Revenant

Remnants of Humanity

The quiet of the basement was sterile, void of feeling, empty of any noise, lacking any trace of life. We were a perfect match.

It was hollow; it was nearly barren. The light above cast a florescent glow on the two couches made of an old, faded taupe fabric. I felt as still as the room appeared, until he shifted, giving a trace of life to the bleak space. His shoulders heaved slowly, head downturned as his breathing picked up. I wondered what kind of expression he wore; I wondered if it was fearsome or fearful. I then tried to remember just what those felt like.

Fear was the sensation of constriction tight around my throat, hot and relentless—no, that had been terror, fear was too weak a word; fearsome was the blind rage in his eyes, the pain that had his mind locked in a vice grip like the fingers that had circled my throat. They made so much more sense then, unable to process in one way but much more understandable by the same hand. What I had felt was horror and fear in their purest forms. But it wasn’t the same then; they felt like memories of things gone past, things that didn’t really exist anymore.

I can’t say that upset me. Emotions were dangerous. Feelings were human; human could be deadly.

He turned his head; lips parted slightly, eyes unfocused as he stared at the beige carpet. He only looked back below him for a moment before he shift completely, pushing himself off of the couch with trembling limbs and a vacant gaze.

“There was nothing wrong with how you felt, Lou.”

He slid onto the loveseat in front of me without a reply, head dropping to his hands as his silence held steady.

“Love, pain, fear, those were normal,” I stated. “But there was nothing wrong with how I felt, either. I felt those things, too, just not for you. Funny thing is, he always forgave me for how cruel I was. But you never accepted the kindness I was offering.”

The sobs started then, slow and heavy, low and figure quaking. I could only watch, crouching down to his seated level, forearms resting on my thighs.

“Maybe I should have ignored you that very first day like I had planned. Maybe I should have been cruel to you like the other girls. Would this have happened then, Lou?” I asked softly; his sobs grew, knuckles becoming white as he grasped at the black curls of his hair. I scoffed, shaking my head. “Well, no point in thinking about the beginning, now is there? Not much dwelling on the past can do for us at this point. What’s done is done, no matter how horrible, and it can’t be changed now.”

I felt nothing as his moans continued, as a red tint took up residence on his skin. My eyes rolled down to my own hands, slowly rubbing my fingertips together. I could feel them pressed together, moving back and forth, the tiny ridges of fingerprints smooth against each other. But there was no warmth, no heat. It was just there, and nothing more. Pressing my nails into my palm I only managed a minuscule sensation of pressure, no pain, no stinging or sharp sensations. I exhaled slowly, barely noticing his sluggish movements towards the other couch; hardly acknowledging the blanket he pulled up and over the figure there. I stood, following him to the back sliding glass door as he carried the motionless figure unsteadily. A few golden brown curls escaped from the top of the blanket, settling atop the crook of his arm as he made his way through the crisp, grey leaves that covered the ground between the trees in his backyard. Every once in a while his head would jerk around, scanning the area behind us, before he would readjust the bulk in his arms and continue at a hastened pace.

Twenty minutes passed before we reached the familiar edge of a rocky valley, a drop that fell forty feet down towards a raging river. He paused before it, out of breath with hesitance and uncertainty ringing out in the air. But I knew it was only temporary. I knew before he did that the thing in the blanket would soon topple down that hill and towards the rushing waters below. I almost felt a shock of pain as he let it drop from his arms, slender, pale fingers escaping the folds of the burgundy throw before it disappeared completely over the edge. We both stood in silence for a few minutes; the sounds of the waters below almost deafening while the cries of the birds seemed more like screams of desperation. Beads of sweat clung to his blemished face as he turned back, trudging past me at a slowed pace.

I held myself, the pressure of my fingers against my arms nothing more than nearly a phantom sensation.

“You were one of the most beautifully human people I ever knew, Lou, because of your feelings, because of all of that love and pain and fear. What you did with them, what you did to me? You shed your humanity like a snake sheds his skin and let yourself become a monster. You took mine from me without a thought. You turned your humanity into something darker, and you left me with just a shadow of my own. Now neither one of us can go back.”

He left me there, speaking words he would never hear, alone in a world where I’d never be seen. I stepped back, looking over the edge of the cliff down into the racing waters below. The merciless currents had taken my body into their depths as easily as Lou had taken my last breath. I remembered pain, I remembered panic and betrayal, I remembered fear; I remembered anything that would make me feel a little more human. I had never appreciated how much those emotions had meant before, and when I couldn’t hold on to them anymore, I realized I needed them more than ever.

I was a dead girl with nothing left; no home, no grave, and no burial. I was going to hold on to the only thing there was that made me feel alive; the humanity that seemed like a distant reality.
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Human- Civil Twilight

I'm trying a bit different style. Something shorter. I don't know.