The Ones Who Live Inbetween

11

When I dream, I dream of death. It seeps through my brain, polluting my heart. Everywhere I turn, is another dead person. I am once more standing on the field of bones which I first visited. But this time, I know the people lying dead around me. This skull here, a crack splintered through his eye socket, is the boy. The golden chain remains wrapped around his neck. And here, this outstretched bony hand lying on a bed of copper hair shuddering in the breeze, this is the woman. My flag of hope and love, now dead. The skull of a dragon, snaggletoothed and old lies resting against the folded and torn wings of some great bird. All around me are the bones of people she killed. The bones of people I killed. By leaving them I condemned them all to this fate. I'm sorry. Gods, I couldn't be more sorry. I scream my regrets to the wind but my throat won't work. All that comes out is the harsh croaking of a crow. Because that is what I am, a carrion crow feeding off of their deaths. The wind whistles in this empty space and pushes red sand off of a body. This body is new but just as dead as all the rest. It is a young girl, surely no more than five or six, her lips blue and skin pale. Her black hair is tangled in knots and saturated with a foul smelling water. I know her too. How? How do I know her? Her eyes flutter open and she reaches a hand dripping with water to me. But she is dead. She has to be dead. They are all dead.

"Forgive me and I will go quietly through the snow," the words fall from her lips, the voice of a child.

But I can't. I cannot forgive her. I can never forgive her for leaving them behind. I can never forgive her for staying quiet. I can never forgive her for letting them die. Even if I must suffer for the rest of eternity, I will never forgive her. To forgive her would be to save her and she doesn't deserve salvation. I will never deserve salvation.

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