TILL DEATH

Episode Nine

DAY 39

Morning. I slept better than I have in many weeks. Before bed I checked in on her was satisfied to see she had moved not an inch. Her eyes wheeled around wide and red, but her body remained stuck in place, like a fly on a web. Later, wrapped in the duvet, I felt something approaching contentment, and I fell quickly into a deep sleep. I woke renewed but with the knowledge that I still have more work to do. What I did yesterday was good for a day, maybe two, but I know that smell will be back because that sacrilegious body of hers will keep rotting. Today I must do more. I must do things I never expected to do, but they are things I must do for us both, so that we may at least see out this apocalypse in company. I will take no pleasure in what I will do, but if we are to be together again under one roof then these things must be done. But first I do what I do every day. I drink my coffee and build the fire ready for the coming night. I eat a modest meal of beans and rice, collect the scissors, the knife and the tape, then I meet my wife in our sunroom. I hesitate at the door. I can feel her presence on the other side of it and I am reminded of the old status quo. I know it's not actually her on the other side of the oak, it's just a representation of the woman I loved, but if nothing else she is a symbol of a past I retain a fondness for, and so, out of reverence for the life I shared with the body in there, I knock before striding in. The sun is bright and she is where I left her, taped, bound and gagged. Angled back against the wall, held flat against a frame made of wood, it strikes me that she is like one of her own paintings. Death it seems, like life, imitates art. Her smell has thickened overnight and it appals me all over again, but at least confirms that I am right to do what I am about to do. With a fist full of scissors I say, "Good morning," and smile, before mustering up some invisible courage and stepping deeper into her dense scent. "Now," I tell her, "let's see what we're dealing with". I smile again, and it's a good smile. Convincing. She trembles, but I start cutting anyway. First goes the blouse. The filthy cotton cuts easily. I trim and snip at the delicate fabric until the floor is littered with strips of it and her upper torso is exposed. I regard it coldly, then remember my manners. "Ah," I say, "it's not as bad as I anticipated. A little bruised here and there, but no nasty cuts. Very good. Very good." My tone is reassuring, but I am lying to her. It's true that the skin is unbroken, but there is much more than a little bruising. She is black and blue. Her chest has sunk and her breasts seem lumpen, hard, and strange. Her arms appear to be in fairly good condition, except for the fact that she is missing a hand, of course. The skin where that hand once met its wrist hangs ragged, wet and barely pink. The exposed flesh and bone there will need to be taken care of. I snip through more of the fabric that covers her tummy, peeling it away until she's naked from the waist up. Her stomach is cold and grey but unblemished, apart from the stretch marks he gave her. It's been years since I last saw these wretched flaws of hers. She was so ashamed of them. During sex she would try to conceal her stomach, getting on all fours just to turn those strange white dashes away from me. Little did she know they ran around her back too. Remembering her that way, on all fours, a sheen of wanting dew across her back, I look under my brow at her gagged face. Her eyes are on mine. I hold her gaze and touch a finger to the place where her those tiger marks begin. Some static energy raises the hairs there. I drop my eyes and watch my finger follow the rainbow of scars down and around her belly button. The flesh is cold, but it still shivers the way it always did... I let my finger drop away and look back at her. In the silence that follows I say nothing because nothing needs to be said. Some ember still burns. I get on with removing the last of the filthy clothes she wears. I trim away her trousers, cutting them down the sides then pulling them away. As the rags hit the floor her smell hits me like a wet slap in the face. Now that she's naked it's easy to see why she smells the way she does. Her left thigh has a deep, torn puncture. It is older than the rest and swollen, jaundiced and angry. Some septic fluid weeps from its depths like the devil's nectar. My eyes fill with water and my mouth fills with spit. I am disgusted, but at least now I know the source of the infection that is turning her rancid, and in turn making my life here so unbearable. The hole in her head needs work, as do the stumps of her knee and her wrist, but there is no doubt that the wound in her thigh is our most pressing issue. I spray it thoroughly in neat bleach. The wound puckers and clouds, but it's obvious that even this will not suffice. I need to consider more drastic action. I leave her propped bare and bound to the door and go outside where I eat my dry lunch on the damp grass. I consider the task ahead of me. The work I need to do on her will not be easy. It will force me to cross lines I never expected to, and it will change us both forever, but what is life if not a series of transformations? Even an earth-bound maggot eventually looks down on its old life from glassy wings. Evolve or die. Isn't that life's most simple lesson? The day is bright and still. Somewhere a bird chirps a new song, a song I haven't heard before. Nothing lasts forever, I remind myself. None of this will last forever.