A small house a small space a small life less than he imagined and still they are taking.
He stands alone. Pours. Lifts a cheap plastic tumbler from the counter and drinks. Pours again. He breathes deeply and lets the acrid honey of loss and despair coat the crumbling internal walls of his being. Pours. Drinks. Pours.
Let it drip across the past.
Let it bleed through the sheets.
Let it splash against the less.
They have conspired against him. They have taken. They have reached with greedy unworthy hands to rip from him that which is his. They have never forgiven her for choosing him, and bitterness corrodes their every thought, informs their every action.
They want her back in the form in which she still exists.
But in every form, she is his.
She was his. He held her in his hands. If he closes his eyes, she is here with him still. His hand reaches through time for her soft skin. He shudders as his palm meets the memoried outlines of her face, as his thumb rubs gently along the dampness of her lips, as her tongue darts to meet his touch. He can feel her hair slide between his fingers as he twists and tangles. He can smell the milky sweetness of her breath as he tightens his grip and pulls, lowers his face to hers. She yields eagerly, surrenders to the sharp edges of his embrace, welcomes the pain.
He groans at the memory of how she yielded.
Hardens at the memory of the taking.
She was his.
She gave herself willingly, and she was his. She knew she promised she swore she embraced she gave her oath she gave her body she gave her mind, and he received her gifts. This was how he knew it would be, how he had been told it would be, how it should be. She yielded and she gave and he accepted and he took, and she was his.
An understanding.
A marriage.
Children.
His.
His to do with as he pleased, because all that pleased him pleased her. He pours and pours and pours as he remembers. Her body stretched taut before him, his hands around her throat, the moment of his orgasm upon him . . . harder tighter better than it has ever been before. He moves, he slams, he buries himself; he holds onto this moment as tightly as he can. As he crescendos, she relaxes, welcoming him more deeply than he has ever known. A cry escapes his lips and he lunges into the explosion that will bring him closer to the only god he knows.
An exquisite perfect moment . . . his moment.
Hers as well . . . her last.
More stars in that desert sky than he had ever thought to imagine, but he could not wake his sons to share the moment. He let them sleep as he said his final goodbyes. He lay atop the sand that covered her and stared at the glittering sky, angry that these stars and this moment were not his to give to his sons. Her fault. This was all her fault. As his awareness of the magnitude of her betrayal grew, he suddenly saw the future. He lay there in the sand watching his breath congeal in the frozen air, and he saw the future.
His future.
In her final surrender, she chose his path.
The irony is not lost on him.
He pours. He drinks. He pours. He walks through the rooms and checks the windows to be sure they are closed and locked. He does not speak but fills the air with the hissing of his hatred and his love and his loss.
It’s almost time.
He watches as the car pulls up and the three of them climb out, one interloper and two young boys, all that remains of her. His. The boys stand quietly as the woman gathers her briefcase and her phone and her keys, and then they walk together toward the front door. He does not open the door until they are standing right outside, as he knows that this part will be tricky.
Welcoming hands and rejecting words and a shaking of his head and ushering arms and a slamming of the door.
He will not be supervised.
He will do this alone.
The three of them.
The two of them.
He pulls what is left of her close, feels the silk of her hair entwined within his fingers.
His.
A cry escapes his lips and he lunges into the explosion that will bring him closer to the only god he knows.
An exquisite moment.
Theirs.
Finally.
This story is fiction, but inspired by this, which is horrifically true.
