The desperation he felt had weight. The sorrow coated him like a sodden blanket and wrapped him so tightly he could feel its suffocating grasp. Every breath was a shuddering, wheezing fit wracked with hitching sadness and the never-ending flow of tears. But worst of all --the thing that held him in a vice grip of shame and misery-- was the guilt. Why had he even given in? Why had it become acceptable with him? Why hadn't he seen it coming? The tumult of questions beat at his head like a progression of angry drums.
And alone he sat. He'd allow his mind freedom to wander without even remembering giving it permission. It would trace the trail of shock and revelation backwards through the days. It would trip over visions, stumble headlong into occasions, and fall head first into moments just as it had the first go round, only this time witnessing each with the outcome first. And sometimes his unconscious would stick and repeat like a movie frame caught on a fleck of broken film. He'd relive those monstrous memories over and over, always knowing how each would end but praying nonetheless that this time... this time he could effect them for the better. But never. And then he'd jostle his head, shake himself free from the torturous thoughts, and snap himself back into the now. The now that was flooded with grief, unanswered questions, and dark, vast, endless sorrow.
And his desperation had a weight like a revenant's chains. They slowly, methodically drug him lower and lower to where, in all actuality, his head languidly lay on the ground. And he wept. The seething guile he knew was finally exposed ratcheted through his mind like a thousand connecting cogs. And he'd lifelessly beat at his head in a harmless attempt to knock loose the thoughts that sought nothing more than to consume him in a fit of ravenous madness. Fear would bubble to the surface and send his teeth to chatter, just as his wanton need to project his weakness on anything else would push away the terror and try to take control. Wrath won out all too often and he felt as though his blood would scream, super-heated from his veins causing him the forbidden comfort of bleeding to death as he bawled for what he'd lost.
Though it was she who brutally trod on his heart with her deceit and blatant duplicity that ultimately reduced him to a fragmented husk, it was always the thing that began it. He'd long since forgotten how it came to them; never was one to hang onto stories about objects. But it had come to them and it had brought with it the immoral, disastrous, fiendish misgivings that gradually forced a wedge between them, culminating in her desire to insult him and make him suffer. She fell under its mesmerizing charm. She succumbed to its morbid revulsion, and with it she fed. She became a glutton on the negativity it poured forth, and she eventually turned... into something else. Her actions were deplorable and her explanations despicable. She buried her thoughtless words and actions into him like daggers.
He was done. He saw no road ahead, no distant, glimmering horizon. He was done. His life had sloughed from him like a layer of dead flesh; she removed that cleanly. He was done and he knew it. No silver lining, no darkness prior to a better dawn, and he could care less how much greener some other pasture might be. Nothing mattered. Nothing worth anything remained.
The hull-grey .45 sat desolate on the table. He stared at it for a bit. He licked his lips wondering how the metal would taste and if it would shatter his teeth before darkness fell. He fingered the trigger and scooped up the gun. It felt icy in his cradling palm; icy but somehow inviting. He glanced down one last time at the pulsating, undulating rouge hue that swam across the surface of the amulet as it hung, and hummed, from is neck.
He was done.
And alone he sat. He'd allow his mind freedom to wander without even remembering giving it permission. It would trace the trail of shock and revelation backwards through the days. It would trip over visions, stumble headlong into occasions, and fall head first into moments just as it had the first go round, only this time witnessing each with the outcome first. And sometimes his unconscious would stick and repeat like a movie frame caught on a fleck of broken film. He'd relive those monstrous memories over and over, always knowing how each would end but praying nonetheless that this time... this time he could effect them for the better. But never. And then he'd jostle his head, shake himself free from the torturous thoughts, and snap himself back into the now. The now that was flooded with grief, unanswered questions, and dark, vast, endless sorrow.
And his desperation had a weight like a revenant's chains. They slowly, methodically drug him lower and lower to where, in all actuality, his head languidly lay on the ground. And he wept. The seething guile he knew was finally exposed ratcheted through his mind like a thousand connecting cogs. And he'd lifelessly beat at his head in a harmless attempt to knock loose the thoughts that sought nothing more than to consume him in a fit of ravenous madness. Fear would bubble to the surface and send his teeth to chatter, just as his wanton need to project his weakness on anything else would push away the terror and try to take control. Wrath won out all too often and he felt as though his blood would scream, super-heated from his veins causing him the forbidden comfort of bleeding to death as he bawled for what he'd lost.
Though it was she who brutally trod on his heart with her deceit and blatant duplicity that ultimately reduced him to a fragmented husk, it was always the thing that began it. He'd long since forgotten how it came to them; never was one to hang onto stories about objects. But it had come to them and it had brought with it the immoral, disastrous, fiendish misgivings that gradually forced a wedge between them, culminating in her desire to insult him and make him suffer. She fell under its mesmerizing charm. She succumbed to its morbid revulsion, and with it she fed. She became a glutton on the negativity it poured forth, and she eventually turned... into something else. Her actions were deplorable and her explanations despicable. She buried her thoughtless words and actions into him like daggers.
He was done. He saw no road ahead, no distant, glimmering horizon. He was done. His life had sloughed from him like a layer of dead flesh; she removed that cleanly. He was done and he knew it. No silver lining, no darkness prior to a better dawn, and he could care less how much greener some other pasture might be. Nothing mattered. Nothing worth anything remained.
The hull-grey .45 sat desolate on the table. He stared at it for a bit. He licked his lips wondering how the metal would taste and if it would shatter his teeth before darkness fell. He fingered the trigger and scooped up the gun. It felt icy in his cradling palm; icy but somehow inviting. He glanced down one last time at the pulsating, undulating rouge hue that swam across the surface of the amulet as it hung, and hummed, from is neck.
He was done.
