Flesh Wound

[Eternity]

The same few moments played over and over again.

"Eeny meeny miney mo," she sang under her breath.

I watched the fickle finger of fate dance over the fallen bodies of Kathy and Shea for days now.

"Eeny...meeny...miney...mo," she sang under her breath.

The next part never got any easier, no matter how many times I relived it.

Damn it Shea, why couldn't you stay out of this?

Her screams, her pain, her injury. It was all because of me.

It was all my fault.

Why did it have to be Shea?

It should have been Kathy...

What? Where the hell did that come from?

No!

Keep it together Warren, keep it together. I can make it through this...

You find Warren Kane sat in a swivelling office chair in the middle of a small room flooded with a red light. His wrists are bound with rope to each of the armrests and his ankles are tied together also and bound around the bottom of the chair's central pole.

It was no use struggling or screaming, last time it only got me sedated, and that was only now starting to wear off.

Thank God.

The door creaked open and there you and Warren saw me standing, silhouetted against the light for a moment, something hangs from my right hand.

You watch me enter the room and close the door behind me, latching it securely. You see me then walk up to Warren, squatting down before him, placing a forefinger gently under his chin and the two lock eyes.

Oh good, you are still here...

Warren: Where else would I be?

Hehehehehehehe, I can see why she liked you, you're funny, short-sighted perhaps but still funny. My very own Mr Magoo!

You see me playfully ruffle Warren's hair, and then you hear me sigh.

I hope the day never dawns when you lose your sense of humour, along with everything else, Kidd. You've lost so much already. So much of who you are - gone - but not enough. No, not nearly enough. Not yet. All in good time, yes, all in good time. There's no sense in rushing these things, is there?

Only fools rush in where Angels fear to tread they say, and we both know what happened to the last fool who rushed to your rescue, don't we?

Warren: Bitch!

You hear me tut.

Such awful manners. Now, mow, that's not very nice. Is that really any way to speak to somebody who has brought you a gift? What would your mother say if she heard you talk like that? Assuming she still cares, and assuming you still want to see her again some day. But maybe she doesn't and maybe you don't. You are family, after all...

Warren: I don't want or need anything from you...

HuhuhuhuhuhuhuhuhuhuhuhuhuhuhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Good one! Got anymore? Now I really am glad I ignored the little voice in my head. You should gag him, you really should gag him! GAG HIM! GAG HIM! GAG HIM! she said. I said No Anabelle! He's our guest, we don't gag our guests, especially not ones with such magnificently sculpted abdominal muscles.

What's your secret, Kidd?

Go on, you can tell me, I won't tell anyone, I promise! I swear!

We all have at least one, don't we? Rattling around in the deep dark recesses of our mind. A voice. A secret. A secret voice. One only we can hear, sometimes it whispers, sometimes it screams, but we will always hear it. None more clearly than when we try to deny it, if not to others, then to ourselves. To preserve our sanity, to pretend we are not all more than a little fucked up in the head.

I know you hear it Warren, because I hear it too. I hear the screams. The cries for freedom. The demands to be let go.

Let me go!

Release me!

LET ME THE FUCK OUT OF HERE!

That is what you want, isn't it Warren? Or are you still sat here consumed by all your guilt and regret over what happened to Shea? Don't trouble yourself too much with all that, will you? So much time and energy wasted on people you no longer matter to. It's a shame, tragic even, welcome to the ways of the world, Kidd.

The truth is Shea O'Hara doesn't care about you. Not anymore. She has much bigger concerns now, broken bones and stalled careers tend to shift a person's perspective as to what truly matters to them in their lives, and right now I doubt you matter to anyone quite as much as you should.

Join the club.

You see me then extend my right hand to Warren, offering him the rubber Frankenstein's monster mask from when we first met, almost a year ago,

Warren: Never! I'll never be like you! Broken, alone and pathetic!

You see Warren spit in my face, and hear me sigh as I get to my feet and wipe saliva from my eyes.

It never gets any easier, does it? I mean you try to be nice, you try to do some good, you try to help people...and they always spit it all right back in your face. Sometimes I wonder why I even bother, I really do. I really hoped you would be different, Warren. I really hoped you would understand, but no, turns out you're just like the rest of them.

Just like Chloe.

Just like Eliza.

Just like Kathy.

And just like Shea.

Can't you see you don't belong? You're special, Kidd. Isn't that what they've told you for your whole life?

A life you now waste, sitting there, waiting, hoping and praying for somebody, anybody to come charging to your rescue. Expectation is the mother of disappointment, hasn't she disappointed you enough already?

Nobody's coming for you, Warren.

Not Mommy, not Daddy. Not Aunt Mary or Uncle Harry. Not Shea and definitely not Kathy.

They never came for me, so why should they come for you?

You're not her flesh and blood, are you? You're not her son. She's not your mother. No, you're not her family. You're not her responsibility. See how quickly people abandon you when its not their womb you came from?

You're nothing to Kathy, you're nothing to anyone anymore, Warren. You're on your own now, Kidd. That'll teach you to spit my offer of friendship back in my face, won't it?

One can dream.

Anything's possible in a dream. You can go anywhere and do anything in a dream. The only limit is your imagination. An imagination you waste as much as you yourself waste away reliving the same tragedies over and over again. Echoes in the dark. Screams in the night. Tears in the morning and all the while wondering why it was them and not you who had to go away.

Tell me again how exactly you're nothing like me.

Tell me again, it's a wonderful little story. One I often tell myself, stuck down here, never quite able to go home again. Back to the way things were. It's going to take more time than I expected, but eventually you will learn the same things I did, Warren.

There are no happy endings, not for people like you, me or Kathy Conway.

There is no love in Heaven or on Earth like a mother's love Warren, and there is no substitute. Another mother's love never saved anybody, so best not to cling too hard to that old ghost. She begs for many things, Warren, including her own extinction, but she will never beg for your life or your welfare.

Because you are not a diamond, not yet.

Nobody came for me either Warren, when I was just like you.

A kid.

Locked up. Locked away. Locked down.

You see me tightly wrap my arms around myself as if I were in a straitjacket.

No family visits. Not a single friend from my life before stopped by, not even a simple hello or a hard goodbye.

Nothing from the outside, for days, months, years.

Everything from the inside. The only thing was me, for a while anyway. Until my friends came. From the inside. Quite the coincidence, I know, we laughed about it for days, weeks, even years. And then we realised if we were going to be all alone, we were all going to be together. Friends forever, not like Laura...

Like you and me, Warren.

Together.

Always and forever.

HahahahahahahahahahahahahahaHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

You see me stop suddenly. Close my eyes, bow my head and take a deep breath, before opening them and walking over to a small wooden desk in the corner of the room. You see me place the rubber mask next to an unlit candle on the desk.

Warren had not paid much attention to it, but now he watched carefully as he heard Eternity rummaging through one of it's drawers. 

You watch me turn and skip back to Warren, a smile on my face. You watch me squat before Warren again, revealing to him a small switchblade knife.

You watch my blade hover over Warren's bound left wrist. You watch me lean forward and sniff Warren before catching sight of a few bright orange stands of hair that clung to him.

You still smell of her, you know? No wonder you're having such a hard time letting go. Over you. That stench, sweet, pungent, unmistakable - so much hope, so much desperation. Lipstick, hairspray and baby powder. Toxic and untraceable. So alike.

Nobody's coming for us Kidd, because people disappear all the time around here.

That's just the kind of world we live in, I'm afraid.

Though obviously not as much as you right now, but one day you will overcome that fear, that choking sense of dread and suffocating sense of hopelessness and on that day you will beg me to...never...let you go...

Warren: Never...

You see me gesture for Warren to continue, her eyes bright and her smile expectant. But he says nothing more.

You hear me let out a short sharp scream before quickly slashing Warren across his left cheek, drawing blood.

Warren grimaces with pain, and then you watch me draw the blood stained blade slowly over my left forearm, whispering.

Daddy...today I am not alone. Today I honour your sacrifice and remember your wisdom...

You see me then walk over and light the single candle with a match from the desk drawer. 

Warren flinches as he watches Eternity hold her bloody wound over the candle flame for a moment, before withdrawing and tilting her head towards Heaven, closing her eyes and taking a very slow and deliberate breath, almost as if she was savouring it.