For as long as I can remember, I've been fascinated with death. I've seen it a lot in my life, and I'd be lying if I said I hadn't thought about it often, wondering how I’d die.
Would it be painful?
Would I be old and gray?
What happens afterward?
I was seven when I started thinking about my death after watching my mother die by her own hand. The needle she'd shoved into her vein containing her 'medicine' killed her. When I was eight, I continued to think about death when I saw my father paint our musty yellow walls with chunks of his brain.
My fascination with death bloomed, growing into an obsession when I was thirteen and witnessed my foster brother kill our foster father. He painted my face with his bloody hands, and I'd never seen anything so beautiful. The sight of me in the mirror with blood on my face stayed with me throughout the years.
Every time I closed my eyes, it brought me back to that moment, a memory I've always been fond of. No one has ever protected me the way that he did. When I think of my childhood, few memories light up my face, but his bloody hands touching me is one that I've always cherished.
I was jealous of him—of the blood on his hands.
To say I was obsessed with death was an understatement.
The only thing that mattered to me was how I'd die. For years I mulled over it, and never once did I expect my death to be at the hands of someone I loved. Someone I took vows with and promised my forever to. My husband, the very man who vowed to protect me and love me, was taking the 'til death do us part' a little too literal.
Now once again, the question was replaying in my head. What would death be like? I was all too eager to experience it.
Would I go to heaven, or would I go to hell? Knowing myself, hell was more than likely the place I'd go. Fuck it. Maybe I'd have a dance with the devil while I'm there.
My abnormal fixation with death was the only thing giving me the strength to endure this moment. My body was numb, and I wished he'd make my death painful so I could go out feeling something. I'd been a shell of a person for so long that the lines between dying and living were becoming blurred.
If I die painfully, at least I'd know the feeling of being alive.
I didn’t fight back against his grip on my throat. Why should I fight to save myself from an inevitable death that I’ve longed for? If I didn't die today, it would be tomorrow, or the next day… One of these days I was going to die, so I might as well make it today. It's as good as any.
I got exactly what I wanted, and now, I was going to die a happy woman. A stupid woman who signed her death warrant the day she laid eyes on the blond-haired, blue-eyed sinner.
My feet dangled beneath me. He had me pinned against the wall with both of his hands wrapped around my throat. I was giving him permission to kill me, but I wouldn't let him get away with it. He was signing his own death sentence just as much as mine. My head was becoming heavy, and it took every ounce of strength I had to scratch any part of flesh I could reach: his arms, his neck, his perfect face. I could feel his peeling flesh getting stuck underneath my fingernails, bringing a sinister smile to my lips.
I wasn’t fighting against my death. I only needed his DNA.
Bright dots crept in, and my vision blurred until eventually, all I saw darkness.
Darkness.
This is it. This is how I die.
“I became insane, with long intervals of horrible sanity.”
– Edgar Allen Poe
Don't do anything stupid.
Don't say anything stupid.
Don't speak unless spokento.
I chanted the list of rules in my head like a mantra. I'd obeyed every single one like I always do, yet Sebastian was still as angry as he always was. The car ride is silent, and I already know what is to come once we arrive home. His actions on the way are always the tale indicator of what I could expect.
When he yelled, that meant he'd fuck me rough to get his anger out of his system, and then he'd move on.
Silence meant he'd use me as his punching bag, but it wouldn't be as bad. It would be tolerable, and that's what I preferred. Based on his silence, that’s what I would be getting.
Tonight, my husband is going to add to my collection of bruises.