Prey and Mercy

VI. Blood Runs Deeper than Wine Ever Could

L E O N O R A

.

The toilet reeks of all the nightmares that plague us tonight. Specifically mine. He wraps his arms around my waist, nestles his chin on my shoulders, pretending his heart isn't bleeding against my back.

I hurl for the third time, turning porcelain red.

Someone knocks on the door. Politely even. There's no time for distress when everyone is screaming.

So I excuse myself with the back of my hand pressed against my colds lips for the next person to release their anguish through tears and with voices no one else can hear. My skin feels dead, numb.

I'm sorry. He says. I'm sorry I loved you.

"I'm not sorry I killed you." I grit my teeth, snatch another wine glass from a waiter who walks with his head down.

Yes, you are. And that's okay. It's okay to remember me Leonora. I remember you.

"Of course you do. I shoved a blade through your stomach and watched you die. You reached for me...but I couldn't help you."

I helped you. That's all that matters to me.

"It's not my fault you loved someone who couldn't love you back!" This time I'm yelling but its heard to hear in a sea of voices just as loud as mine.

I'm in a room of screams, walking amongst a ballroom of lunatics. We all hear the voices. We're all suffering together but apart.

My old English teacher walks through the crowd with her fingers pressed against her temples, seething at the mouth. The crazy is impossible to escape.

No one hears Noah like I do because no one knows what his heart tastes like. What his powers feel like. What it means to have his soul crammed into my head.

How did you know when it had to be done?

Of course he asks. Of course.

"Done already?" Margret finds me first. She has a tray of her own except the glasses are full of air. All except one.

She replaces the one in my hand as swiftly as she holds the platter. I hadn't even realized I finished it.

"It's Noah." I say. I take a swig, feel his presence fall away if only for a second. "He's convinced he loved me."

"I told you he'd come. The most recent ones always do. I'm dealing with Celeste as we speak. She's residing to screaming instead of word play...it was never really our style."

Tears glide silently down her polished face, its hard to notice through her forced smile. Margret never cries.

But it's not like I have any words that could console her. There's nothing to say other than "drink." And we do.

I knew it when when we held hands for the first time. Every muscle in my body told me to twist it behind your back and ram your skull into the nearest wall. But I knew I loved you, so I couldn't.