Hello munchkins, tis moi, the ever unfaithful Junaberry. I come baring a frightfully unskilled one shot and hope that you read it.
Life Without Love
By Junaberry
How is it fair that someone as good as Susannah Simon must die? How is it fair that I find true love after 150 years of loneliness and it is taken from me so quickly? How is it fair that the only person I have ever truly loved is lying in the cold dirt and will never speak another word to me again? How is it fair that we were separated like that, forever? How is it fair that we will never meet again and I will never be able to tell her how much I love her?
For surely this is God's work; his inner desire to destroy my life for that is what he has done. Susannah Simon saved me from eternal lifelessness. I have not seen her in too many years to count yet I think of her everyday, without fail. A year after I was brought back to life, I walked her back home. We were hand in hand, braving the gusting winds and thin, pelting rain droplets. Surging through the vicious climate which was no at all the norm in Carmel, I felt Susannah's hand slip from mine, the rain managing to work its way between the crevice and prize us apart.
"Jesse!" she squealed and lunged towards me, grabbing my arm in fear. "Oh my God, I nearly got blown away."
"Are you alright?" in a strained voice, I asked, clutching her hand tighter in mine.
"I'm fine," she replied.
In the glaze of the brilliant gloomy sky, a figure was heard pounding against the footpath behind us. I looked back in alarm. The closer he got, for now, I was certain that the person was man by his broad shoulders and carriage, the more I feared. By then, Susannah was aware too and cowered against me. The man groaned against the gathering wind and paced himself until he was astride with us.
"Suze, what a coincidence," he said, smirking.
"What do you want?" Susannah replied in a quaking voice.
I wanted to pull her with me and run away – I hadn't told her three months ago of the evidence I had found of the Carmel mass raping or the cold, glistening foreheads of the few survivors who made their way into my ward. I hadn't told her about Paul's disappearance from his grandfather's home the night of the second attack. My intention was to protect her but it was something I would always regret.
"Oh, nothing really." Against the wind, his voice was like a hiss, burrowing into my brain.
Even when he said this, he scrambled forward and pushed me to the ground, blurring my vision and wounding me on the back of my head. At the same time, he grabbed Susannah by the shoulders and pushed her into a nearby bush. I didn't want to watch; it was like a reel of film; it was like a play I would've never taken my sisters to; it was like a nightmare, a nightmare I didn't think would ever become reality.
Paul stepped threateningly onto Susannah's chest and dug his heel into her, leaning forward until he faced her, eye to eye. She tried to shield her face from the inevitable attack but couldn't; Paul had pinned her arms by her sides.
"You know why I'm doing this, right, Suze? You ignored me, you mocked me and guess what? I'm not used to being made a fool of" he said as if this were all her fault.
When he raised his arm and looked back to me with cold, frozen eyes, I struggled to get up but my fall had left me in a disorientated state and my balance was not at all enough to keep me on my feet. As his hand closed down on her face, he clenched it into a half fist and knocked Susannah unconscious with one blow.
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, I kept repeating to myself, unthinkingly. This was not happening; I refused to believe it but the more I watched, the more I was transported into an alternate universe where Susannah was alive and well. I saw Paul's disgusting head lean down and molest her face with his lips. It was a foul sight – here he was, doing these dirty, vile things to Susannah and I could do nothing to stop it. A growl built in my throat but instead of releasing it, all that came out was a soft moan of pain.
"Guess I won in the end, de Silva," Paul shouted over the rain pelting down onto the pavement.
Before I could realize it, he drew a gun from his pocket, swiveling it on his finger; mocking me.
"No!" I finally found my voice but still remained immobile.
A sadistic smile tugged at his lips and he released the trigger, the barrel right inside Susannah's mouth. I looked away, turning rigid against the freezing ground. When I returned to look, Susannah was dead; her head was so bloody and torn up that I couldn't even distinguish her features anymore. Crimson liquid was splattered all over her body and a thin trickle of it trailed down from the grass to the footpath and eventually to less than a few inches from my eye. I followed it with my gaze and could see my reflection, baring a terrified expression.
So ended the life of Susannah Simon; lying in a muddy imprint of a former self, painted in gory blood, dead with her honor stripped of her. She gave her life to me, she gave me everything, and then she died. How could the life of such a vibrant, deserving, beautiful girl be cut short so quickly? Where is the justice in that? Another innocent tormented by God and forced heavenward… and never shall I see her perfect face again.