I didn’t want to leave.
So ridiculous. Insane. But there was something at the back of my mind, something that was nagging at me. I didn’t know what it was.
The sound of a car engine came to my ears as though from a distance. I could hear it coming around a lower bend in the road. All I had to do was run out into the middle of the road, wave my arms. I was free. I could go home.
What was it he had said that troubled me so much?
The car’s engine grew louder, and I closed my eyes, my hands at my temples. Thinking back. He wanted to let me go. Surely he knew that I was going to go to the police. He hadn’t even asked me not to tell anyone.
Bored.
The car came around the bend, but I was already running back up toward the house, the troubled feeling in my mind coalescing into something as clear and bright as words on a page. I knew what he meant.
Bored—that was the reason I’d tried to commit suicide. That was what I’d told him.
I ran up the porch and banged on the door, the feeling of dread growing inside of me.
“Gav!” I shouted. “Gav! Let me in!”
The door knob rattled in my hand, but the deadbolt was secure.
“Gav!”
No response.
I went to the window, banging on the pane. I tried to look in, but the glare of the sun reflected off of the glass, and I could see nothing inside. I raised my hand to break the windowpane, and then hesitated. But only for a second.
What is he going to do, kill me?
Gav
The darkness descended, but this time it was not the darkness of my shadow. Shadows need light to exist, and where I was going there was nothing, nothing at all.
Around my neck I felt a strange tug and tension cutting off my blood. My heart pounded loud, drowning out everything. My body kicked once, then again, and I only sensed the body kicking, could not feel it myself. I was already drifting away into the darkness.
This was a dark like fog, so thick it slid over my skin. A soft, enveloping darkness. A peaceful void that I fell into knowingly, longing to lose myself. It was the same thing you sink into halfway on your way to sleep - an ether, thick and palpable. The murmuring fog cradled me, turning me in its arms.
My breath stopped. My lungs were empty. I was empty, blissfully empty. The sound of my heartbeat faded, slowed to a dull murmur. The shadow of a heartbeat.
The sound of the fog - lord, how can I describe it? Pick up a shell and hold it to your ear. It’s not the ocean you hear, but rather a reverberation of static noise. That was the sound of the fog, a low roar coming from nowhere and filling everything. It was a dull roar, a noise that tickled at my senses without letting me hear anything else. The sound came through my body and filled me, too, a peaceful static.
The noose tightened on my neck, but it didn’t hurt. Nothing hurt. I was weightless now, floating away into the dark fog, leaving my shadow and all shadows behind.
Kat
I broke through the window, stepping carefully inside so I wouldn’t cut myself.
“Gav!” I cried.
I checked the living room, the kitchen. He wasn’t there. I heard a noise from upstairs. The bedroom. I stumbled up the steps and raced down the hallway.
“Gav!”
I banged open the door and saw the rope, the chair, and his body, his beautiful body, hanging limp in the middle of the air. Like he was floating.
Gav
Perfect, this darkness. It was not the shadow at all. The shadow was gone, far away. All of my sins would be suffocated, drowned in the fog. I let myself drift, feeling calm. Peaceful.
Then, from away, far far in the distance, buried in the fog, I heard a scream.
Kat
My fingers fumbled at the knot, but it was too tight. His entire weight had pulled the knot, and I couldn’t undo it. His face was white, and his lips were beginning to turn blue-grey, the same color as his eyes.
“No, no, no,” I mumbled, casting my eyes around. There it was. The knife on the dresser. I grabbed it and swung the blade hard at the bedpost, cutting the rope right through the knot.
Gav
With a hard jolt, I was yanked back ungently into my body. All was dark, still, though my shadow had yet to reappear. There was still peace around me in this darkness. The tension around my neck loosened and gave way, but I clung to the dark fog.
A sharp pressure on my chest made me gasp, and I heard the blood in my body start to pump again. My pulse thudded in my ears.
A heartbeat. Sobbing. The peaceful fog began to recede. I clutched for it, and it slipped away uselessly through my fingers. No! My chance to escape!
From the place I had already left, her voice was calling.
“Don’t go,” she cried. Her words faded in and out like a poorly tuned radio, becoming clearer as the darkness receded. “Don’t die. Oh god, don’t die.”
I wanted to tell her not to pray for me. God, if such a thing existed, wouldn’t intervene to save the life of a killer. Then again, He might have a sense of humor.