someone saved my life tonight
‘I didn’t kill her’
He said nothing.
We all knew, in this moment, all of us. We knew that there was more to be spoken. I was unsure how many were here watching. The shadows were vast, the light cast a small safe haven in a sea of darkness. I knew they were out there, in various forms. No doubt.
All was quiet as we waited.
I was cool. I knew I wouldn’t be breaking the silence. Not me, I had spent most of this life in silence. Like a ballast tank – I was easily equal to the silence pushing on me from outside. I sat, not moving, looking in his eyes, and then, when I least expected it sweet freedom whispered in my ear.
‘you did.’
‘I didn’t. I didn’t kill her …’ I felt no relief at the sound of my voice. I felt as if I had been duped, yet deeper down, nearer to my soul, I felt … a truth. This was exactly as it was meant to be.
‘I didn’t kill her’ Louder this time. ’She just died’.
She just died in my arms, and then, and then, she was gone. Even as I said it it sounded false, surprisingly so. How come I wondered? Why does that not sound right, after all this time, after all that has happened since. Why now should that sound … awkward, wrong on my tongue. Was this what a deeper truth did? Was everything on the surface now … questionable?
That was what happened.
That was what happened?
‘You killed her’, he spoke softly and quietly with careful aim, ‘and then you killed yourself’.
What! What the hell is this? A dream? Immediately I see the blessing in that. I see the door is open, my hands no longer tied to the chair. This is a dream, my dream. Ha! I am free motherfucker! I am a butterfly!
‘What are you talking about? How the hell could I have done that and be here talking with you. Be interrogated by you?’ I speak. It doesn’t make sense. That’s right, it doesn’t make sense, and there is a reason for that. Fuck. Fuck. What was that? Stop.
Stop, don’t say anything.
‘How could I..’ the words die away. I am lost once again,
A voice from the dark. A memory.
‘That’s why you are here talking with us’. That’s why. Of course, makes complete sense to me. Tell me then, tell me how I did that? How I managed to kill her, and myself, and be here.
I’m speaking into the dark now. There is no volume, no substance to this darkness. It is I who seems to radiate light. Nothing else.
‘TELL ME!’, TELL ME!’ I hear nothing. I scream and there is no sound.
I am afraid. I know. I know.
‘I want to know’. A whisper from all that is not me. Dark no longer, now just an other, a void, an emptiness. ‘I want to know when you first met her. I want to know what makes a sweet guy turn so mean. I know about the end, I want to know about the start. Beginnings and endings. Births and deaths. Tell me!’
I was in a hurry I remember. Looking for something. I was … it comes to me like a rush. A tsunami that sweeps me away. I know. I know where I was.
Tags: loosefiction