There she is again, performing her little play as though the world exists solely for her stage. That grin of hers cuts across her face, wide and polished, like something practiced in the mirror until it gleamed with false charm, carried by those plump lips. To anyone else, it might be dazzling. To me, it’s nothing but a predator’s lure, sweetened poison dressed as warmth.

Her hair tumbles with the breeze, strands catching the light as though nature itself conspires to flatter her. People sigh, endeared at the effortless beauty of it. The way it dances without her raising a hand, the way it frames her face. But all I see is a jumble of messy threads clings to one another, sticking, suffocating like cobwebs against skin.

Her sun-bronzed complexion glows in the daylight, the kind of skin others envy for its radiance. Yet to my eyes, it’s slick, too bright, a sheen that makes her look sticky to the touch. It looked oily. Even her clothes, curved tight around her form—mock me. They look suffocating, restrictive, yet she moves in them like they’re weightless, unbothered, flaunting the ease that grates on my every nerve.

Her perfume, cloying, syrupy, choking the air.

Then there’s her voice. Too high. Too sharp. Each word a note that lingers long after the sound fades, like the scrape of glass on stone. And her eyes—those emerald, gleaming eyes, they carry that ‘spark’. Others call it life. I call it calculation.

Every detail that enchants the world only deepens the bile in me and pits my mind into nausea. Because I know better. I see the siren lurking underneath the shimmering water. And everything about her makes my blood curdle.