[COMPLETED]
[WATTYS 2022 WINNER]
James Quinn can't die. Actually... that's not true. He's died many times - somewhere in the neighborhood of 250 - only to be reborn as himself to live his life over again.
For millennia, he's had to endure this c...
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Martha pinned James against the inside of his front door, then bit his lip in celebration of their long awaited seclusion. Desperate to be close, she peeled his jacket over his shoulders and to the ground. He followed suit, pulling her hoodie over her head and taking her t-shirt with it. For a moment, she felt bashful, but then laughed at the absurdity of the thought, before slamming him back to the door.
It wasn't about having sex – well, maybe a little bit – but about being close. She'd flatten his bones and organs against this door if she could and still not be close enough. She needed her atoms to shift in concert with his so they could occupy each other's space.
James had a different idea and launched himself off of the door, lifting Martha in the air. She instinctively wrapped her legs around him and felt his enthusiasm swell as he carried her to his room.
He shoved his bedroom door open with her backside and she laughed, breaking from their kiss and opening her eyes. Then she gasped.
James had once again painted a dizzying maze on a wall of his room, but this time, instead of stairways, rails, and streams, there were thorn covered vines, barbed wire, and pike filled canals. She jumped off of him to get a closer look. As before, the detail was masterful, if twice as disturbing. He'd added red to the color scheme of gray and black as many of the conduits were smeared or dripping with blood. And there were victims now – heads impaled on pikes, entrails hanging from thorns, bodies tangled in wires and writhing in pain.
"Oh James..."
"Like I said," he breathed. "This life has been different." Then James unbuttoned his black shirt and dropped it to the floor. Martha's breath caught. His ribs were pronounced under his sun deprived skin in stark contrast to his athletic physique from their first. But more concerning – so much more concerning – were the scars.
Lines in rows and lines in chaos littered his torso. Some were a fresh, deep red while others had faded with time. Some weren't lines at all but blotchy welts from burns. Martha hurried to him, then after a moment's hesitation, placed her fingers on a particularly large welt over his chest. He flinched slightly, but let her draw her hand down his torso and across the bumps and ridges.
"I'm so sorry," she whispered
"But it's not your fault," he said. "Why-"
She looked into his eyes and he knew instantly that it wasn't meant as an apology.
Martha placed her hand on her own chest – bare, soft, and unharmed. "I... had to keep up appearances to make it here, but..." A tear rolled down her cheek and James brushed it away with his thumb. "I have them too. You just can't... You can't see mine."
His brow twitched as tears welled. She recognized the sorrow in his eyes reflecting her own and she didn't need their atoms to align. He knew her pain and she, his. They carried it for one another as no one in the world or in time ever would.
