Authors Note: Before reading, you will need to check out my short story, The Fan, https://www.wattpad.com/story/12686127-the-fan-featured-by-wattpad-2014  if you haven't done already, as this little tale is based on events and characters in the original story. I originally wrote The Rockstar to be included in a Halloween anthology here on Wattpad and to be honest, I always had reservations as to whether I should even revisit The Fan or just leave the characters where they were. In fact, I had so many reservations that I didn't even pimp the story out when it was posted because I was kind of embarrassed by it and didn't feel it was my best work. I still don't, but at least I don't hate it as much as I did before. I've made a few changes since the original draft was posted, but only because my bezzie mate copper, told me it was factually incorrect in the eyes of the law. Bah. F*ck the law, eh ;-) 

Thank you for reading, as always, Linz xxx

***

KYLE DONOVAN FOUND NOT GUILTY IN LIFT HORROR MANSLAUGHTER SHOCKER!

Fans were celebrating today to learn that Death in the Asylum frontman, Kyle Donovan, has been found not guilty of manslaughter over the death of eighteen-year-old stalker Candice Coleman during July's nationwide blackout.

Donovan, 28, was discovered by fire and rescue services in the lift of The Dorchester Hotel, over fourteen hours after it broke down when cyber-hackers disabled the National Grid. The body of Coleman, a self-confessed superfan of the group, was found with the star, after Donovan killed her, in what his solicitor maintained, was an act of self-defence.

Following further investigations of Coleman's home, where she lived with her parents and fifteen-year old brother, Cruise, police confirmed they had discovered disturbing evidence that the teenager had stalked the star for a lengthy period of time before her death and had even hatched a plot to kill him and herself, detailed in a bizarre series of fan fiction stories posted on popular writing community website Wattpad.

Coleman's close friend Becka Jennings said yesterday "Candice told me of her plans to kill Kyle but I never thought she meant it. I mean, she loved him, like, really loved him, she was his biggest fan. She said they were going to be together forever." 

***

There it was again. The crack of bone. The dull thwack of skull as it hit the floor.

Again, and again and again.

And all the while that damn camera shutter sound clicked furiously as if he was being papped while he smashed in her head, until the crack of bone was replaced by the soft squelch of brain tissue.

Kyle Donovan, lead singer of the internationally famous rock band, Death in the Asylum, son of Rita and Brian Donovan, coke addict and now murderer of an obsessed fan, sat bolt upright up in bed, the sweat streaming down his back as his eyes strained to see into the shadowy corners of the bedroom.

He'd heard something. Something beyond the nightmares. Something that had come to him in the dead of night and whispered into his ear. Something that had left the scent of apples hanging in the air. Or maybe that was just him.

The smell of her perfume had stuck with him since that night in the lift. No matter how much he scrubbed at his skin, he'd not been able to rid himself of it. Of course, he'd not been able to rid himself of the stench of piss or blood either, but it was that sharp, sickly apple fragrance that haunted him wherever he went.

Even in the police cell where they'd made a half-hearted effort to cover up the cloying stench of urine with extra-strength bleach that clung to every surface, Kyle had still smelt her apple scent, not just on his own skin, but in the air, as if she were sitting right next to him on the cot, with her ample cleavage pressed against his arm and smiling that inane, plastic grin. The same grin that her corpse wore for the next five hours that Kyle was stuck in the lift. The same grin that seemed to mock him as the doors finally opened and his rescuers gawped at the sight of her broken skull and Kyle - international superstar no less - covered in her blood.

Sat there in the middle of the impossibly large bed, which seemed now ridiculously large without his usually gaggle of nameless, nubile groupies, Kyle's eyes quickly adjusted to the shadows that lurked in the corners, thanks to the light that shone through the crack in the door of the en-suite. It was just enough light to help him sleep at night and he hated himself for needing it, hated that at the age of twenty-eight he couldn't sleep without a light on.

Dude, you got yourself a nightlight? Awwwww poor baby 'fraid of the dark?

And he was. He was afraid. He was afraid of the dark. He was afraid of closed-in spaces. He was afraid of paparazzi shouting his name over and over. He was afraid of faces he didn't know and afraid of faces he'd known for ages. But most of all he was afraid of her.

Her. Candice Coleman.

He thought that when he had found out her name, it would make her seem more...human. More than just a crazy fan he'd been stuck in a lift with for nine hours. More than just a monstrous thing he'd killed before she could kill him. More than just a ghost who had haunted him ever since.

And haunted him she had. He'd seen her face everywhere. At the hospital. At the police station afterwards. In amongst the bastard paparazzi hoard that had waited like ghouls to catch a glimpse of him. In the courthouse. Knowing her name had just made her real – flesh-and-blood-real - and now he was more scared of her than when he'd been screaming and pounding her head against the floor of the lift. Again, and again and again.

"Fucking crazy idiot," he mumbled to himself. "Scared of a dead girl. You're losing it, dude. really bloody losing it."

Reaching up to massage the back of his neck, he winced at the sharp stab of pain that was spiking right up to his temples. Peeling the covers off his clammy legs, he pushed himself off the bed, hitting the switch and flooding the room with light, immediately feeling a sense of comfort as it momentarily stung his eyes. The light felt good, really good. Like that first line of the day. Like that first shot of Jack. Better even than Kiki What's-her-face and she'd felt damn good - at least she had until he'd passed out in the back of the tour bus.

Padding barefoot through his Notting Hill apartment - the one he was about to put back on the market thanks to the loose-mouthed wife of his estate agent, who had leaked the address during her bi-monthly visit to Bitches That Blow Dry or whatever the fuck it was called - Kyle switched each light on in turn, feeling his breathing finally settle back to normal once the whole place was illuminated like a football pitch.

Opening the door of the American-sized fridge - more light, even better - he grabbed a bottle of chilled still water and emptying the last couple of pills from the tub on the counter, Kyle chugged them down, feeling them grate against his throat on the way. The kitchen waste bin contained too many empty bottles of painkillers. Of course, Lizzie would have told him it was better than empty bottles of whiskey.

That shits going to kill you, Kyle. Or that filth you shovel up your nose. One day it's going to bloody kill you.

As it turned out, it wasn't booze and drugs he'd had to be worried about. It was girls with fuck-me eyes and too much lip-gloss. It was girls who posted stories on stupid websites. Stories where they want you to screw them, abuse them, do whatever-the-hell-you-wanted to them. Whatever happened to getting married and living happily ever after anyway? These girls - these crazed, obsessed girls - didn't want that anymore. They wanted sex, violence, death. That was their happy-ever-after now.

"I bet you're not happy now, are you, Candice?" Kyle muttered. "I bet you're not happy at all. Well, fucking cheers to that, you crazy bitch." He raised the water bottle in mock-salute to an empty apartment and took a swig, before spitting it out into the sink, feeling the nausea hitting him hard in the gut.

The water tasted of apples.

*

"How many times as we going to go over this? We've been over it so many times already."

"Mr. Donovan, while I appreciate a world-class celebrity such as yourself must have much better things to do than sit in a very drab interview room, a girl is dead and it's important to maintain the facts."

"I've told you the facts. I've told you bloody everything. She was fucking crazy. You saw what she had in her bag. You showed me yourself. She was going to bloody kill me!"

DI Stonewall was a hard-arse. One of those red-nosed whiskey drinking coppers with enough scars to show he'd seen some action in his time. One of those coppers who looked like he sprinkled crushed glass on his cereal every morning. Stonewall was a stalwart of that generation who had little time for soft gits like Kyle who had probably never done a single day's hard work in his miserable life.

The detective sighed and leaned back in the plastic backed chair, making it creak in protest. "Mr. Donovan, right now there is no evidence to prove...."

"No evidence? She had a knife! She had a story in her notepad, all about how she was going to slit my throat, stab me ....and you're saying that's not evidence?"

"We are carrying out further investigations at the victim's home...."

"Stop calling her the victim. She wasn't a victim, she was...."

I'm your biggest fan.

Kyle froze. He'd heard her. But not in his head. Here, in this room, as if she was standing right by his side, whispering in his ear. He didn't want to glance to his left because he knew he'd see her, with her sparkly belly button piercing on show, her shirt buttoned way too low, her perfect glossed lips and her smashed, pulped skull oozing blood.

I would do anything for you.

Clutching his head in his hands, he closed his eyes but that was no good either because he knew she was still there. He could smell her.

"I believe my client needs to take a break."

"I don't need to take a break."

Look at me, Kyle.

She had the knife. The knife she'd hidden in her bag, the one she had planned to kill him with, before then killing herself. Holding the knife, she drew it slowly across her wrist, smiling, smiling, smiling, as the blood seeped out from the thin slash. She was standing so close that it was dripping down onto the table. Pat-pat-pat.

"Mr. Donovan, maybe your brief here is right, perhaps we should take a break?"

Look at what I did for you Kyle. All for you, babeeeeeeeey.

And he looked, covering his mouth with his hand in a way he hoped looked casual, when all he wanted to do was scream and scream and scream.

The letters were roughly carved, but unmistakable.

K-Y-L-E

Carved right into the skin, from elbow to wrist. Four bloodied letters. All for him.

"Mr. Donovan?"

Kyle snapped, wrenching his eyes away from the girl as she twirled a lock of blonde hair around her finger and ran her tongue suggestively over her lips.

"Everything was just as I told you. That girl was nuts! She told me she'd been to my house. She'd been watching me. She knew stuff, private stuff. Do you have any idea what that's like? Knowing someone has been creeping around outside your house, rooting through your rubbish, tracking your every move? She took pictures of me taking a piss. She took pictures of me when I was asleep in the lift. When I caught her, she went crazy. I mean, she said she loved me, for God's sake! Who says stuff like that to someone they don't really know? I was frightened for my life. She was going to kill me. I did what I did, but I'm not the one in the wrong here. She was completely fucking mental and you're looking at me like I'm the crazy one? She was crazy. Not me. Not me!"

Stonewall eyeballed him for a moment, taking in the sweat that peppered Kyle's brow, the way his hands were jerking as he talked, the way his whole body was trembling. Then he sighed and reached over to the tape recorder.

"Interview terminated at 8.24pm."

*

"Bro, seriously, I mean, don't you have a cleaner for this? What happened to Dora or Flora, or whatever the Hell she was called?"

Kyle gritted his teeth and carried on scrubbing at the bathroom floor. "Her name is Cora, and I gave her the week off."

Donny 'Snake' Morrison, lead guitarist in Death in the Asylum and Kyle's usual partner in all his drug and booze-fuelled crimes, lay out on Kyle's ridiculously large bed, messing up the covers that Kyle had already straightened out five times that afternoon.

"Whatever, dude," he said, rolling his eyes. "I still don't understand why you're scrubbing the floor. It looks pretty damn clean to me."

"It's not," snapped Kyle, thrusting the cloth back into the bucket of bleached water. "It needs cleaning. What's it got to do with you anyway?"

Snake laughed. "Bloody hell, bro, just chill the fuck out will you. I'm just not used to seeing you down on your knees, if you know what I mean? And besides, I thought we could go back to mine and celebrate?"

Kyle shot up from all fours and sat back on his heels. "Celebrate? What the Hell do I have to celebrate? Am I meant to throw a bloody party or something?"

"Hey, dude, you got off a manslaughter charge. You were found not guilty. I reckon things could be much worse, to be honest."

"Worse?" Kyle glowered at him and clenched his bleach-raw fists. "You think things could be worse for me right now? I killed a girl, Donny. I smashed her brains out."

"Dude, it was self-defence. That bitch was a grade-A certifiable freaking loon. You know what the filth found at her house...all those pictures of you on her walls, the ones she took herself. All that shit she took from your rubbish bins. And don't even get me started on all those stories she posted on that crazy fan girl site! I mean, who writes shit like that? She was fucking insane, man." He waggled his finger round and round to indicate just how crazy he thought she was and pulled a stupid face.

"You think this is funny?" Kyle stared at him, incredulous that his friend could make a joke about it, like it was nothing. "You think I should be having a good laugh about it? Poor old Kyle gets stuck in a lift for hours with some total head-case who wrote stories about killing him and you think it's a bloody joke?"

Snake sat up, sweeping his long straightened fringe off his face. "Woah. Dude, come on. I'm just trying to make light of a bad situation here. And anyway, you're freaking me out a bit. I know what you went through was totally screwed-up. I mean, damn, that blackout was just insane. The things that happened to people. The things people did. It was like the whole country just went to the dogs, man. The power went out and never came back on and everyone thought that it was Arma-Fucking-Geddon. It was Hell out there."

Yeah, thought Kyle, but you weren't out there, were you? You were safely holed up in your pad with Kiki and the rest of her skank friends, getting high and all the while I was the one in Hell.

"Look, Kyle, my man, all I'm saying is that I know you've been through something really traumatic. I mean, prison on remand must have been fucking horrible. Being in there with all those criminals and shit..."

Kyle almost laughed out loud at that. It wasn't the criminals that had bothered him. It was when the lights had gone out. When she whispered his name over and over. When he felt her breath on his face during the night. When he saw her in the canteen. In the visiting room. In his cell.

"...But even more reason to come back to mine and let off some steam. You can't stay here and scrub the floors forever, it's just...weird, dude, really weird. Even I can see it's clean and I've never scrubbed a damn floor in my life."

Kyle wanted to tell him that it wasn't clean. He wanted to tell him but he knew how crazy it sounded and he was pure damn tired of everyone looking at him like he had totally lost the plot. He was already the killer rock-star who'd slaughtered some fan during the blackout. He didn't want to be the killer rock-star that went insane, because he knew he wasn't crazy.

So, he didn't say anything. He didn't say how he'd walked in there earlier to find it written in blood over every surface. The mirror. The walls. The floor. The shower. The ceiling. Everywhere. And no matter how much he scrubbed he could still see the letters.

Just like it had looked carved into her skin.

K-Y-L-E

*******

The lights were out.

The en-suite. The hallway. The kitchen. Every single one.

Kyle eased himself up in bed very slowly, still feeling the effects of the half bottle of Jack he'd consumed at Snake's place. He knew he shouldn't have gone. He knew it as soon as he'd walked through the door and found the place teeming with people. Too many girls wearing lip-gloss smiles and little else. Too many people he didn't recognise. Too many people cutting lines in the bathroom. Too many wanting a piece of him, so in the end he'd grabbed a cab home, pulling his hood low over his face all the way back to Notting Hill. A few of the more persistent news hounds still waited outside his place, baying for his blood because they hated the fact he'd been found not guilty. As he walked passed by, he flipped them the bird and breathed a big sigh of relief when he was inside and could turn on all the lights.

But now the lights were out and Kyle could feel the panic rising and his bladder pressing painfully against his stomach and weakening by the second.

Everything seemed smaller in the dark. More confined. More closed-in. It felt like the walls were moving in, crushing the darkness against him until it filled his lungs, poisoning him, making it difficult to breathe.

Scrambling over to the edge of the bed, he fumbled for the light switch on the wall, letting out a small moan when he clicked it again and again to no avail. He couldn't deal with another blackout. Just the thought of it made him want to throw up.

Scrabbling around on the bedside cabinet, knocking numerous pill bottles over in the process, Kyle found his phone and jabbed at the screen with a trembling finger, the immediate glow softly illuminating his face. Swiping the screen up, he found the button for the flashlight and switched it on, holding the phone up in front of him so he could sweep the light around the room, checking every corner.

"You're at home. You can deal with this," he whispered to himself. "Get a grip."

With his bladder reaching bursting point, he slipped out of bed and using the light of the phone to guide him, he found his way to the en-suite, pushing open the door with caution and exhaling a shaky breath when everything seemed exactly as it should be.

"You're going bloody crazy, Donovan, truly bloody insane," he said to himself, before stopping in front of the basin to wash his hands, splashing cold water on his face. The JD haze was still fogging his brain.

Scrolling through his call list, he hit the most familiar number, listening to it ring and ring before finally, a very groggy Snake answered.

"Dude, it's 5.09, man. Why the Hell are you ringing me?"

"It's happened again, right? They hacked the grid. I don't think I can do it again, Donny. I don't even care that I sound like a baby, I can't sit in the dark, not on my own. Can you come over?"

There was silence on the line for a split second. "Kyle, did you take something, bro?"

"What? Of course I haven't. Why?"

"Because there's no blackout, man. The power's still on. Maybe your fuse blew. Just call the bloody maintenance guy or something."

The line went dead and Kyle looked up into the mirror.

His bladder, which was already shrieking in terror, was the first thing to go. He felt the hot stream of liquid trickle down his thigh, forming a small puddle at his feet. The second to go was his legs, although of course, that came a little while after, giving him plenty of time to see the bloodied words, only this time it wasn't his name they spelt out. It was hers.

C-A-N-D-I-C-E

That name that had made her real, that had brought her to life even though Kyle knew she was dead. That name. Over and over again. And not on the walls or the floor or even the ceiling, but on him. Carved into every inch of his skin. Her name in little raised welts all over his body.

The stench of apples and piss now was overwhelming and Kyle knew she was there even before he saw her face in the mirror, even before she pushed her cold body against his from behind, her icy fingers clutching at his back, tracing fingertips over her name carved into the skin on his shoulder.

"Oh, would you look at that," the dead girl whispered, her lip-gloss smile stretching wide across her pale, puffy face. "You're my biggest fan." 

***

Author's Note: Okay, so as with all my short stories, I do love an open-ending. All theories welcome! What do we think happened to Kyle? Is this just the work of his paranoid-drug-addled mind? Or has superfan Candice reached out from beyond the grave to claim her prize? I hope you enjoyed, and if you did, please don't forget to hit the vote button and leave a comment - thank you, my lovelies!