Almost Lover
Katja Aeron Valiant
Tell me that you'll never forget….
He hung his head, letting waves of tension ripple down his spent and heaving body. His fingers closed around the vacant air in a shudder of desperation. Pale eyes flickered, closed tightly, yearning for just one more chance… muddled fragments of emotion collided within his collective being; the dead one, the one breathing in the broodingly black nightly brew of death, the one dearly clinging to the moment. This moment was what part of him needed, what another part desperately rejected in favor of the searing pain enveloping the lobes of his memory. The last part wanted nothing to do with either, just sublime innocent blackness. Such was the ceaseless conflict in the triad of enemies warring within.
"Do I need this…" he moaned, his words lacking conviction enough to make his ragged breath a question. The trilogy of voices argued inside, and he let them. He was never answered, no faction proved more right or valid than the opposing two. A terrible myriad they were, though now dimmed as his attention was diverted. Soft fingers smoothly running through his snow-white hair, fingers delicate enough to crush, as he would a rose in the palm of his hand. Breath plaintive and sweet, the vanilla musk of dewy skin graced by nothing but his touch, his endearing pain. An illusion, he dreamt against the wrongly warmed sheets, he knew it was nothing more than illusory. Appeasing one part of him (this time, the desperate one) would lead to jealousy, twicefold from the dead man and the masochist.
Why won't you let me sleep? The dead man would complain.
You don't deserve this… the masochist would chide.
The addictively desperate one would remain silent, conciliatory, as his demand was fulfilled.
Morning found him alone.
The other two found him vulnerable.
Go back to sleep, the dead man pleaded. Be at peace.
"There's no peace, either way," he audibly muttered, taking the masochist's side of the eternal argument this morning. "No solace."
The desperate addict of a man demanded more coffee. He didn't refuse. The hot bitter blackness stung his throat in a deliciously painful way, letting the masochist get his fill. The dead man was restless; the dreamless sleep of every passing night never enough. It was never plain enough, never any less distracting, never any more deep than it had been.
"That's what comes with life," he said, himself this time. "You will never get complete, inexorable silence… when your heart still beats."
He finished his cup of coffee in silence.
"Prosecutor's Office," his serene secretary announced.