In Fog -- 23
Ah, but my joy in the slaughter did not last, my love. I would not be here now if it did. As I slept, washed and dried of all that death, cradled in warm arms and warmer skin...those deaths haunted me.
They all did, in fact, every one. Every moment I slept, and when I was awake. Whenever I closed my eyes, I could not escape the faces, the screams. As delicious as they were in the breaths I took them, in the pain, the agony, all of it so beautiful...when all was quiet, calm, they wailed with sharper voice.
With shaky breaths, with gasps and giggles and tightly held silence they tormented me. Reminding me of all I had become, even as I refused to feed that darkness, even when I insisted against the death, they wailed.
Monster, fiend, unholy wretch! They called me. They were not wrong, of course; I had become all I accused it of being in our first week together. Worse, in fact, for I was not born to it, I chose it.
But never had those voices wailed louder than that day, my love, after that train.
That death, that blood, magnificent in its taste, its touch, its song...the quiet after it shredded me.
There had been children on that train, children, my love.
We fed on their death as all the others. Quick, painless—I made sure of it—but we killed them all the same. I killed them. Oh how it smiled when I did. So wide, so proud and I ached to earn it. But the voices would not leave me, their faces would not leave me.
When I woke in our stolen room, drenched in chill sweat and hot shame, it was there to soothe me—always there, ready to calm my weeping soul. My dreams were as bright and clear to it as all my thoughts, all my heart, and I needed no words to explain my terror.
“Witnesses, darling, you had to,” it comforted with gentle hands, soft kisses.
“I know, love,” I answered with kisses of my own, all over those sweet hands, and I did know, it was necessary for our survival to go unseen, “but, did I?”
“They would have given us away,” harder those gray eyes, tighter the hands, “our trick aside, we would be hunted everywhere, unable to have a moment of peace.”
It was right, was it not? Still I doubted, “You cannot die and I, I am not sure I can anymore either. What would it matter if all the world hunted us?”
“Did you enjoy our time at the beach,” its voice cut, fingers leaving my skin as it shrunk to the edge of our stolen bed, “what of the market, or that old woman’s home, do you long for more moments like those, more comforts?”
“Yes,” I reached and it shrunk further, “of course.”
Sudden, sharp, it snapped at me, “Then there can be no witnesses.”
I fell quiet in that snap, in that burst of fear—masquerading as anger—I had not seen in weeks, at least. And it noticed, softened, and reached for me with careful hands, pulling me into its arms. The nightmares were troubling, of course, but more was its fear and in that embrace, so warm and calming, I worried of it.
Too loudly, perhaps, worrying of what it would do if I did what built with the nightmares, that which had gnawed. I did not think with words, my love, I had none to give what I felt. But I had images of ‘home’, of fog, of you, and it saw them all.
“You cannot save them,” it told my hair, puffing my scalp with hot breath, “and if you think to drag me to them, to put them back in this body it is too late.”
That had not occurred, I told it so, “You misunderstand what you see, love. That is not my want. I love you, as you are.” And I did. I had no understanding for what I wanted, not yet. I only knew the nightmares would get worse if I did not find you. “I need to go back,” I told it, kissing the neck too close to ignore, “but not for why you think.”
All of me so open to it, it saw all I considered, whether certain myself or not I was laid bare before it. Pushing me away, just enough, it stared at what were likely wet, shimmering eyes for how I felt, “How do you know that will work?”
I smiled, or tried, “You fear my shadows, love, so surely there must be something in them that would—”
“A hunch,” it scoffed, gripping me tighter, “you leave me alone, on a hunch?”
“I cannot keep waking to these nightmares, love. I question everything we do, everything we are, no matter how sweet your touch, how kind your affections,” I cried then, weeping openly and it held me closer as I continued, “I know we are monsters, truly, we are. But I love you and I will be this monster for you. Yet I...I cannot be what you want, what you need of me while this wretched guilt haunts me.”
Petting my head then, it cooed, “Alright, darling, alright. Go to your love then, obtain this closure...and come back to me,” shifting to catch my eyes, it asked, “but with how far we have traveled, how will you find me again?”
“I think I could find you from across the sea, and this is barely across the country,” I smiled, and it narrowed its eyes before it returned it.
But it did return it, and the kiss, and all the others that followed.
We spent the remainder of that day, much of the evening...all of the next, in that bed, in that stolen moment of calm gifted by resolution.
Until it was ready to let me go.
After aiding me in dressing, and taking great care with my hair, it pressed a hand-drawn map into my hands. “In case you cannot find me,” it sighed, speaking to the map, “we were so close to home.”
Lifting its face to mine, I smiled, “I thought we were going everywhere, carving a trail of hot blood and sweet pain?”
“Tease,” it said, looking away from me, “And maybe we will, when you come back. I will wait there; in the mountains...you will find me, return to me?”
“All the world could not stop me, love,” If my words were not enough convincing, I hoped my lips and eager, desperate tongue were.
But I will not know until I find it, for that was the last I saw of my partner, my monster...
6 notes
·
View notes