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dreamties · 10 months

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polyam! ghostface || chapter 1

A/n- Masterlist

tw: animal death, creepy behavior from Stu & implied assault!

series desc. Stu spares most of the details when he tells Billy about you. He spares maybe too much detail, as he tells Billy that he made a friend in the city and not the fact he met an honest to god serial murderer. He figures he’ll talk about that one when the topic arises.

Stu spares most of the details when he tells Billy about you. He spares maybe too much detail, as he tells Billy that he made a friend in the city and not the fact he met an honest to god serial murderer. He figures he’ll talk about that one when the topic arises.

. . .

Their friendship begins in 1994. Well, not exactly. Stu is freshly 16 and finally has his drivers license. He only really needs it to get to the main part of town, at that point it’s easier walking everywhere. What’s a license and car good for if it spends most of its warranty stuck on the property? He thinks it’s bullshit. He’s also reckless and still a kid.

He decides, before he’s even fully confident in driving, to go to the nearest big city from Woodsboro. That means the roving hills of San Francisco. Maybe it terrifies him a little- not that he’ll admit it- but it’s thrilling, so he doesn’t take a U-turn back home.

He’s old enough that a few remarks and suave confidence usually gets him into places he shouldn’t be, along with a fake ID- and if that doesn’t work, a show of what’s in his wallet usually does the trick.

He meets you in a club. Or- Stu sees you from afar and thinks you’re cool, but doesn’t say hi. There’s this dangerous, nervy edge to you, that he enjoys simply observing. You’re different from these other party goers. He gets a drink and when he goes back to his seat in the corner to watch you, you’ve already slipped out the back door.

He never brings Billy up with him to the city- despite being good friends, maybe even best friends, if guys are allowed to do that sort of thing. Nothing makes Billy nervous. Nothing that Stu is aware of yet.

(Billy’s fine. He’s stone-walled and flirts with danger like it’s no one's business. And then his mom takes off in the middle of the night, with two hastily packed suitcases, leaving him alone. He’s 14 when this occurs.

He’s freaked he’ll never be found again. A mothers love will go to any length to make sure their baby is okay- Billy’s not enough to make his mom love him.

He also hates leaving Woodsboro- that one is irrational. He doesn’t get it himself.)

Stu’s up late, flipping through channels, when he stops on the news. Another man is found with his throat slit in the SF Bay. Authorities aren’t sure if they’re connected yet. It’s too early to say, but it looks like California might have a new serial killer on the loose. That should scare Stu, he gets excited about the possibilities. He loves horror and he’s engrossed in slashers- he’s never thought how human blood must feel between his fingers. He gets giddy and has to calm himself down- he takes a hunting knife from his dad’s collection and skins a stray dog in the woods.

He’s been up to the city a few times throughout the year since his brief- strangely exhilarating, yet fraughtless and boring- encounter with you. He hadn’t been back to that specific club though. There hasn’t been any more news about dead bodies- a part of him, a sick part, wishes there'd be more talk about it, more pictures. He wonders if he went up to the city and waded in the cold waters- if he’d find a dead body. Wonders what a dead person looks like up close.

Woodsboro doesn’t have any killers or crazy crime. Though there has been an uptick in wild animal deaths.

It’s the end of the year, nearly. Which means he’s nearly 17. He’s at Billy’s dad’s apartment, while said dad is out working. He’s lying with his back on the bed, Billy half-listening to whatever moronic rambles Stu’s on about.

Billy sits on the floor, reorganizing a collection of comic books and CDs. He interrupts Stu, not looking up at him. “Have you ever thought about killing a person?”

It’s not very tactful- he learns to be better with that. Stu seems unfazed.

Stu shrugs. “Yeah, sure. Why you asking, man?”

He speaks like it’s easy to admit.

Billy scowls to himself, thinking.

Stu disrupts that thought train, because of course he does. “It can’t be that different from killing animals.” Except he thinks it would be more fun. He’s getting excited. His hands itch and ache with the thought.

“Geez,” Billy lets out, too surprised. “That’s fucking ruthless, man.”

Stu sits up, just enough to turn his head to look at his friend. He twists his face, raising a brow in genuine confusion. “What?”

Billy gives him a look.

“What? You asked, dude.”

It’s a frustrating exchange- Billy laughs. Fucking laughs. It stirs on a reaction from the other boy. It so . . . fucked up and they’re laughing. This is a catalyst to their relationship.

“Stu, do you not see the issue?”

He gets a shrug and a wild grin in response. He smiles to himself and then turns to look at Stu, who’s fully sat up now, who looks onwards into his eyes, awaiting in intrigue, hanging onto Billy’s next word. It feels nice.

Billy tells Stu about a plan he has. Stu’s on board with little questions asked. Perhaps no real questions asked- he asks about the methods, if they would get to wear some sort of costume like they do in film, he asks when do they start like this was an interview for a job. He doesn’t ask Billy why he wants this.

Shortly after his seventeenth birthday, Stu goes back up to the club. He gets a short sort of vague warning from his mom to be careful- that there’s an investigation going on for recent killings in the area. He doesn’t say this- but he knows. He’s been obsessed with watching the news. It’s usually on late night that new stuff is announced. He guesses it makes sense- it’s not really daytime media, a daytime event. He’s kept track of each man found dumped in the water, evidence drained clean. Suspect still at large. A pattern that still needs to be found.

He doesn’t say it- but he has clippings taped on his wall from The San Francisco Chronicle, detailing how the victims were killed. How skin with jagged edges came to be, how likely it was that some of the men hadn’t even died yet before being pushed to the water. Bleeding out and struggling to swim up in freezing temperatures. Whoever was behind this knew what they were doing.

He goes up to the city knowing this- and partially because of it. He doesn’t think at all about you, though. He’s mostly forgotten about you by now. He’s more focused on the future killing of Maureen Prescott towards the end of the school year.

He goes to this club because he knows it’s easier to get into than some of the other ones he’s been to over the past year. He gets a drink and people watches in the corner. He doesn’t really care to join in with dancing or chatting girls up. He’s had enough of french kissing guys in empty bathrooms. He can do most things here that he’d have more fun doing in Woodsboro.

Except maybe kissing guys- but that was tiring. The only boy he wanted to kiss was his best friend, anyway.

He notices you out of the corner of his eye. You’re having a verbal altercation with an older man- it’s quiet, he only recognizes it for what it is because you push him away, and your face is scowling, and your hands are shaking. He recognizes a split-second of darkness in your eyes, not far off from how Billy looked, when they were sat in Stu’s room, pinkies brushing against each other, as they talked and looked at the massacre of clippings on his walls.

The man is pushy, angry. Stu doesn’t think to step in at first. Shit happens. He’s not about to mess with things. He quite likes watching it, anyway. Which is fucked up, Billy would let him know that- he’s Stu’s moral compass. He feels a sort of jealousy seeing you pushed out the back door, into the alley. It perks him up from his glass, he abandons it in his corner spot. He follows the interaction in quick steps.

The alleyway is a maze. It doesn’t empty out neatly into a long stretch. He has to turn the corner before he’s actually in it. That’s where he sees you.

You’re pressed against the wall; not struggling anymore, but your body still shakes at the edges. The man is slumped over your frame. He’s violently pushed to the ground- and this is- it’s dangerous.

Stu could very well be dead now.

You’re standing there panting and holding a bloody knife as you catch your breath over the body of a dead man.

You hear Stu take a few steps forward, your head shooting up with wide eyes.

“Oh, shit.” The two teens say in sync.

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