I
am
burning.
I think this slowly, as if my thoughts were yawning while they said this information. It doesn’t quite bother me right now, this sense of burning. I am barely conscious anyway. My eyes see without seeing. My ears hear without hearing. I feel without feeling. But I suppose that’s not true. I see the smoke, and the flames. I hear a distant sound. Like when the wind howls. I suppose that is me screaming. I feel the tingle of my nerves dying. That is what my body is doing. Dying. I should be worried. Concerned at least. But my mind has been ruined already. Scarred, shredded, bruised, beaten, however you want to say it. And the mind cannot exist without the body, and neither can the body exist without the mind. Unless you count floating in between existing and death in a coma. But what is the purpose of being alive without living?
So here I am, my mind fading from my body, my body being burned away from my mind. How did I get to this point? I cannot remember. I cannot remember many things now. I cannot remember my parents faces, or their names. I cannot remember our house, or what city we lived in. I could remember my name yesterday, but not today. All I know is that I am burning.
I will not linger much longer. I feel the warmth from the flames in my bones. In my numbed state they feel soft, smooth, like it wants to give me one last comforting touch before I succumb to death. Because I will have my death. I will welcome what most fear.
My eyes grow tired. I am so tired. I want to sleep. So I give in. The darkness washes over me slowly. Like wading into a warm ocean. Only I am not moving. I am so tired, I am asleep now. I must be. There is no light now.
A small child plays with a red rubber ball in the front yard quietly. A man watches calmly from the porch with a smile on his face. He sips at a mug. A woman yells from within the little brown house. He moves quickly into the house, as if expecting the call. A few moments later a visibly pregnant woman and the man walk together to their small car. She looks slightly pained as the man helps her in. He calls to the child urgently, though kind. The child runs on stubby legs and drops the ball. When they return many days later, they are no longer three, but four.
Life exists only with death.
Your Sweet Assassin
Your Sweet Assassin 