Whisky Bruises

He is stood there. Staring. His eyes threatening me. I cling to my suitcase and shattered spirit. A suitcase full of my patchwork life, tattered, torn and desperate. This was it now. The end. Of love and life. A love that had been splattered in bird excrement, dotted white flecks dirtying our happiness. A life that had been beaten, openly it cheats the brutal scars in my eyes. The bruises bleed, staining my footsteps. Left to retrace my never-ending bloody trail, forever followed. Now I am at the end, alone, I can see the gate, its rusted, lock ready. He was the only one that wanted me with what I have. I can give nothing, he loved that. I only just see it was him. It was his fault. I am staring at his gate, he is giving me the key, I can now grasp the handle, run away where the shadow in my eyes never cry.

"Forever." He whispered. I could tell in his voice he meant it. Each word lingering like yesterday's hung bodies. His clouded breath scented with dusty roses and lies. My hands are dry, scrubbed clean. Still, the guilt cannot be washed. The memories not erased. They say what you experience makes you, who you are, what you have become today. I say that’s just another way of putting off your mistakes. “I love you.” His voice now cracking, breaking under his breath. I smile. For a while. Then I remember. The thing, that fractured our life, bled on our love. The baby we lost because of the lies that he told. Still I push back the diseased tears, grasp at my bag with the back of my skull bleeding. No pain. I have adapted to the beating, now affliction is my nature and happiness became distant. Growing further away from me, the seeds spread in the arms of the others, the lovers.

The first time was a while ago, a few months after the first punch, I saw them. Her legs spread apart, his body on hers. They rocked. In our bed. He saw me and our eyes locked for a brief heart splitting second, he stopped. He Grappled for secrecy, breaking away from my fragile stare. My eyes soon transfixed onto the other. Her body it shimmered with beautiful delight. Her eyes glistening with ecstasy for a moment until she knew I was watching. Their lust in my sheets, pure dirt. “Figment of your imagination” He screamed. The bruises he painted me in for believing my eyes. Still, I scrubbed the duvet until the colours were nothing but a stained white. The drinking soon followed. The whisky and ice.

I found out. I had this thing, this curse. Something no person should have. I wanted to start a family soon, seeing as I lost my chance a while back.

(Pause)

I can’t now. I wouldn’t wish my child to have this, this curse. I just can’t see how it is fair though, people get blessed all the time, then dump it, just dispose of a life so easily. Then there are the people, like me, who yearn for it, a life of their own, but they can’t.

(Pause)

Who am I to talk? All I am is a hypocrite. I had a baby and got rid of her at the click of his fingers. Someone would have liked my baby. I would have loved my baby, if he hadn’t made me murder my joy. Two months pregnant I was.

(Pause)

As soon as he and I discovered the infection, it happened, again. This woman was different somehow. She was blessed with even more perfection than the last. Her curves were delicious, the curls in her hair magnificent. The way it bounced when she was on him. Again, in our bed. In our filthy, white sheets. I didn’t say anything this time, it wasn’t worth the risk. Still, I smiled. Pretending forever, like always. I would grab the whisky and ice, drink the moments away.

Soon after this, the fighting began. He would drink then hit me, I would then drink instead of grasping for the paracetemol. He said enough was enough, so he left me for a while. For a moment in my life I was smiling, felt I could take whatever I wanted. I believed I could walk beneath the canopies of the trees, without the scare of him following me, haunting my steps. I didn’t seem to have a care in the world, well, except the one.

(Pause)

There was a permanent smile cast beneath my nose, my shadow was rebuilding itself, its grey form growing, blossoming. I stared into the mirror and could not believe it was me, glowing pink, having that sparkle in my eye like you see in the glossy magazines, such truthful smiles, gleaming satisfaction. But they had babies in their arms.

The real smiles didn’t last long because he came back. He forced me into our bed. And that was that. I looked in the mirror and saw her again, the one with the black face and red hands. I knew he loved me, despite what he did. It wasn’t his fault, it was mine, my fault I had what I had and what I gave him, that’s what he said to me. I let the birds circle our home, their beady black eyes transfixed with our every step. Thirsty for our mistakes. Still I smiled. To show them all, for a while, I was happy.

(Pause)

It happened again. He was with another woman. She was far beyond perfection in my eyes. She was what I once used to be before things happened. Again, I saw them holding each other in our bed. Naked they were. I ignored it like before, just smiled. For a while. I will itch the scabs, let them bleed on my arms, like the memories surfacing in my nightmares, just let them leak, ignore them for as long as I can until they choke, prickle tears in my eyes. He wiped them away with the filth stricken bed sheets. The ones that had been scrubbed a thousand times but still, the remains of the women were there. Their gleaming eyes, wild screams forever engraved in my already infected life.

He yelled at me. I wasn’t sure what I had done today. He said it was my fault because I had that thing, the thing that stopped me feeling free. He said it was why he slept with anything and everything. I believed it was my fault. He explained it so perfectly to me, as if it was all me. He had another one pregnant. But this time it was different. It would have what we have. This baby should have been ours, a child that we should have raised. She would be six years old and sixteen days now. Still, he told me to get rid. I was fifteen, too young, he said. Three years later we married, and that was that. It was only a year after he started cheating, just before I found out we couldn’t start a family. Because of that thing we had.

Of course, I cried. In front of him I cried, and drunk the whisky from the bottle, no ice. I hit him. For the first time, I made him bleed, made his nose splurge with a cursed crimson. He just stared at me, didn’t say a word, for once. But his eyes, they were speaking for a thousand tongues. He was going to kill me. So I ran, and I ran. To her house, the pregnant one. I had to warn her, tell her that he was no good for her. Just infect her, like he did me. Poison her and make her believe the craziest things…

But I saw the spiders in my eyes, and they swallowed my sight.

I woke up with a bleeding skull, still determined. The birds outside were looking happy, twittering with excitement. They could smell my blood soaked presence, the fact that things had gone wrong. Their excrement falling on us, on everything. Their diseases roaming through us. I just ran until I felt my mind spiral out of control. Until all the colours were a mixture, a blended massacre. I kept going though, because I knew I would be there soon, able to spill it all, allow the memories to leak, and flood her mind. Drown her just so she could see he isn’t worth a single thing. I was too late though. He was there, cuddling her, whispering in her ears. I saw it all through the disgusting white frills hanging there behind the window, through it I could see that they were a young him and me.

I couldn’t have this. The very thought of that baby holding his menacing characteristics, being just like him, having the dirt part of me terrified me. I stormed in, made my presence heard. I spilled it all, let it just run through my teeth, she had to know. But when I finished, she looked at me as if she didn’t understand. Then she hit me. I hit her back, with a bit more force. I knocked her to the ground. She was bleeding. I stared at her shadow, lying there, undisturbed. I had to run again, back home, pack my suitcase but leave the diseased sheets. I ran through the street, past the fallen church, past the blurring cars and blending trees. Nothing was clear anymore. Just one thing was in my mind, something I shouldn’t have been thinking. I wished the baby was dead.

Now I stand here. He is staring at me, telling me he loves me. Saying he is sorry, and he will be with me forever. He wishes the baby was ours, so we could care for it, unlike the way we cared for a dead marriage. I can see it now, everything he has done, he just injected me, fuelled me with this hatred for myself. But now everything is too late. I am twenty-two years old, in a shattered, loveless marriage. His eyes are staring at me, just staring. I cling to my suitcase, full of all I have left to show for my pointless existence. Now I am waiting for the true end. That knife held in his dripping hands, waiting to force its way into my heart, so then I can fall into heaven and lie with my unborn baby, forever.