METANOIA

RUIN

Barry walked tall and proud. His shorts were sticking to the flesh wound and chafed at it with each step he took. The blood had already seeped through the fabric.

Barry was the chosen one. His minions were back to accompany him. Lucy, his new best friend, walked beside him as he made his way through the dark alleys. Buddy, on the other hand, pranced around them. He ran from shadow to shadow, briefly appearing to Barry with his shrill voice. He had found a monocycle somewhere it seemed.

Lucy was busy egging him on. "How could she leave you, Barry? You are the chosen one. The most important being in history." It was mostly the cocaine talking, but it made no difference. Barry was fantastic, and the universe knew it.

Lucy said, "You should call Melinda, give her a piece of your mind for leaving you."

Barry looked at him quizzically, "What about the non-contact?"

Lucy reassured him. "What about it, Barry? You can make no mistake, can't you see. There is nothing you can say that will get in the way of the things you want. Just... let... loose..."

Those words rang in his ears. He stood alone in the alleyway with Lucy before him and a manic Buddy Christ whizzed past them maniacally on his motorized unicycle.

Barry reached into his pocket and pulled out his cell phone.

He dialed Melinda from the call history. The phone had ringed for a long time before there was any response.

Her voice was tired. She sounded like she had just woken up. "Barry, it's three a.m. What happened? Are you okay?" Something in her voice sounded like it came from miles away.

Hearing Melinda's voice shattered him. Tears rolled down his cheeks uncontrollably. He croaked, "Melinda?"

She was annoyed at the rude awakening.

"Barry, are you drunk?" she sighed.

Barry was crushed; drunk dialing never helped. This was the moment he realized he had made a fatal mistake. Tears streamed down his face. "I love you; please don't do this to me."

Melinda was not impressed by his late call, but him breaking down in tears had shattered the only thing she cherished in him: dependability. The normally staid, strong man she had spent her time with had been reduced to a drunken mess. Although he was never really domineering, he was always reliable. The voice on the other end of the phone was not. It was the first time she had ever heard him cry. She couldn't picture it inside her head.

Melinda spoke slightly more dismissively than she had intended.

"Barry, get some sleep," she sighed.

This second sigh was the last straw. Barry felt an unfamiliar feeling rising vibrantly to his chest. With just one breath, Melinda had twisted the very fabric of his passion into something else - rage.

His voice became an animalistic grunt. "You ungrateful, worthless bitch."

His own voice scared him as much as it did Melinda.

Buddy Christ stopped mid-air with a dumb, surprised look, while Lucy was grinning.

"You fucking tore out my heart and took a steaming pile of shit on it. All for what? So you can go back to sucking the cock you are used to?"

Melinda wanted to calm him down, but the insults were out of this world. She was shocked. He had never even raised his voice at her before.

"Barry..." She started to protest, her voice cracking.