Bound Pair

Noah was used to being alone. In high school hallways lined with hand-holding couples, his solitude felt more than empty—it was suffocating. To him, the world was made for people in pairs, like atoms in a molecule, drawn to each other with some invisible force he seemed to lack. Watching others laugh, whisper, and share secrets stirred something dark inside him, an ache that seemed to erode him day by day.

He'd fancied a few girls, but each one dismissed him, usually with a look of disgust, like he was something that didn't belong. His heart bore scars from these moments, each one a fresh reminder of his isolation. He blamed everything for his loneliness: fate, rotten luck, even his parents for bringing him into a world where happiness and romance were just beyond his reach.

Desperation soon turned into an obsession. Like Pygmalion of myth, who'd crafted his perfect lover from marble, Noah decided he would make someone who would adore him and only him. In the dim light of his basement, he set to work, piecing together scraps of fabric, bits of straw, and wires from his father's workshop. He was no artist, and his creation looked grotesque, a patchwork of lopsided features and mismatched textures. Yet, in his eyes, she was beautiful, precisely because he'd made her.

He named her Lydia.

Every night, Noah sat beside her, whispering secrets, dreams, and hopes that he'd kept locked away for years. She was his captive audience, and he her creator, bound by the strings of his affection. He imagined her soft voice replying, imagined her cold, straw-filled hands warming in his own.

But the longing in his heart was unsatisfied. He needed her to love him back. And so, he made a pact. He didn't know if he believed in the supernatural, but desperation makes believers of us all. Late one night, he whispered a plea to the shadows, to any spirit, demon, or force that might listen. He'd give anything—his soul, his dreams—if only Lydia would come to life.

A stillness settled over the room, thick as fog. Then he heard it—the faintest creak of straw. He froze, heart pounding, as Lydia's head tilted, her eyes—dark buttons he'd sewn on—staring into his own. She looked…aware. Alive.

"Noah…" she whispered in a voice as soft and raspy as rustling leaves. His heart raced with exhilaration and terror all at once.

She leaned forward, and he could almost feel warmth radiating from her face. He leaned in too, intoxicated, consumed by the fantasy made real. But as he moved closer, Lydia's button eyes narrowed, her sewn mouth stretching into a twisted smile. Her straw fingers reached out, curling around his arm in an iron grip he hadn't anticipated.

"Noah… you're mine now," she said, voice darkening, growing menacing. His thrill curdled into fear as her grip tightened, her straw fingers clawing deeper, leaving pinpricks of blood on his skin.

He struggled, but Lydia's hold only grew stronger, her body no longer mere straw and fabric, but something that pulsed with a sinister life. She was as possessive as he had been, her love as consuming as his loneliness.

Now, he sits beside her every night, no longer out of choice but compulsion, bound by the very desire that had once consumed him. His friends and family have begun to notice his absence, but he's beyond their reach, chained by a lover of his own making, a twisted embodiment of all he yearned for.

In the dark stillness of his basement, they sit together—Noah and Lydia, two halves of a macabre pair. But for Noah, the romance is long gone, leaving only regret, a flickering candle of horror, and the knowledge that his wish had been granted too well.