Oliver Lawrence wasn't an impulsive person. His decisions were rarely made without back-and-forth debate. His decisions were rarely made by himself, period. He was both blessed and cursed with being a brain-over-heart thinker. Sure, it took a couple hundred years to decide whether or not to do something, but he hardly regretted his choices.

Oliver Lawrence wasn't an impulsive person.

So why was he scouring the aisles for a gallon of bleach at this hour? He rocks back and forth on the soles of his feet before settling on the most expensive gallon. Expensive equals better, right?

Clammy hands grasp the plastic handle with unnecessary strength as he hastily scurries to the register before closing. There isn't much of a line; everyone else had already tucked in for the night. There was only him, the cashier, and the array of security cameras.

"9 dollars, 99 cents." The cashier holds her hand out, awaiting the cash as she monotonously commands.

The annoyance laced in her voice snaps Oliver back into reality. With shaky hands, he opens his wallet to hand over crumpled bills and coins. She huffs, counting the coins and tossing them into the register. Oliver practically trips over his own feet getting back to his car, not bothering to take his receipt.

Oliver had never been a particularly religious person. But, if there was a God somewhere out there, they would put him out of his misery and finally let him wake up from whatever this shit show is.

If God existed, they clearly didn't give a damn about him.

Everything was how he left it when he impulsively drove to the store. It was... serene.

It was comforting to know what would come next. So why was he struggling to find solace?

He drops to his knees and opens the gallon, the sting of bleach filling his nostrils, yet still not being able to overpower the other pungent stench in the vicinity. You didn't need a particular skill set to clean up bodily fluids. Pour the bleach, scrub the ground, rinse the brush. On the other hand, cleaning it well was another question. It felt like subsyndromal insanity. No matter how much he scrubbed, how much he poured, the image and the smell would never leave.

Blood mixed with tears. Insanity leaked into sanity. He did the right thing, but why did it feel so sickening? The taste of bile and salty tears fills his throat. Oliver cleaned and cleaned, but the puddle grew and grew. There was no point in participating in his self-imposed torture any longer.

Work on his script. He was good at working. He could do that.

He didn't mean to. He didn't know what happened to the body. Perhaps they were still alive and left. It's not like he was trained to aim for the aorta.

Honestly, Oliver's mind blurred too heavily. He couldn't even remember which store he had gone to, let alone where the body was, only guess.

The thumping of the wall. Or the floor. Or inside the sofa. It was here. Somewhere here. He knew that much. Why was it still beating?

Oliver tips over the entire gallon, pouring it out onto himself and the floor, letting everything bathe in chemicals. He leans down, lapping it up like a cat drinking from its water bowl. It stings for the first few sips, but Oliver didn't mind. If his sins couldn't be cleansed, at least his body would be.