Rhombus [h.s]

Epilogue

My dear Howler had left before me. At the young age of nineteen, she was so filled with grief that it made her extremely gray and desolate. I've just found out that her father died from nasopharyngeal cancer four months after the rally. Her friends left her alone. She was kicked out from university because of a selfish plan. Heavy boots swarmed through her home and scooped her up. She was bound with plastic zip-ties and brought in for "questioning".

A year later she was released from subjugation. She was so alone. She was so depressed. And nobody was there to help her. I was there, hiding, and it made me feel like a fucking worthless piece of shit.

I've never told her how much I loved her. I've never even kissed her. She was the only person that I truly cared for. And yet I was too occupied by my own thoughts - by my own plans - that I completely forgot about her. How her eyes made me feel. She always had that look of otherness about her. She was too wise for her age. Her eyes saw things much too far. Her thoughts wandered off the edge of the world, and I would've gladly taken a journey to reach them. But there I was, hiding behind my own insecurities.

After escaping persecution in 2015, I traveled to my grandparents' house in Clayton to hide. Of course they were absolutely surprised, furious even, to see me there, in the dusk of spring semester, looking like a bum. But I was a smooth talker, so they took me in. I stayed in the shadows for a year – to recover from my illness, and to keep a low profile. Louis Tomlinson and that bastard Gordon led this wide search to find me, so I had to lay low for a while. Never really understood why Tomlinson was so eager to bring me down. Maybe he was just jealous.

Fast forward fifty five years later, and here I am. Hair as white as paper. Old as dirt. Clutching a walking stick in my trembling hand. Today, I found out that Rue Bennett is dead. My search for her is over. And so I gave up the thought of dying old and spending my last days in this world with her.

I've finished a book called "Rhombus" today, and closing it encapsulated my grief. The book was a revelation. I saw it in the display window of the old Parisian bookstore I used to work at in Greenville a couple of years ago. Of course, seeing it at the bestsellers section, I had to buy it. But it wasn't that simple. I struggled with a long internal debate. Stepping inside the bookstore would bring in a lot of memories, and I wasn't sure if I was ready to burst open my dam. 

The figure on the cover ignited the wick inside my mind, felt a strange spark. But still, after digging through my thoughts and convincing myself that it was an important book, important that I'd have it, I was quite unsure about the symbol on the cover. A drawing of a rhombus (recall: Geometric shapes) with a diagonal line in the middle. What did it mean? Why was it so damn familiar? It screamed to me, felt stirred. So at the end of the day, after rubbing my wrists and massaging my temples, I heaved my ass in the bookstore and bought the book. When I stepped outside, I cried. It just sort of happened. 

Anyway, after a good long week, I'd finished reading it. Today, this afternoon, two weeks later, after a meticulous rereading session, I've realized that "Rhombus" is an edited version of the life journal; the very detailed and lewd account of my young antics, my Operation - Operation Red Death - which Rue had tirelessly written before her death, as her half of the story. 

A Journal of Modern Life, it said on the cover. 

by Edward and Howler

I started crying again. Now I remember. Those nights, writing with her in the library, never really thought she was writing about me the entire time; how I made her feel, or how intelligent I was to her, how she looked up to me. Never crossed my mind that I was an "inspiration" to her. Instead of valuing her love, which would create a far more lasting impact, I chose not to. I chose to shove my ideals and beliefs down her throat without hearing her side, and now that I think about it, I led Rue Bennett, this sweet, innocent girl, straight into her death. I was her own personal Death.