Avogado6 Short Stories

Blood-Stained Water

////TW: Abuse////

I stand in the cold air of the hour between night and sunrise. The cold air of the ocean. The wind hits me- no. The wind forces its way onto my face, making its presence known, like a child without attention. The tides are loud and clashing. The sound of birds is blaring as well. It's odd how unapologetically clamorous noises can be so soothing... to the masses at least.

I look onto the body of water, unable to keep my mind blank. The sound, the smell, the feeling in the air, it's all a grim reminder now. My tears now add to the mass of sea.

She loved the beach. She begged our mother every weekend to drive us an hour, just so she could swim. The pool was never enough. This went on for years, occasionally missing our trips for things such as visitation to and from relatives and miscellaneous events.

She reflected the ocean in her person. She was upbeat and dynamic, a very rowdy person in her social life, but she had a stillness to her. She went with the flow. She overall had an air to her that was intoxicating. She was good, though and through.

We stayed close as we grew older. She was in her college years when I was in high school. I'd call her every day and talk shit about people at school, and she would do the same. I spent every Sunday with her at her apartment that she shared, because every Saturday she was at the beach with her friends. She was never invasive with me. I told her about everything in my life. She was my best friend.

He seemed nice at first. He spent time with her, he was generally giving as well. He paid it no mind how much he spent on her. It seemed as though he genuinely wanted to make her happy. He was always there, ever since I had started visiting her at the apartment, though his presence wasn't prominent. He eventually started hanging around more and more, until he was there all the time.

Things started to get weird, though. He seemed to become passive-aggressive. He started causing scenes. At first I brushed it off, as we all have bad days, but these events became more frequent as time went on. He would yell at restaurants, whether it be at me, at her, or at civilians. He would storm off, and he would not be present for the rest of the day. Where he went, I still don't know.

He yelled with no hesitation, though I dismissed this as hot-headedness. Eventually, after a few months, he threw a tantrum every week. Of course, I was only around on Sundays, so I was only aware of the fits I had witnessed and the ones my sister would tell me about. I doubt she told me about all of them. It seemed like any little thing would set him off.

Of course this concerned me, what kind of a brother or friend would I be if I wasn't, but she assured me each time that he didn't mean anything that he would say, and that he has stress due to his work, so this should be expected. She assured me that everything was okay.

It was not okay.

I still remember the last letter she sent. It was sent from some island in Hawaii. They had taken a semester off from school for a vacation. I had been in a dissociative state for the days prior. When I saw it in the mailbox, I became nauseous. I tried leaving it there, pretending like I never even saw it, but it stared into me. Its sharp edges tore open my already broken soul.

It took a long time, but I made it back to my room with the envelope in hand. Time seemed to drag out as I opened it.

It smelled like her.

I felt her hands on the paper.

She dragged the tears from my eye sockets.

The streams were hot and all too familiar.

My hands shakily slid the paper out of its paper casing. It took a while for the tears to stop their traffic to allow me to read.

Her last words to me were:

Hey bro,

First off, I wanted to say that I'm sorry about leaving unannounced, it's just that [he] sprung this on me out of nowhere. You know how spontaneous he is. I'm having fun, though. The water here is so nice, but there's something about it. I guess it just lacks that nostalgia of home. The air here is really sweet though. I love it here either way. I just wish you were here with me. You'd love it here too :)

Okay he's gone now. [my name] please tell mom to make up some excuse to bring me back home. Please. Please I'm begging. I can't take it here any longer. You were right. You were so fucking right. I can't stay here. I'm scared. I'm so fucking scared. He's been monitoring everything. I can barely get away from him. I can't even speak out loud about what's going on, otherwise, I would call you or mom or anyone. He's taking a shower now. Please. I don't know how much time I have left here. I have to rush downstairs before he finds that I'm gone just so I can send this to you. He's been watching me. He has bugs everywhere and I can't find them. Please I'm begging you I'm scared for my lif

And that was it. Her last words to me were begging for help. After I read that, my whole body shook, as though my entire consciousness wasn't able to cope with the reality of what I had just read.

She had been pronounced dead two days before the letter arrived. We were told that she had suffered intense head trauma from a blunt object and was knocked unconscious. Blows to the head after being knocked unconscious caused hemorrhaging, resulting in death.

A few weeks later he was tried for voluntary manslaughter, key evidence against him being his prior violent tendencies, as well as matching fingerprints on the weapon used on her. He was found guilty. As of now, he is still imprisoned.

The ocean air feels.... nice.