This is dedicated to my boyfriend Clyle.
Who I learned to never let go of.(:
3
Oh, my love.
Please don't cry.
I'll wash my bloody hands,
And we'll start a new life...
I watched myself in the bathroom mirror, my hands holding on to the sides of the slick marble sink. The running water sending little warm droplets of water on my purple and blue bruised arms. I couldn't help but shiver as cold, lifeless eyes stared back at me in a steam-filled mirror. I wanted to throw up, wanted to just sleep and wake up and see all of this was a dream, a nightmare that kept reacurring, just another illness my therapist could slap on my bill. I would have so much prefered that.
But no.
This was my reality.
My life.
I threw myself to the cold, white toilet, letting my stomach empty with every hunch, every sob. Tears burned my eyes and flowed down my face as my stomach emptied and folded in on itself. Everything hurt, everything ached. My wrist burned from its latest "surgery" I had performed myself on my kitchen floor with a brand new pizza cutter. I had cleaned it out after losing so much blood, wrapping it up in gauze just in time.
The thought always occured to me that I could have died that night. I could have been free of him. That monster I had let control my emotions for so long. Too long. But then my mind drifts to you and I know that if I just hold on, if I just go through this, I could always have you. I sit up from my mess and flush, curling into a ball on the cold tile floor and sobbing harder, feeling my mascara running down my face. He'd be home any minute and if he seen me like this, a mess, a crying mess, he would do so much worse. I try to pull myself up, but I can hear the door open, can see him making his way towards me. I look up at him, eyes furious, fists balled. At first, I am numb. I block away reality, letting everything become just a daydream. But when I feel his hand grab my arm, yanking me towards him and demanding why I was crying, I know it's real. So painfully real. He snatches me up, hands branding into my skin. I scream, his other hand slapping me across the mouth. I want to just die. Maybe then, he'd feel remorse for what he had done to me. But I think of you, and I know I have to survive.
I feel the punches, the bruises the kicks multiply. I can feel my energy draining more and more from my struggle. I see I'm on the floor, face up, at the ceiling. Everythings hazy, everything feels like a dream. I look to my side, to see him, his foot getting momentum to lay a fatal blow to my face. I'm so tired of fighting, so tired of crying, that I lay quiet, waiting for his foot to just connect and kill me. If he hits hard enough, he could break my neck and I'd die fast. That's all I want. I forget about you for just a moment and smile, awaiting to die. Awaiting to be free. It's when I don't, when I hear screams that aren't mine, when I feel familiar arms rocking me back and forth, whispering that it was over, that I was free that I knew something wasn't going according to his plan.
I let hazed over eyes find you in the middle of the room, blood on your hands, him on the floor. He looks broken, bent in odd angles that I cant quite explain to describe. His chest is not heaving and everyone is silent. He was dead, I should have guessed right away, but my mind wrapped softly around you. The corners of my vision were snowed in white and all I could see was you, bloody and bruised, standing over my tormener, my lover. My heart swells, my soul flies and suddenly, I'm asleep.
Fall deeper, and deeper
The sirens
Are singing your
songs...
I can hear ocean waves crash inside my head, soft and misty, and when I open my eyes and see you lying next to me, your hand in mine and smiling, I feel so safe. The room is warm and I snuggle closer to you, the smell of blood still on your body and I assumed it was simply my memory making me think you smelled of him. You brush away my hair from my eyes and ask if I'm okay. I smile slightly and nod, not wanting to talk, just to be with you, with your body heat in sweet silence and bliss. Your skin like sunlight, hot against my cold clammy presence. I can feel myself slip in and out of conciousness but before I finally let myself dream onc more, I can feel you kiss my lips and say in a whispered but strong voice,
"I love you, Princess."
