raising too many eyebrows.
"That obvious huh?" She asked. I offered an awkward smirk as I nodded.
"Well it's not subtle." I said.
"I'll work on that." She told me with a wry smile.
"Well for what it's worth, the guy is an idiot." I said. She clearly appreciated my sentiment as that smile grew into something a bit more genuine.
"Anita." She said, offering a hand. I accepted it graciously.
"Blake." I replied. I won't bore you with the details of what we talked about because frankly I don't quite remember. Not to say that we didn't have a good conversation, it's more the fact that my mind was focused on other things. Though I don’t remember her name, I remember some things about her. She was a grad student who lived alone and studying to be a therapist. She was a fitness buff and was preparing to run her second full marathon. I never really saw that need to run for fun. I mostly did it for the cardio aspect of exercise. Also, she was expecting to meet a blind date who happened to cancel because he was just not too nervous to meet her, which meant that he had no real intention on meeting her in the first place. Good for me, bad for her.
After a few drinks, Anita had warmed to me and we really got along well. Now, I don't have intimate relationships. It's not good for business and mostly I'm just not programmed that way. I think there is a part of me that didn't develop properly when in the womb or during my formative years so I've never really been able to make any real connections. My empathy had to be a learned response rather than inherent. Sure I can understand how people feel and how, given the proper context, to respond but I'm not one to cry over an unjust death or feel for a grieving family. Pets are something I don't understand. Now I've never killed an animal, I just want to put that out there, but I don't go 'awe' to a cute picture or see them as anything other than a nuisance.
I guess I would be classified as a sociopath. To quote a great detective, "I'm a high functioning sociopath." Now, not every psychopath/sociopath becomes a serial killer. In technical terms it is just someone with enduring anti-social behavior and diminished empathy and remorse. It's that, combined with other emotional issues and triggers that creates killers. I'm not a killer. Well, I'm not an intentional killer, but I'm getting ahead of myself.
It was almost eleven when the concept of leaving the bar came up. She was fairly tipsy but not drunk. I was fine. My tolerance for alcohol was pretty high so I was able to pace myself very well. The waitress that I had been watching was gone, having left over an hour earlier. I was grateful for that, not having to worry about pulling too much attention from her. The conversation came to the point where it was time to figure out if my night was a failure or success. I had been planting information all night, saying that I was only in town for a few nights and that I was staying in a place nearby. After that it was just a matter of sealing the deal.
"Do you want to get out of here?" I asked, setting down my empty bottle. I had just returned from the restroom and I was ready to go. Anita considered this for a moment, her head seemingly swimming from one too many drinks. Now, I didn't drug any of her drinks. That would be counterproductive. I needed her mobile and practically falling down if not already unconscious just would not do. I'm a sociopath, not a scumbag, there's a difference.
"Yeah, let's." She said with an enormous smile on her face. Check and mate.
I paid our tab, with cash and gave a decent tip; not too big, not too small. Average. We left the bar behind and I led her to the motel room. This was easy because she trusted me. As I said, empathy was a learned skill, much like sewing or card tricks. I can read the cues and behave appropriately. I chose this particular motel because it was close to the bar, had no cameras and didn't require ID if you paid enough. Which I did. I had a number of fake IDs, an associate of mine is a very good forger, but an ID still required a picture and I didn't want my face copied, if I could help it. So paying extra for someone to forget my face was worth it.
Now, as I said I took some care to prepare my room. I also took care to prepare myself. At my door, we started making out. With her distracted I opened the door and ushered her into the darkened space. Now this comes from practice and I've gotten pretty good at multitasking so as I kissed her and moved her into the room, I removed a small syringe from my pocket. Closing the door behind, I flicked off the cap and under the guise of caressing her, I used it as a guide of find her neck and in less than two seconds, I had inserted the needle and depressed the plunger. Before she could even react to the pain, she was out.
I locked the door and turned on the lights. The motel room was fairly plain: a bed, TV, closest and bathroom. My bag was sitting on the bed, just waiting for me. While the living space was barren and plain, the bathroom was different. Plastic sheeting on the floor, walls, fixtures, basically if anything had to be cleaned, it was covered. Once Anita was in the bathroom I ran back to my bag and pulled out a saline bag with an IV drip, a needle, and a bottle of sedative. I needed to make sure she remained unconscious throughout the entire procedure and well into the morning thanks to diluting the sedative with a saline solution on a constant IV drip.
Hooking her up to the IV I gave her the sedative. I ran into the motel room where I had insisted there was a mini-fridge. Opening it up I pulled out a blood bag I had placed in there before leaving for the night. You see when harvesting an organ, there can be a lot of blood if you are not careful. There will be blood regardless but trying to minimize the damage is something I strive for. You may be wondering where the blood came from, well I have a friend that works at a blood bank. With a few hundred bucks per transaction I have my own supply chain.
As I said I am not a killer, I'm a sociopath and my source of income comes from organ harvesting. I collect organs for the black market and sell them for a decent price. Now I don't take anything that is absolutely vital to life. If you have two, I'll generally take one. I don't go on a spree, I just get an order from what they need and then take it. That day it happened to be a kidney. Now, I've gotten very good at collecting parts. I was in medical school for a very long time but the issue with being a doctor is that there has to be some sort of care for your patient’s well-being. I just didn't care. So I took the skills I was given and dropped out. Now while I try to not actively kill someone I don't really care if they do die. I just prefer if they survive because that's one less body I have to worry about disposing of. Sure there are risks at leaving someone alive but using the modified defibulator, I simply run a brief current through their brains and wipeout their short-term memory. It’s a neat trick I learned while researching the biology of memory. If you haven’t picked up on it by now, I take a lot of precautious to stay off the radar.
Now, I have done something like this many times, taken kidneys, lungs, even eyeballs and pieces of livers. That night things took a turn when I went back to my bed to get my surgical tools and started to feel a little light headed. I thought for a moment that perhaps I had moved too quickly and I was simply getting dizzy. However even as I stood still, the world continued drift further away from me as my head grew heavier. In my stupor I struggled to figure out what was happening to me. I knew it wasn't the beers. I didn't have enough to even make me tipsy. I needed a steady hand and any slight buzz would make me have to put off my surgery. Was it a gas leak? I didn't smell anything. Perhaps it was carbon monoxide. If that were the case then I was done for. The front door looked a million miles away and I didn’t think I could make it before I passed out. It was as I tried to gain my senses I couldn’t help but think about how all of my victims felt when I…
It was then I realized what these effects were. Drugs. I was suffering the effect of a drug, and there was only one drug I could think of that could be administered to me without my knowledge. I had left the table for only a moment to use the restroom and that was long enough. If my theory was correct and I was certain it was, someone had slipped a Flunitrazepam into my drink. Or more commonly known as a roofie. Anita had slipped me a roofie. As I came to this realization, I had stumbled into the bathroom and that was the last thing I remembered before waking up.
As I said, I can't think of anything worse after a night of drinking than someone waking up next to you and not being able to remember their name. Especially when we are both waking up after being drugged. What happens next is completely up to whoever can get to that scalpel on the floor between us first. Personally if l get it, I might just spare her. After all she played me well and I am very impressed. I don’t know what her intention was for me or if she would be so magnanimous when it comes to sparing my life. Clearly she was the one who slipped me the roofie and I was as curious as hell to know why but that may remain a mystery forever. Of course if I do kill her, there is one thing I will have to know: what is her fucking name?