THE ORDER OF KORES

Twaalf

My body felt hot and uncomfortable– the sort that came with a high fever. I was sweating in droves and could feel my sweat causing whatever I laid on to be wet with it as if I was drowning in a pool. There was a pain unlike any other in my mouth, a reminder that it wasn't some sick twisted nightmare that my tongue had been cut off. My head was pounding, and everything from my ears to my toes ached with the pain that I felt in my mouth.

I opened my mouth, parting my lips and began to let out pained muffled cries as the only way to express what I was going through. "Shh, shh," I heard a voice say in my ear and I slowly opened my wet eyes with tears.

I was met with sable eyes and it felt like I was looking the devil himself in the eye.

I began to cry even more, speaking incoherently, "please kill me!" I sobbed, my words coming out grumbled and a wet, bloody mess. "Get away from me, Satan!" I continued, my eyes peering into his with the sinking realisation that I somehow found myself at the mercy of a lunatic.

Men like Kores, they didn't exist in anything other than fiction.

"There, there, you'll be okay," he said as he placed a wet cloth to my forehead. Gently placing it with the gentle touch of a devoted lover.

He kissed me on the tip of my nose and peered down at me with that sickening glare of love that I've always wanted to be on the receiving end of. Today, however, it felt like a curse.

I continued to cry, praying that he'd stop looking at me that way. "You've had a rough day, it's alright. You'll be able to talk," he said to me as he adjusted the warm cloth on my forehead that didn't provide any bit of comfort. "You'd be amazed what we can do as humans. I didn't cut the tongue from the base, you'll be able to talk. It won't be as clear as before, but that's okay. Could we even call it a lisp?" he asked me, as he gently brushed my tears away with his thumbs.

He was silent, his eyes looking into mine like he couldn't understand the tears that flowed. "I hate that I've showed you that part of me, wife. I just...I can't stand when I'm being lied to. I always know when you're lying, I have that special ability. I call it the bullshit sense, I have a lot of it. But I was trained, from when I was a little boy, how to pick up when someone lied to me. The way you blink, the way you breathe, the way the pulse on the side of your neck moves, the way your eyes look between mine, the stammer in your voice– all of that, I can pick it up."

He reached to my neck and began to touch the Barbie necklace that he had gifted me all those years ago. He began to play with it, and then he sighed, "The first lesson's always the hardest. It gets easier though, because you learn and most importantly, you listen." His eyes looked up from my necklace to my face. "You're so beautiful, wife. Even as you lay here, covered in blood, sweat and tears– you're still the most beautiful woman in the world. I don't know how..." he let out a breath and lowered his body onto the bed, sitting beside me as he continued to wipe my tears.

My cries had now gone quieter, but they hadn't disappeared. "I miss the bob braids," he spoke with that dimpled grin on his face, showing off his sharp canines and speaking like we were on the phone and like he hadn't killed a man and hurt me. He spoke to me like we were sat in the Pretoria Zoo and his friends had run off and left us alone, and we'd talk about anything.

"And that gap you had," he reminded me of the horrible and obvious gap I had because of my two missing front teeth. Everyone made fun of me, except him.

"I miss those mini gold hoop earrings you'd wear, and that beaded bracelet that you got from your grandmother. I missed a lot about you, wife. Even after all of those years, I still thought about you. I asked myself what you were doing, how you were doing, how life worked out for you. You told me you wanted to be a pilot, and I always imagined you flying high in the sky. I'm wondering why you didn't become a pilot, why you decided to go with law, when you know that's not your passion. I see it in your eyes, wife, you want to be a bird. You want to be a pilot, but you've chained yourself to law. Your dad, maybe? Is it because of him?"

He didn't wait for me to answer.

"It's what I think of when I lock myself in that room. I stare at those white walls for days at a time, and I just come up with these stories. I've always had the chance to have my men follow you, to know everything about you, but...I always fought it. It was much more fun just imagining, just putting together the pieces from ten years ago. Do you still dip your lollipops in yoghurt? Are you still deathly afraid of bees? What happened to having beads in your hair like you did when we were little?"

He took my hand in his, and spoke so gently to me, it made me cry even more. This wasn't the boy from ten years ago. That boy had died a long time ago and in his place was this monster.

"...you've changed," he spoke as he slid his fingers between mine and began to play with my fingers, "you might think I have too, but I haven't. I was always like this. I was just taught to hide it. I don't hide it anymore, mother says it's not good for me, and I agree. I have to be myself. My mother, what do you think about her? She loves you," he told me with a smile like I gave two fucks about what his mother thought of me. All I wanted was to get away from here and from him.

"Mother wants to see me happy. You make me happy." He leaned down and kissed me on my bloody lips. My blood stained his pale skin. "Not a lot of things make me happy," he paused as he wiped the blood on his lip using his thumb. He looked down at his thumb and then put it in his mouth, licking my blood, "which is why I will never let you go again, wife. I won't survive another ten years without you."