Richard wakes up, cold and shifty. He is not bound to anything but he cannot see clearly and he does not know where he is. His muscles are sore and his bones scrape against his skin. His head is filled with the dull tear of rusted metal. This is what dying feels like , he tells himself, as if it were a consolation. Maybe, he hopes, this is just another one of his late-night self-pity hangovers and when he blinks the sleep from his eyes, Raven will be there, a glass of water and a Blowfish to help ease the pain; massage the fatigue and worry from his bones.
He remembers then, that he is trying to find Raven and that she will not be helping him if he cannot locate her first. His vision clears, eventually, but he cannot move. He knows he is still at the wharf, he can hear the waves and the seagulls and the distant call of people above him. He is staring at a blank wall, wooden and eroded from the potent sea winds. The place feels small, with the wind echoing so loudly and closely. He holds his breath and manages to turn himself in the other direction.
She is facing him, eyes open but not in shock (in fierce obstinance); she does not see him. Richard can see the gray-blue hue of her irises; can see himself in them. He does not remember crying, but he knows he must have (why else were his eyes so sore and his skin so tight?). Her head lay on its side, strategically placed to stare directly at him; to haunt him. Her blood was still warm, not oozing, but rather slowing like the tide. Scraps of trachea and skin were jarred and littered around her neck- jagged and sharply cut.
Her body was there, and had he not willed himself to look at the blood, he might not have noticed its state of detachment. He reached for her hand, gritted his teeth from the white-hot pain burning through his nerves. Her fingers were still malleable and he found himself intertwining their hands. He might have laughed, remembering how much she hated it when he hugged her in public or had to hold her hand for whatever security matters.
"I'm not getting paid to hold your hand." she would say.
"If only your job was so lovely." he would say back.
He remembers whispering something through his tears, repentance, maybe. But he would not remember those words for years. Not until he slept and her voice cradled his woes.
Police sirens sounded and he could hear gunshots. The door was kicked in and the officers found him lying in blood, crying and murmuring to a dead girl that lay beside him. His focus was not on them; he saw swathes of blue and black and thought the walls were moving around him. He screamed when they raised his body away from hers, but he could not fight them.
