Clean

The End

Clean. Sweep here, dust here. Pick up that empty pill bottle, dispose of that beer can. Wipe the bile from the sink. Scrub. Scrub, until the tears stop and your hands turn red. Until sweat slicks the nape of your neck. Until your thoughts drift and pop like soap bubbles. Clean.

"Mother."

The girl tried not to flinch. The word tasted rancid in her mouth, like burnt paper. She took a deep breath. "Mother."

"Mhm...hm?"

The woman half-opened her eyes, tried to prop herself upright. "Oh, Delilah...I didn't mea—"

She didn't finish.

A frenzy seemed to overtake the girl as she plunged the knife into the woman's heart. She didn't care where or how or why, she just kept plunging and stabbing ang plunging, so hard and so fast that the woman didn't cry out once. All the while the girl was

screaming

screaming

screaming

yet she was dry-eyed and quick and energetic, not pausing once. She didn't stop until the wall themselves seemed to bleed, until she was covered from the neck, down to her waist, in blood. The same blood that ran in her veins.

The girl looked down at the woman—now just a mangled body. And for a second, she felt a pang of guilt.

She had...

No.

"No." She shook her head, pressing a bloodstained finger to her temple.

She hadn't, for this thing on the floor wasn't her Ma. Her Ma died years ago. Died the day the crematory operator turned her husband to ash. Died the day she drunk herself numb.

The girl smiled. It was going to be alright, going to be fine.

She went to the kitchen and fished for a thick towel. She took out the largest basin she could find, turned on the tap. As water filled the basin's inside, she went upstairs for a blanket and her favorite cleaning soap. It was strong and floral scented, and she loved it. It seemed fit to cover the smell of blood.

She carried everything to her Ma's room, where the body lay on the floor.

And then she cleaned.

The floor was so clean that it gleamed. Every inscrutable speck of red had been scrubbed off, from the rugs to the vases to the windowsills, and the smell of roses and burning candles pervaded the air.

In the midst of this stood the girl. She gathered her hair into a messy ponytail, looking around, beaming to herself.

Ma would've been proud. After all, she taught the girl how to do this, years before.

The girl made her way from her Ma's room and halted. She wasn't done. There was something she forgot to do.

She retraced her steps, picking up some matches in the kitchen. Then she made her way to the backyard.

Watching pieces of the woman set ablaze, a satisfied smirk crept on the girl's lips. The smell was horrid, but she didn't care. She lit another match, then threw it at the burning, cut-up body.

As the last of the woman's skin faded into ash and smoke, that was when the girl knew. She was free. Finally.

It was finished. It had taken a while, but it was finished.