Love you to Death.
Chapter 1: Prologue.
"There's no end to what I'll do… because I love you, I love you to death."
- - -
Tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick…
It was all he heard. The ticking, the incessant ticking. Why wouldn't it end? Where was it coming from? He felt himself becoming more numb as it continued its tedious and steady rhythm, every passing second… moving from the tips of his toes, up to the single strands of his hair. God, how he would love to just reach out and grab the sound and squeeze its life out. Was that even possible? Had he gone so far past the throes of insanity that already he was imagining himself killing a sound?
"What was summer like for you?" she asked him with a smile.
"What's tomorrow without you?" he silently replied.
Oh God, how it hurt.
He wanted to scream. He wanted to throw something and watch it smash and fall to pieces like his life. He wanted to tear his clothes off and rip apart his flesh and etch away his miserable existence. He wanted to die.
Tick, tick, tick, tick…
How sweet death would be at this moment. Nothing, nothing, could erase the feeling that was encasing his body right now. It was like an invisible demon had come to life inside of him, eating what he ate, using his oxygen to let its wretched heart beat life, and draining his energy to keep itself going.
Please, please Lord… I know I'm not exactly in your top list, but please spare me. Spare me Lord. Spare me this horrid pain and I will forever be in your debt. If it is even possible, I would raise a church in three days for you.
But he knew his thoughts and silent cries and pleas were falling upon deaf ears. God didn't care.
- - -
The voices echoed about in his bleak mind, reminding him of the past couple of weeks. Had it not been for the painkillers and being numbed from the world, he would never be living this hell right now. He was utmost positive he would have found a tall building by now.
He laid still for a moment, wondering if he should open his eyes. He knew once they were open he would have to come back to reality. But for a moment…
Erik shifted, his hand feeling the hem of the nightgown that all patients had to endure in a hospital. His hand caressed the material in thought for a few moments, and he shuddered, even in his dark world. He knew there was a world out there to explore. A world to find the one you love. A world to have a family in…
The voices echoed about in his bleak mind, reminding him of the past couple of weeks. Had it not been for the painkillers and being numbed from the world, he would never be living this hell right now. He was utmost positive he would have found a tall building by now.
He found himself getting caught on that thought,
What's life without her? He thought silently.
As he lay there for a few moments, all the voices that had been but a distant murmur, suddenly became louder and clear.
"Erik DeFleur; twenty-seven year old male Caucasian, born in Bedford Dwellings and moved here about twelve years of age. No sight of family in any local area. He is a single man, never been married and has no history of any children, but he did apparently have a romantic fling with Mr. Winslow's daughter. He is currently the town's common Embalmer working at the old morgue up on the hill. " the doctor cited, reading Erik's transcripts to another doctor.
"The girl who just passed away?"
Erik stayed still, feeling numb. It was unusual to hear your whole life read aloud in only one tiny paragraph.
A few footsteps resonated throughout, and Erik heard a third voice. "Is he alright? He went down pretty hard that day…"
Erik felt the cool hand of the doctor's hand on his arm and then on his chest. "Nothing dire seems to be affecting him. I think he is just in shock. It's pretty hard to lose someone you love…"
The guest nodded and placed his hand on Erik's forehead, drawing the sign of the cross across his forehead, ignoring the strange feel or part of his face. "Will he be able to leave soon? I'd like to discuss some things with him."
The doctor nodded, setting down the transcripts on the nightstand by Erik's head. "He should be ready anytime now… I think he's just hiding from the world because it emotionally hurts, not physically."
"It's God's trials and tests of faith."
xoxo
Friday, November 13, 1992.
He looked across the field filled of graves, to the trees that stood against the dark cloudy skies. Black clouds hung above, water falling from them like tear drops of a lover.
Holding out his hand palm facing up, he felt the fat raindrops landing square on his hand. His closed eyes opened for but a second, and he looked at the rain. His mind though numb, kept processing one question; what colour was the rain? Did it truly even have a colour, or was it invisible as he felt he was right now?
"I will always be with you… I'm the anchor of your sorrow." the words whispered in the fierce wind that gusted along, making the hair on the nape of his neck stand out, causing the rain to come down harder in that moment. The group of people who stood around the dug hole in the ground, and the casket beside it, held tightly to their black umbrellas.
"For as much as it pleased almighty God of his great mercy to take unto himself the soul of our dear sister here departed, we therefore commit her body to the ground…" the Priest read aloud.
"Such wretched weather." a woman whispered to her husband, barely hearing what the Priest had to say. "The poor thing barely even begun to live life." she smoothed out the slight wrinkles on her black dress.
Erik glared at the woman standing across from him, along with her husband. He couldn't believe the audacity of her for saying such things at his beloved's burial. His thoughts caught on the word burial, and he almost choked up bile from such a thought.
He clenched his fists at his sides, feeling the leather gloves on his hands bunching up and being stretched. She had lived her life more than any of the fake people standing here pretending they were sorry for her departure!
Tick, tick, tick, tick!
Oh when would the incessant ticking cease? He felt like a bomb was planted inside him and he was ceaseless to its eventual combustion.
His eyes couldn't bare looking at the coffin, so he raised them up, only to be met with the eyes of someone he hated more than anything in the world. Those dark plutonic eyes stared into his, and Erik could see the anger and resentment burning inside of them, his hand trembling as it clenched tightly, the black handle of his umbrella.
His shorter wife, pale and circles circling her eyes, held tightly to her husband's arm, looking completely exhausted and not alive.
"Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust…"
"Did you see the man she had claimed to love? " a woman whispered.
"Did you know he wore a mask and was terribly ugly underneath?" another said.
"Such a beautiful girl… we always knew she could do better."
"Wasn't there a charming young man after her?"
Tick, tick, tick, tick!
"… In sure and certain hope of resurrection to eternal life, through our Lord Jesus Christ… "
Erik squeezed his eyes tightly shut, hearing all their voices… all their murmurs…
"I bet… I bet her hideous lover is the reason she is lying dead… being placed ten feet under. I warned her she was making the wrong choice… I warned her, why wouldn't she listen?" the girl sobbed.
Erik stood still as he listened to the group of people around his beloved's coffin, mock, and make up hideous lies of him, knowing he was standing right there.
He hadn't wanted to come… no, not at all. He always told her how he hated groups of people… how he abhorred it! But… but today was special… he couldn't let his beloved go down below without him to watch over her…
"… who shall change our vile body that it may be like to his glorious body…" at the moment, a group of men stepped forward, and they began to move and lower her body into the ground where she would rest eternally…
Tick, tick, tick, tick!
The whispering speculations of everyone around, grew louder…
"…according to the mighty working, whereby he is able to subdue all things to himself…"
Sobs began to wrack him as he saw it go deeper and deeper into the ground. He fell to his knees, not caring of the grass was wet and contained with mud. He didn't care if anyone saw him.
When he looked up, he saw the two black eyes.
"It was all your fault." the voice whispered.
Boom!