She took a deep breath, drinking in the sheriff’s american colored lights that flickered in the rearview mirror of her car. And she knew it too, swallowing the boulder of fear that was buried in her throat– she knew what jail felt like. And yet, would eternally crouch behind the bars of her own heart, confining herself in denial. She would never voice it, never administer any ascendancy to those vulnerable thoughts that already imprisoned her. A twin pair of cufflinks would weigh too heavily on her, becoming too real.
The rearview mirror held a reflection of silver lining her eyes like the crescent of the moon, just a last glimmer of the night sky before he stole it. The last light within darkness between the bracketing hollows beneath her eyes as she extinguished the world for him.
Her hands ran themselves along the icy coat of stone walls, feeling the valleys and hills that ran through their aged moldings.
The place of her own capture she admired. Her mind copying the landscape of his body instead of stone holdings. With will expiring at the loss of hope, the resurfacing memories became more difficult to grasp as days passed. Months passed. Aptly, the warmth of the stones faded each time her fingers traced them. Their crevices became more worn against her frequent longing strokes. Until one day, the hills and valleys became flat with one lengthy crack. Realization hit her as if the world had split in two.
It was a Wednesday night when the silence which now thickened in the air had been diluted with light jingles of nickeled keys. Her body had been balled in the corner, shrouded in unbreakable shadows, before her feet weakly found the stone floors. Faintly, bare feet shuffled until her hands coiled the bars of her cell.
With a soft creak, the door her jailer strode through permitted traces of moonlight to narrowly file in. And she transfixed on the two pairs of chimera before her. Her eyes running back and forth, trying to memorize both before airy hope snuffed them out like the flicker of a candle.
Like a lesser kneeling against the bars, she could feel the dewyness of his breath; liquor falling from it. His scent coated her like the sediment of a dying campfire. Albeit, this time, she wouldn’t scrub her skin until the smoke wore off.
He spoke loose words, fumbling from his tongue. “It’s good to see you.” His breath wrapped itself around her fingers, slithering down her knuckles where she wished it would crawl further.
The keys jangled in his hands once more. Her heart shriveled, small enough to fit in his palm. She wished it would so maybe she would get to dance in his light again. Maybe laugh beneath it. Love beneath it.
Composure. She thought. I don’t deserve to be a prisoner.
Two deep breaths hurtled themselves into her, as if he had granted them. Gifted a meager few back. And bittersweet grief twinged in her chest at the offering of kindness. Despite the darkness, she nodded; her head leaden as she groped for words.
Silence stretched eternities between them until pending her reply.
She’d succumb to it, just as she had eagerly locked the shackles herself. Everything she wanted to say threatened to drown her. Her will nearing past the point of saving as his fingers discovered her own.
No. This time. Free yourself. Love and grief warred beneath her features. “I’d like to be free. Please. I’m tired. I’m so, so tired. And it is so cold down here.” A fraction of her soul cracked as she begged, bowing before the bars. Before him. As she’d done freely time and time before with little to no prevail.
Balmy breath wound around her fingers again, twining itself like a vine around them. It’s so warm down here. She thought as he leveled his golden gaze to meet hers, eyes like a gilded coin she’d performed for. A gold coin she’d never bargain or trade but prize as if she were the richest merchant. It was all she needed to live, a sliver of his gold to call hers. Light. It was so light–
Interrupted by a clash of keys at her feet, her thoughts fell with them. “As you wish.”
Nothing more as the wooden door to her cell slammed shut. And the air went still as if a greater being had stolen it. As if storm clouds blotted the light, it had dimmed to not even a splinter. It is so dark. It is so cold in here. She thought as the keys twisted and churned the gears of the lock, opening the cage and willing her free. Breaths caught in her throat and fought their way into the world as she took her first step into freedom.
She had never voiced it, but loving him felt illegal. Something so sacrilegious and deadly she vowed away the world. The scars atop her wrists from the cuffs she wore– jailing herself to hollow hope– now stood as the art of love: a sacrifice at the altar of power. And until that very darkness, that very whisper of death begged her to live, did she choose to let you go. A prisoner to love you never even gave.
The ground beneath her feet was no longer stone. The hollowness was no longer hope.
She walked upon grass and allowed grief to sink in. Allowed growth a vacancy.
