the alive

Terra

Wants to raise the house by licking it with fire. Imagines David's home as a hollow wooden orange black shell bursting flames like demon fingers up a witches skirt. A skin curl collapse of ashes. She thinks about what might've been David's screaming, char crisp husk. Maybe she should've killed him by such means. Burnt alive. Maybe. No. He didn't need to be sanitized in such a way. What she did was better. For her it was a satisfying release. The brutality of physical touch. The absolute annihilation of all of him.

Her thin fingers are like she's been digging into red soil. Each of her digits feel like hard tight shackles and each knuckle still reverberates from the cracking' like powerful storming thunders of her fists. His death was a reprieve for her. His death was meant for her. Justified with his blood and remains. Finds herself content. Content to leave everything the way it is. Broken in butchery. A decomposing smear. Every bit of flesh will melt off every bit of bone. David's finally dead. She's alive and free because he's dead. She's finally alive. Mouth breaths the calm candor in the moment like a vampire witnessing the dawn for the first time in centuries. Breaths freely.

Terra bare foot steps away from the faceless mangle. Bloody footprints follow her back into the shower. Washes every fleshy bit about her. Cleans the stains of his fluids off her ashen skin. Blood rivulets down her belly toward her dark pubic. Flows down her legs and swirls like a bubbly galaxy at her coal black toenail feet.

Afterward, Terra drip dries as there're no more clean towels. Lingers naked at a mirror. Smiles at her hairy legs and arm pits. Black teeth. Bright green ring in her sable eyes. Doesn't mind being unclothed in this particular moment. Touches her face. Seems unnatural. No pimples. No anxietes. Notices a single long black hair by her right nipple. Pulls. It's attached. Nods to herself. Leaves it because she likes it. Figures the social norms which lean such demanding weight upon women are nothing more than knowledge which will wash away like David's blood down the drain. The interpretation of what she is in the eyes of Man means nothing.

Collects her clothing. Slips the red dress with the white polka dots over her shoulders. Fumbles toward the door with her black flip flops. Steps outside to retrieve her cornflower blue city bicycle and pink backpack from the side of the house where her and Millar...David...where David had control of her body and mind through the domination of scent. She views the whole backyard episode as rape. Knows it. Terra had no choice in the physical sloshing. He knew that she had no choice.

Her stomach becomes weak and sore with such thoughts. His touch. Him in her. Feels like vomit and bile in the back of her throat. On the walk she hurls a yellowish liquid onto the nicely mown blades of a neighbours lawn. Hates him and hates herself for not seeing who he was much sooner. Her fists clench. Shakes her head. Whips long raven tether hair across her face like a clacker. Breathes fluidly and remembers she's won. Her stormy stomach calms. But the storm has killed all her butterflies.

Approaches the abandoned house. The place next door that is her's hammers and thumps with a general contractor's blame. Too many trades at once. The safety inspector's pen would salivate check marks and exes.

Stucco and roofing and landscaping fill the air with smells of propane and cigarettes and body oder. Rumblings of jumping jacks and plate compactors and shots from nail guns. Mixing drills and portable air compressors and mitre saws. Shop vacs pollute her outer intuition. Vans and trucks litter the block. No one really lives around here anyway, so no one will ever complain to the city about the parking.

She retrieves her bike and backpack. Hears the whistles of a couple roofers behind the wall of sound castrating her ear drums. She doesn't look up at them. Senses their eyes and the leering meaning behind their gaze. Then, like the slow motion opening of a crypt, she turns her chin up to view their cat call countenances. Her heated glowing obsidian emerald ring eyes witness the two shoulder tan shirtless skinny ab boys from her pale fathoms below. She can see one is commando and partially erect under his work pants. Notices her inhuman face in the reflection of a window. Smiles like Roman lead poisoning toward the roofers. They must notice her black teeth. Senses the very first second of their terror. The catcalls halt. In a single moment she's no longer an object of their sexual desire but an ominous mysterious fear. Doesn't avert her gaze from their eyes. Their slow mannerisms are the uncomfortable trembling limbs of uncertainty. They turn away and go back to work like Terra isn't there. As she rides away, the loud ring nailers sound like petite gunfire.