Swallow, Starving Faithful | ONC 2020

9. TODAVÍA DUELE.

Gabriel's body lies at the bottom of the ombú tree. It has been stabbed many times, in both the chest and the face. That nice American haircut is unrecognisable, weighed down by mud and leaves and the man's blood. His spotless suit has been ripped open and his chest beneath ruined. I recall pieces of his perfect English, but I cannot remember a great deal, as I only saw him fleetingly. I recall partly that handsome face, though I see it in real parts now, bits and pieces, flesh-rubble. 

Bernadette stands over him with a broken branch. It's that sharp branch we used to drink each other, though she wrenched it from my tree and used it as an effective weapon. 

"Well," she says. "Fuck. I'm sorry you had to see that."

I don't say anything, but I feel very ill again. I feel as if I am in a dream again, with the images in front of me alternating and morphing and becoming something else entirely. Vivid colour back to the browns and greys, and then a great blast of sound, which startles me. Was that Juan? Was that Juan the adulterer and abuser? Is he gone now? Who was Gabriel? If Juan and Gabriel are the same person, why two names? Am I being a lunatic? 

Bernadette approaches me. I feel myself drawn to that gash of her's, though I want to resist it.

"Gabriel is dead," she says.

"Stop," I murmur. "Stop, please. Who is Gabriel? Where is Juan?"

"Gabriel is my dead boyfriend. We had an argument."

"You said he was Juan!"

"I lied," she says curtly. "Juan was an easy name, you know? A hateable name. Like, you hear the name Juan and you automatically go, fuck that Juan guy, yeah? Either way, it doesn't matter. I just wanted you to like me."

"Stop. Stop."

"What, Sarah? You promised to leave with me."

"I didn't! Who was he?"

"Who?"

I grab her shoulders and shake them murderously. "Who did you do that to? What's that body?"
"I say some shit that isn't true sometimes. You know that!" She throws my hands off and pushes me down. The mud splatters. 

"What?"

"We can't stay here. We just killed him.

"We?"

"Come on. To Buenos Aires. That's where we're going."

"Was everything you were telling me a lie?"

"No."

"What was?"

"I don't fucking care. Come on." She grabs my hand and begins dragging me through the mud. Great big strides and the rain is getting heavier. She's quite strong and I'm suffering through a freezing slip-and-slide until I stand, shove my heels into the wet ground and say, "I don't want to go. I don't know who you are."

"I'm yours," she hisses. "Isn't that enough for you?"

✦

The Kind Man is sick. He is deathly ill. I watch as hunches over, hollow-cheeked and gaunt, vomiting onto the ground of wood shavings. It's a never-ending tide. I walk over to him, finally bridging this recent gap between us. But my hands to not stop there: without consent, they move to his shoulders, his elbows, his knees, his ankles, his hips, his neck, his wrists, those joints in his fingers. I bend them ways they are not meant to go. His frail body snaps, snaps, becomes subject to a mass dislocation. He clatters to the floor because nothing will hold him together anymore.

I watch as he marinates in his own misgivings and spoiled wood shavings. His head is the wrong way around. His limbs all jut out at unnatural angles. He is a creature. This isn't the way it was meant to be, I didn't mean to bully the man. I didn't mean to bully him like they bullied me.