Bitter

Two lovers who never got to fulfill their wishes are cut short by death. This is really scrappy and I haven't decided if I'm going to form it into a bigger story or not.

I turn to see her body on the ground. I can feel my body running but I can’t seem to get to her fast enough, my heart beating out of my chest becomes the only sound in my head. It feels as though by the time I reach her, she will have decomposed in the elements completely; but I keep pushing for her. 

I arrive by her side while she is still taking shallow breaths, quietly whimpering involuntarily. I fear that if I touch her, she might break into a million pieces right before my eyes. She’s never looked so fragile, so scared and broken. Her dirt stained face has trails of clean skin where her tears have fallen towards the cold ground beneath her. I know she can’t move or else she would be giving her best attempt at fixing her chestnut hair, her soft hair that is now sprawled across the forest floor. 

“Riley, stop it.” My voice cracks. 

“Riley, I know you’re just faking to scare me, to teach me a lesson. Stop it, you’re scaring me.” I’m unsure of how my brain is coming up with these words, I can’t think them up, or feel them rolling off my tongue. All I feel is nothing, numbness, longing for her. 

Suddenly I realize her cold fingers are interlaced with mine. My thumb is slowly rubbing the back of her hand as if this is some terrible attempt to warm her. 

“Riley, please. Please don’t leave like this, I need you.”

Saying her name doesn’t feel the same. It used to pulse excitement throughout my body. Thinking of her made me float up off the ground and into paradise. Looking into her oceanic eyes used to make me melt into giggling mess. But now, all of those make she feel as cold as she looks and I fear I will never be able to erase this visual of her lifeless body that is now smeared into my mind. I fear I will never see her the same, I will never remember her sweet smell, but rather the stench of sap and rot. The memory of her soft skin will be replaced with the feeling of rust beneath my finger tips. I fear she will no longer be the person who arose an awakening in my soul but rather the person who broke it. The person who shattered it into a million tiny pieces destroying my heart and happiness with its shards. As I repeat her name, the sweetness of all she is starts to dissolve on my tongue, and the vile poison of her death starts to reach for my lips. Her memory is fading into resentment, anger, anxiety, everything she was and everything she helped me become was on the verge of extinction right before my very eyes and all I could say was.

“Riley.”

I hated that she made me feel like a child in a candy store even now, even as she is shredding my heart strings, as she is signing her contract with death, she makes me feel alive and free. 

“This isn’t how this was supposed to happen. You weren’t supposed to leave me this way. You were supposed to live! You were supposed to save us both! You were supposed to be the hero!” My voice is raw and as shattered as my will to continue breathing; to remain in this world without her, my screams for her are as broken as my hope. I realize my screams go ignored, her breathing has come to a stop. Her eyes have become encased in glass. I know she is gone, and she has taken my happiness along with her.