Killer Love

“I’d kill for you...” Those were Azrael’s exact words the day he told me he loved me. I never really thought much about those words until he actually did it. Not just once but a few times. I know it sounds insane...but that makes me love him even more.

To have someone love you enough, to want to protect you so much that they would literally kill someone just to make sure your life was more at ease.

I was fearful at first because he would come home, his long dark chocolate hair in his face and fists balled up colored with the faintest hinting of his deeds, then sit in the restroom staring at the floor for a long time. His dark brown eyes would always seem darker as I tried to get him to talk to me.

“You mean everything to me.” He would say after my many attempts to try and make him talk. Tears would roll down his face then. I never really knew why he was crying. Maybe it was the guilt? No, he hardly feels guilty for things. He felt his actions were justified because they were treating me the way they were.

He would sit next to me and lean his head on my shoulder. We would sit there for hours. Just sit. What went on in that mind of his all those hours was beyond me? Finally I would have to get up and make him change.

He must have been very precise…with whatever it was he did because there was hardly any blood anywhere. He was always one to make sure he did things quick, clean and was a genius at masking it. Even so, it was a wonder why it took so long for them to figure out he did it.

I would ask time and time again about how he went through with it, what exactly did he do? He would look at me deep into my eyes as if seeing into my whole being and tell me, “You shouldn’t think about things like that.” Then kiss my forehead and give me a hug.

He gave me so much to look forward to so I don’t really think badly about him when I think about what he has done for me. He provides for me and encourages me to stay in school. He had a fit when I told him I was just going to quit college and work full time. His tan skin grew shades darker as he yelled about me needing to keep growing in knowledge and expand my horizons. Ha. It makes me laugh now that I think about it. He sounded so old telling me things like that. His grandmother, Mama is what she told me to call her, would tell me he is like an old soul trapped in a young body.

When she passed away a few years ago I was all he had left. His parents were killed when he was younger. He didn’t like to talk about it but I know they were killed by some guys his mother knew in high school. I never knew the whole story and Mama was such a sweet heart I didn’t like to bring it up with her. No one should have to go to their own child’s funeral and the thought of bringing it up was horrifying.

He wasn’t always so strict or quiet though. He had his moments. I can remember one Halloween, we walked into a costume shop and he came out with a duck suit. Or the other times when he would talk so much about dragon ball z, his favorite cartoon, and music so much that my brain felt like it was going to explode. Didn’t take long after that to get me hooked on what he loved though. He would sing silly love songs that he made up while practicing guitar all night long and every once in a while he would get me to learn the words and we’d be belting out the corny lyrics like it was nobody’s business. A few times we would hear our neighbors threaten to call the cops because of the noise. I didn’t think we were that loud to be honest.

He was persuasive and could talk his way in and out of everything. There were times when I wondered if I was just being brainwashed into staying with him because of how easily he could make other people do things or make them see things his way. But the way he would hold me, the look in his eyes when he would listen to me, the way he put up with all of my ugliness made me realize that I loved him and even his own persuasion couldn’t get me to leave him.

I didn’t realize how dependant I had become on him until he was gone.