Page 82 of Light As A Feather
It’s over.For better or worse, I’m off the carousel ride of us spinning around and around this inevitability.
For the first time, I welcome the darkness, the quiet of it, peaceful and reassuring. I let it hold me as I release a lifetime and embrace the rightness of the sacrifice I’ve made. A final act of love has to count for something, right?
But of course, the tranquility doesn’t last. From somewhere deep within that abyss that now surrounds me, a voice reaches for me, red with anger.
“Solaneen.” The command of it cuts into the very core of me, tightening its hold until it becomes a closed fist that drags me out of that peaceful pocket of solitude and toward something uncomfortably familiar.
Instead of the warmth of relief, I’m slapped by the frigid hand of horrific realization.
For just a moment, I was able to forget that my afterlife was set to be a prison and the man I’ve bound myself to has come to pass my sentence, eager to claim what he’s owed.
“There she is.” His blue eyes light up as he sets his sights on me. His encroaching energy is a greedy rushing river ready to pull me under, excited to finally drown me in him.
Around me, things start to come into focus—dirt, dust motes, and only the faintest of light filtering through.
“Where are we?” I utter, and even the whisper seems too loud in the tight space. Several inches above me are beams and insulation, leaving no room to sit up, so I have no choice but to remain lying down.
With a rough hand, he turns my head to the side, so I’m forced to look him in the eye as he reveals a proud smile that beams wide as he takes in his prize. “Hello, Little Dove.” Tentatively, he pushes my hair behind my ear. His eyes close in satisfaction while my stomach tumbles at the full brunt of it,his unfiltered touch. So real, so present. I’d always imagined that death would be the absence of a body and all the sensations that come with it.But I feel.Worst of all, there’s nowhere for me to flinch away.
With no way to physically remove myself from the situation, I attempt to dissociate, but he takes that from me too.
“There you go, slipping away into that mind of yours. You think you’re such a clever girl. That you can hide anything from me. Always so elusive, so guarded. But not anymore.” Ivan fists my hair. “I own you now.” Pulling me closer, he inhales deeply,his nose buried in the green strands. I yearn to rip it out, if only to get rid of any trace of him.
A single, hopeless tear escapes from the puddle gathering in my lashes. “So, what is it you’ll do with me then? Now that you have me?” My voice is strained, dread smothering out my strength in this moment of uncertainty. I need to get my mind right, get my bearings, but I can’t think straight, not with him this close, not with his body feeling more real than ever before, not with the full intent of his possessiveness closing in on me.
“All the things I’ve been dreaming of for so long,” he muses as if he’s speaking about a vacation. “You’ll see. Soon, you’ll see.” His arm wraps around my waist as he leers over me, searching for something I’m completely incapable of giving him, no matter how hard he clings to me.
Bitterly undercutting any happiness he might find is my only path of resistance right now. “This is what you’ve been dreaming of? Us cramped together in some dark, dank place?”
His jaw tenses, the muscle jumping with the bite he’s withholding. “It’s not ideal, but it’s temporary.” Ivan leans over me and plucks away the sticky strands that cling to my face, casting them aside.
I shift away from him, more instinct than a plan to run. He clasps his hand around my face, gripping my cheeks until they grind against my teeth, his palm pressing against my mouth. If I needed to breathe, I would be struggling. Instead, I tremble with fear. It’s been many years since I’ve felt the full brunt of someone’s angry hands, but the impact is all the same. “Little Dove, let me make one thing very clear; I will not tolerate you playing the victim anymore. We’re done with your lies.” Ivan preaches from beyond my sight. “Are we clear?”
I can’t get a word out beneath his hand, but I nod reluctantly.
“Now, say it. Nobody else is here; you don’t have to pretend anymore. Admit that you brought this upon yourself.” Heremoves his hand, expectation glowing in his eyes as he watches me intently.
“I brought this upon myself.”
“Good girl,” he preens, stroking my cheek.
There’s no hesitation in the way he touches me, no reservations about how hard I fought not to end up here, no respect for my open mourning. His hands explore, prodding, violating.
You’d think death would be something different, but I find myself in this endless loop that I couldn’t save myself from.
My disgust is a palpable, suffocating thing that clings to me like humidity, but it won’t choke me, won’t release me from this misery. The only way to cope is to break away, to tap into that safe space inside myself where his words, his touch, his unrelenting desire can’t reach me. If I just try a little harder, I can find a place that he can’t get to me.
It’s no surprise that the pocket I slip away to inside my mind brings me to a much younger Hawthorne. He’s the only safety I’ve ever known.
“Are you just going to ignore me?” he asks when the girls who were giving me a hard time are finally out of earshot.
“You came to me. I assumed you would speak if you had something to say,” I respond with a shrug.
His brow furrows as if he doesn’t know quite what to make of me. I get that look a lot. “I was just wondering why you’re over here tucked away like a little spider when the rest of the class is hanging out over there.” He rubs his hands on his board shorts and then pulls his hoodie higher around his neck.
“Why would I want to hang out with people who don’t like me? Besides, this is much more interesting.” I hold the tiny bone up to the sun that barely peeks between the clouds, angling it this way and that. To the average person, a bone is something with no purpose but to decay, something without worth. To me,it’s a treasure, something worthy of giving a new life. There’s a look in his eye that tells me he might not find it completely worthless. That maybe he sees beyond the surface of things. I might enjoy the company of someone like that. “If you’re going to just stand there instead of going back to your friends, you can assist me.”
“They’re not my friends.” I tilt my head at the unexpected admission. “Well, not all of them. Besides, you’re right, this does seem more interesting.”
