The Dust of Death

Chapter 9

The sun filtered through the leaves leaving a polka-dot blanket of shadow and light that speckled over the grass below. A butterfly flew its zigzagged flight in front of her. She crept along the path, the tall trees standing guard and throwing shadows across her face.

The breeze blew a strand of his hair onto his forehead. His head was bowed. His back was arched. He was on his knees. She watched the strange figure in black, his arms frantically working, elbows in and out like a jigsaw with rabies. She was coming up behind him.

What was he doing?

What made his body jerk so, she wondered.

He was grunting, strange guttural sounds, interrupted by deep sobs.

The man is crying, she thought, creeping closer still.

Closer still.

Her small, even teeth chattered. Her lips were blue. Her face was a mask of gray. But it was not cold. It was sunny. It was warm. Still, she trembled.

And yet, she could not help but inch closer. So great was her curiosity that even the fear that made her heart race wildly inside her tiny chest could not stay her advance.

Closer.

Closer still.

She saw great droplets of sweat glistening from his neatly shaven neckline. His usually crisp, white collar was wet and stained with the anguish that oozed from his body. She came just to the edge of his sight.

Her steps froze. Her body stiffened. Her tiny mouth pursed into a silent 'o.' She was too shocked to utter a sound.

His hand stopped in midair.

The ragged piece of material held between his fingers fluttered in the breeze. The doll lay on the ground at his knees. Its head was torn from its body. Its wig was entangled in a mass of leaves and twigs, and clumps of hair lay scattered around the doll's corpse like downy tumbleweeds.

The doll's face was cracked, the top half of its head lying several feet away. She stared at the hollow head, broken but not bleeding. Arms and legs lay here and there. The cloth torso was naked, dirt-stained, and ripped apart like a chicken whose head and feathers have been rung from its body.

Lifeless. Cold. Dead.

There was no way the doll could ever be made whole again. Her eyes met his, the crazed eyes of a lost soul. Her breath caught in her throat.

She ran.

She heard heavy steps falling behind her.

Did he cry out for her to 'wait' or not?

She did not know. Her brain was only registering she must get away. She must take flight. She must remove herself from this disturbing scene.

Great tears streamed down her face, threatening to blind her as she ran. Stray tree branches smacked at her face and arms, stinging and tearing her porcelain flesh. The ground was uneven and filled with knotted roots and rocks. She stumbled, and the world around her took on the blinding blur of lost balance and a dizzying fall.

Her beautiful face contorted into a grotesque mask. She closed her eyes and screamed as loudly as she possibly could.