Sequel: The Sanguisuge and the Eidolon. ›
Revenant
Voices in the Light
At night he found his escape. At night he found a way to block out the whispered voices he could never quite hear, yet never in full certainty claim weren’t there. The hazy bars of town would wait for him with open arms just as the women in them opened their bedrooms to him on a nightly basis. He couldn’t hear my words then, the hazy voice he so often pinned to his guilty conscious, a thing of his imagination left to torment him for what he had done. The alcohol and heavy breathing of his lovers would overwhelm his senses and pull him far from my reach. All of the fear and guilt were far beyond him in those moments, even if just for the briefest periods of time. He would forget about me as they wrapped their arms around his neck and their legs around his waist. But it didn’t matter; I always came back.
He would lose himself in the throws of passion, the pleasure of his nameless lover for the night. But I would be there after all was said and done, as he lay next to them in their beds, and I would speak to him. I would be that voice in the back of his head again, an afterthought, a dark memento he would never lose. I was the girl he couldn’t escape, the one he wished he were lying next to instead; the one who he had left with no stone in the graveyard or no known whereabouts as far as the authorities were concerned.
The days were hard on him; I made sure of that. I made sure in the hours of the sun I was never far from his mind. The weeks following my murder, that hadn’t been too difficult. The cops came to him multiple times, but never once got anything out of him. I had left in a rage, he said, when he had rejected my advances, and from there he hadn’t seen me since. I had laughed at those words, remembering just whose advances had really been shot down and how the reaction had been hands around my throat as opposed to a quick flight from the scene. The hairs on the back of his neck had prickled and a wave of goose bumps had erupted across his skin. That was the first time I realized he could—if only faintly—hear me.
From that point on I hadn’t strayed far from his side. My time was spent reminding him of how I had passed, how tightly his fingers had pressed against the soft flesh of my neck, and the marks he had left there after he was done. I also often reiterated how much I had detested him when we were alive, how my thoughts had flitted more often than not to how badly I wanted to fuck his best friend and how satisfying I would have found his reactions to such news.
My words had kept him up at night, the whispers like voices that weren’t really there, and a month after he had disposed of me he first took solace in the bars and the girls he found there. Of course morning would roll around and their beds would cease to protect him. I made sure his thoughts always returned to me, I made certain he had days where he broke down and begged in the sanctity of his room for me to come back, for his actions to be undone. Other times he’d walk back to the place where he left me, looking over the edge and down at the dark waters below. His hands would shake; his eyes would glass over in the dull light of the day.
“Please, please come back,” he’d beg. And for a while the sounds of nature would be his only response. Minutes would pass where I would allow him to believe he was alone, to believe he was free. But that voice he always imagined to be at the back of his head would eventually return and the black cloud that was the truth would once again loom over both of us.
“There’s no going back, Lou.” I’d stand beside him and trail my fingers lightly along his shoulders, back and forth. “There’s no taking back what you’ve done. And you’re never going to forget it, are you? Because I’m going to make certain I live on in your memory until your last breath. I’m going to be your cancer.”
It was with certainty I knew that just as his love had destroyed me, it was going to destroy him as well.
As the day would fade to night though he would once again retreat to the alcohol and women who made his head swim and my voice fade into the background. And at night I would patiently stand by, watching and waiting.
He would lose himself in the throws of passion, the pleasure of his nameless lover for the night. But I would be there after all was said and done, as he lay next to them in their beds, and I would speak to him. I would be that voice in the back of his head again, an afterthought, a dark memento he would never lose. I was the girl he couldn’t escape, the one he wished he were lying next to instead; the one who he had left with no stone in the graveyard or no known whereabouts as far as the authorities were concerned.
The days were hard on him; I made sure of that. I made sure in the hours of the sun I was never far from his mind. The weeks following my murder, that hadn’t been too difficult. The cops came to him multiple times, but never once got anything out of him. I had left in a rage, he said, when he had rejected my advances, and from there he hadn’t seen me since. I had laughed at those words, remembering just whose advances had really been shot down and how the reaction had been hands around my throat as opposed to a quick flight from the scene. The hairs on the back of his neck had prickled and a wave of goose bumps had erupted across his skin. That was the first time I realized he could—if only faintly—hear me.
From that point on I hadn’t strayed far from his side. My time was spent reminding him of how I had passed, how tightly his fingers had pressed against the soft flesh of my neck, and the marks he had left there after he was done. I also often reiterated how much I had detested him when we were alive, how my thoughts had flitted more often than not to how badly I wanted to fuck his best friend and how satisfying I would have found his reactions to such news.
My words had kept him up at night, the whispers like voices that weren’t really there, and a month after he had disposed of me he first took solace in the bars and the girls he found there. Of course morning would roll around and their beds would cease to protect him. I made sure his thoughts always returned to me, I made certain he had days where he broke down and begged in the sanctity of his room for me to come back, for his actions to be undone. Other times he’d walk back to the place where he left me, looking over the edge and down at the dark waters below. His hands would shake; his eyes would glass over in the dull light of the day.
“Please, please come back,” he’d beg. And for a while the sounds of nature would be his only response. Minutes would pass where I would allow him to believe he was alone, to believe he was free. But that voice he always imagined to be at the back of his head would eventually return and the black cloud that was the truth would once again loom over both of us.
“There’s no going back, Lou.” I’d stand beside him and trail my fingers lightly along his shoulders, back and forth. “There’s no taking back what you’ve done. And you’re never going to forget it, are you? Because I’m going to make certain I live on in your memory until your last breath. I’m going to be your cancer.”
It was with certainty I knew that just as his love had destroyed me, it was going to destroy him as well.
As the day would fade to night though he would once again retreat to the alcohol and women who made his head swim and my voice fade into the background. And at night I would patiently stand by, watching and waiting.
♠ ♠ ♠
The Night Starts Here- Stars