Status: Completed =]
#17 Songstress
Now
Every day, I hear number seventeen’s Slovenian song in my head. Her voice follows me as I drive through the city, when I wave to my neighbors and as I pound shots of whiskey against the granite of my kitchen counter. I see her every single time I shut my eyes, even with the quickest blink of an eye I see her silhouette. More importantly, I imagine all the bruises I gave her. I can feel her blood clotting in the cracks of my skin. I smell the salt of her tears, and I become more terrified by the day that I care.
What I could not wrap my mind around, no matter how long and hard I tried, was how someone could go through so much, and have the strength to create something as beautiful as song. Why not cry? Why not scream? Why did she not attempt suicide or try to run away? She chose to sing. She chose to fill the halls with music and put her mind in another world, somewhere joyous like her song. I imagine she pictured her home when she sang. Only now did I realize how brave she was, in comparison to the coward I became.
As days passed on, my questions became more personal, and demanding. Did number seventeen have a family? Did her parents cry when she vanished, were they still looking for her? What was her real name? The nights that the questions came, essentially every night for the past two months, I resorted to putting myself in an alcohol induced coma so that I could stop thinking, but no matter what I did I could not escape the dreams. I saw her so vividly in my sleep, but she was not a prostitute in my fantasies. She was in a field, surrounded by the most golden sunlight. Until I woke, I watched her run through the field, singing her song and smiling. Every morning, I awoke to stinging eyes, and I realized how much I cried in my sleep.
This process, I decided, was the development of a conscience- the one and only thing that had the ability to destroy me and all I had built. I felt empathy for number seventeen’s plight, and for the first time in my life I felt truly guilty for the exploitation. Because of her song, I saw myself through the eyes of others. I saw the heinous monster that devoured the lively spirits of innocent human beings. I finally saw the villain, the devious serpent lurking in the grass. After all these years, I finally looked in a mirror, free of camouflaging filth. I fucking hated what I saw.
Today, I find myself trapped within the collapsing walls of my house. Three thousand square feet and I still feel utterly confined inside. I cannot shower; I cannot even find the will to dress myself in sanitary clothing. Instead, I sit in wrinkled khakis and sob into my whiskey, unwilling to leave the cushion of pity I created. For hours, I’ve been eyeballing the 9mm gun lying on a stack of mismatched magazines spread across my table. I reach for it, and hold the cold metal between my shaking fingers. Until this moment, I had lost all power. I no longer looked at those girls as objectified merchandise; I no longer lived guilt free. For once in my life, the emotions of others controlled me. All of the money in the world could not help me get the power back. But right now, I once again have power. I have the power to decide the fate of my own life, and no one can take that away from me. All the singing in the world could not take my finger off the trigger, and every crying prostitute’s sighs could not force me to pull it. It was hysterical, how far I fell. My body shook with a desperate laughter, without me realizing the pressure I placed on the trigger…
Bang.
What I could not wrap my mind around, no matter how long and hard I tried, was how someone could go through so much, and have the strength to create something as beautiful as song. Why not cry? Why not scream? Why did she not attempt suicide or try to run away? She chose to sing. She chose to fill the halls with music and put her mind in another world, somewhere joyous like her song. I imagine she pictured her home when she sang. Only now did I realize how brave she was, in comparison to the coward I became.
As days passed on, my questions became more personal, and demanding. Did number seventeen have a family? Did her parents cry when she vanished, were they still looking for her? What was her real name? The nights that the questions came, essentially every night for the past two months, I resorted to putting myself in an alcohol induced coma so that I could stop thinking, but no matter what I did I could not escape the dreams. I saw her so vividly in my sleep, but she was not a prostitute in my fantasies. She was in a field, surrounded by the most golden sunlight. Until I woke, I watched her run through the field, singing her song and smiling. Every morning, I awoke to stinging eyes, and I realized how much I cried in my sleep.
This process, I decided, was the development of a conscience- the one and only thing that had the ability to destroy me and all I had built. I felt empathy for number seventeen’s plight, and for the first time in my life I felt truly guilty for the exploitation. Because of her song, I saw myself through the eyes of others. I saw the heinous monster that devoured the lively spirits of innocent human beings. I finally saw the villain, the devious serpent lurking in the grass. After all these years, I finally looked in a mirror, free of camouflaging filth. I fucking hated what I saw.
Today, I find myself trapped within the collapsing walls of my house. Three thousand square feet and I still feel utterly confined inside. I cannot shower; I cannot even find the will to dress myself in sanitary clothing. Instead, I sit in wrinkled khakis and sob into my whiskey, unwilling to leave the cushion of pity I created. For hours, I’ve been eyeballing the 9mm gun lying on a stack of mismatched magazines spread across my table. I reach for it, and hold the cold metal between my shaking fingers. Until this moment, I had lost all power. I no longer looked at those girls as objectified merchandise; I no longer lived guilt free. For once in my life, the emotions of others controlled me. All of the money in the world could not help me get the power back. But right now, I once again have power. I have the power to decide the fate of my own life, and no one can take that away from me. All the singing in the world could not take my finger off the trigger, and every crying prostitute’s sighs could not force me to pull it. It was hysterical, how far I fell. My body shook with a desperate laughter, without me realizing the pressure I placed on the trigger…
Bang.