My Dark Beloved - onc 2023 Ambassadors Pick-Longlisted

.14

Little bird, little bird, where are you going? Where have you been? Can I get you a pretty new outfit? A pound of sugar or one of flesh? A garland of thorns? A new way to mangle your mind?

Zillah's voice follows me as I walk into my house. The front of my shirt is covered in blood. My hair is covered in snow.

I feel crimson damp on my chest so I leave my jacket on and go to find Lux.

She's sleeping in her aquarium yet fusses when she hears my bare feet pad over.

"Elio." Her voice is a balm. I want to to crawl into her palm and let her care for me like a lost little sparrow.

"Fuck, Lux. Fuuuuck." I am crying. Not solitary tear crying but really bawling my guts out.

My mermaid slips out of her tank and rushes to me. Bare and soaking. Her feet leave marks on the floor. Her hair is letting waterfalls create chaos.

"Don't say a word," she whispers as she pulls me into her embrace.

Lux holds me and I cry. Oh, fuck above, how I cry.

"I don't even know where to begin," I melt against her. She is my salvation.

Lux strokes my hair, unzips my jacket and then removes it. Carefully, she lifts my shirt over my head. Though she doesn't say anything, her eyes do not leave the huge blood stain. With a click of her tongue, she balls the top up and hurls it away.

"Tell me this ones name," I hear her say but I am falling into the comfort of her chest.

As if I have done this before, my lips move and a word morphs, "Zillah."

"Your shadows."

I remain silent against her skin.

"Shadows," Lux repeats. "Nothing but your torment and fragments of insanity."

I touch the tips of her hair and focus on how the water clings onto my finger.

"I wish I could do more, Lio." Her tone is a lament.

I sing hymns somewhere inside my bones where a part of me – I believe – had once been taught to pray. There are angels humming. They are all nestled in Lux's existence.

I have fed, but that does not stop me for wanting more. I need blood like an alcoholic needs his wine. "Allow me?" I beg as I plant my lips to her neck.

She nods as I break skin.

When I am done we're no longer standing. We're on the floor. Lux is unconscious but I see the rise and fall of her chest indicating I haven't killed her. Yet.

There's blood all over. I bet I spilled more than I drank. I am sloppy tonight.

I get up, stagger to her desk and pull out a piece of paper. I sit next to her, dip my fingers in red and begin to write.

My dark beloved,

As chaos crawls closer I need you deeper and deeper. You are a harsh master. I am a perfect slave. You have made me yours because I eagerly allowed it. Allow me.

Allow me.

Allow me to crawl into you. Into that crescent of chaos where everything is perfect and poisonous.

Do not desert me for it will be my undoing.

Yours in this life, in the hereafter, in whatever you desire.

Your little bird.

I wait for the blood-words to dry before carefully folding it and putting it in an envelope that smells faintly like Lux's perfume. Tomorrow I will mail it. But I have no clue where to. I don't even know where Zillah lives. It could be anywhere and nowhere. In a house, under a rock, in a puff of smoke. Suddenly, I am in a state of panic.

Clinging onto the letter, I pull it close as I come to the realization that it will never make it past my doorstep. Where would it go? I don't know. Oh shit.

I spin on my heel. My gaze darts around the room as if it could give me any sort of answer.

From beyond the open bedroom door, I hear a whisper, "Where are you going?"

I know no one is there, but still I reply, "I don't know." My voice is a pitiful moan.

"Where have you been?" The phantom voice airily asks.

I drop the letter I am holding and follow the questions. "I have been away," I say.

"Oooooohhhh. I knooooooow." There's a shadow inching towards the wall. It giggles before it clambers up and skitters like a spider along the ceiling.

The shadow skitters to a photograph on the wall and vanished behind the ink.

I walk closer and look at the smiling face. It is that of Lux on her birthday. She's wearing a childish party hat which reads Birthday Girl in sparkly pink. There's a cake in front of her – shimmery blue icing that she told me reminds her of the sea. Pink balloons frame her. I know who snapped the picture. It was me.

As I go to touch the photo I catch sight of a tiny bit of fluff by Lux's eye. Inching closer I realize the fluff had legs and that it's not a piece of fluff but a spider. No, it's two. Three! Holy shit they are crawling out of the photo's eyes. Mouth. Ears.

I yelp and skitter backward. The spiders crawl in all directions. They invade the east, the south, the north and the west. It is pandemonium.

I watch them cover the walls until there are no more walls left. They do the same thing to the ceiling and window sills.

Soon they are over my letter. Their ugly spindly feet tap dance on the paper. I bring my hand to my eyes. I want to pluck them out but all I end up doing is pulling out my lashes. Black hairs cling onto my sweaty fingertips. When I look at them, they twitch like Daddy Long Legs feet.

"Get the fuck away!" I shake my hands. My arms. My body. My soul. I try to shake the spiders away before running out of the room and straight up to mine where I slam the door behind me.

"Your blood," a cacophony calls from outside my door. "Poison."

"Get. Lost." My breath is in my gut and it's avoiding my lungs.

Fists pound on the frame. I jam a chair under the handle and shove my comforter against the small crack under the door (yes, I used a goddamn comforter. It's winter. No, I don't sleep in a coffin. I'm not fucking dead. Well, at at least not fully. Why are you still even here?).

"We can leave," the voice says. "Me and all the little spiders will go. But they will still be here. Your own ghosts. Your little fantasies. Your madness."

"Good bye, sweetheart now it' s time to go." The voice gets further and further away. I hear a million feet walking down the steps and then I hear the front door open and close.

I press my ear to the door and make sure there's no more sound. When I am sure that there's no one in the house but Lux and I, I open the door and look outside. Naturally, there is no one. No silly shadows. No freaky spiders. There's nothing but a huge blood-red heart drawn on the wall and my letter resting gently against the plaster. 

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