acquainted with the night
I have been one acquainted with the night.
I have outwalked the furthest city light.
Robert Frost
There’s something visceral and unsettling about seeing your innards. My intestines were not the color I expected them to be.
Oh my god. Oh my god!
(wrongwrongwrongwrong)
(the moon is wrong and my bones hurt)
(deaddeaddeaddeaddead-)
But then again, neither were the torn muscles at my shoulder. There were tears on my face, stinging in the cold night air, and I screamed, still hoping to be found.
I saw blue lights right as I passed out, a deep voice calling out.
“-emus!” I didn’t know who that was, but I was grateful that someone was there, and I fell unconscious, finally.
ᵂʰʸ ᵈᵒᵉˢ ᵈᵉᵃᵗʰ ʰᵘʳᵗ ˢᵒ ᵐᵘᶜʰ?
It was the weekly friend dinner, the unofficial occasion where all of my cheap friends would gather in my apartment and beg food from me before passing out on my living room floor.
I was making pav bhaji, because I could buy the bread from the stores and the gravy/dip was easy to make in large quantities when everyone began to hustle in with their usual gifts, excuses, and copious amounts of blankets and pillows.
Maya, as per usual, tried to sneak in beer, but we’d been playing this game for so long that it was easy to shove the beer into a hidden alcove. She threw a stuffed animal at me when she realised her alcohol was again, gone, but she knew I’d return it come morning.
I don’t like drinking. There’s not a whole lot to say about it, because I’d never chastised any of my friends against it, but this was my home and thus bound my rules. Cleaning up vomit and bile wasn’t pleasant, after all, and I’d had persistent nightmares about any of my friends drunk driving, so this was my effort to prevent that.
As Sophie had once bemoaned, I was certainly the mom friend. But I honestly didn’t mind, because I had a good fifteen people ready to fight for my honor at any given moment. Don’t bite the hand that feeds you, and all that.
Drew slipped into the kitchen like a particularly tall wraith, wrapping his arms around me. I relaxed into his hold as I stirred the bhaji, gently adding onion into the mixture.
Many had asked if Drew and I were dating, and we weren’t, but our friendship always had that tinge of ‘more’, and we were comfortable with each other in ways that superseded everyone else. With Drew, it felt like my bare-bones could be revealed, and it would sound excessively florid, except whenever these gatherings happened, he always fell asleep curled around me, smiling at me.
It was nice. We fit together in comfortable ways.
The doorbell rang again and Drew tightened his arms around me before letting go. He got out the porcelain plates and told everyone to wash their hands, among grumbles and sardonic cries of Yes father dearest. I snorted, loudly, startling Aileen, who’d been water ‘her’ plants on the windowsill. I gave her a cheeky smile before turning back to the pot.
Aileen and I had been friends since third grade, but we’d fallen out because of ‘she-who-shall-not-be-named’. We’d reconciled after one of my other friends, Grace, began dating Aileen in highschool.
Aileen, who’d gone to the same stuffy, conservative, religious school that I’d gone too. I would’ve been more ‘concerned’ had I myself not dated several girls.
The one end result of religious schools, I found myself musing, was that the students either adhered to the principals rigidly or rebelled at every turn.
I turned off the stove, stirring the bhaji once more as I began to clean up. The cutting board and knives went in the sink to be washed by whoever I bullied into doing my chores.
I placed the pot on the cheap kitchen table next to the stack of plates.
“Dinner is served,” I said with glee. I made sure everyone got their fill before piling up my own plate with bread and drip. I took a seat on the living room floor next to Drew and Aasia. The girl was tucking stray bits of hair back into her hijab, and I tucked in the strands she’d missed.
The joy of the headscarf, I thought sardonically to myself, looking my bedroom’s open doorway. There hung a lovely pink hijab that my grandmother sent from India.
I hadn’t worn it, but I hadn’t given it away either, so there’s that.
I turned my thoughts back to the conversations around me. “So, what are we watching?” Aasia and Drew turned to each other.
“The Princess Bride,” they said in eerie sync, before glaring at each other. My best friend and…pseudo boyfriend did not get along. At all. But they were similar in some important ways, which made it even more hilarious.
“Oh ho?” I sung, just to be an ass. Aasia glared at me while Drew smiled indulgently over the top go my head. I could feel it, and I wasn’t even facing him.
I grabbed a stray blanket and covered myself and Drew, leaning back a little. It was nice, and I dug into my dinner.
The rest of the night was pleasant as my friends either left or passed out on the floor. I was much too small to carry any of them to my bed, but I managed to shove pillows under their heads and blankets over their prone bodies.
Drew had fallen asleep next to Aasia, and I placed a pillow between them. Aasia wouldn’t like being touched by a man, even if it was unintentional, and I could prevent some hurt feelings ahead of time.
I only had the kitchen light on, and the house was covered in a warm, golden glow, and I couldn’t help but smile.
It taken quite a while to get here, I thought to myself. Happily ever after and all that.
I looked at the overflowing trash and sighed. Leaving it out would be like inviting the cockroaches to come feast. I shoved the trash further into the bag, picking the bits of napkins.
It wasn’t too late, I told myself. Tomorrow was the trash day, so maybe I could just go throw the bag away now. It’d make my life easier.
I left my phone on the counter with a reminder to call my father soon. I looked at my near-empty pill bottle and set another reminder to call the pharmacy.
I contemplated kissing Maya on the forehead as she slept. Her face was just amazingly adorable, but I shook my head. No. I’d be back soon, and I could kiss whomever I wanted on the forehead.
I hoisted the trash up and unlocked the door. I locked it once more from the outside, not feeling entirely comfortable leaving my sleeping friends defenseless.
I didn’t have my wallet with me.
Maybe that was my mistake.
The dumpster was a bit far from my flat, but I knew the way. I hefted the bag over my arms and threw it in. I turned around, about to step back into the open, when I saw a dark figure. I only had a second to process it before I was shoved up against the grimy alley wall.
My heartbeat pounded in my ears as I gasped over the hand covering my mouth. My breathing was heavy, the hand around my throat tightening.
I couldn’t see who it was, but it was a man, much bigger than I. I was a resounding 5 feet, 116 pounds and I couldn’t breathe.
“Darling, where’s your purse? Hand it over and I won’t kill you.” The voice purred and I closed my eyes.
“Don’t. Have it-” I gasped out in the brief respite. The hand around my throat tightened again, and my mouth tasted like ash. My lips were salty from the tears.
The voice tutted. “Really? We’ll see about that.” I shook my head, because no, I didn’t have it, but I didn’t have a moment to beg him to stop.
Something was shoved into my stomach, and it didn’t hurt at first, but the metallic edge grew cold in my stomach, and it burned and throbbed. I wailed as the person hummed in my ear.
The fucker had stabbed me!
“Let’s try again- where’s your purse?” At this point, I began to wonder if he even care about the purse. Surely, no one would protect their wallet at a time like this?
I thrashed in his arms, crying out as the knife was dragged up. Wasn’t adrenaline supposed to numb all of it? I screamed as the man began sawing into the bottom of my spine-
“Don’t have it please, pleasepleaseplease stop-“ I gave out a garbled moan of excruciating pain. Please, please hear my screams, someone, anyone-
“Hmm?” Another slow cut upwards and I gagged on the blood rushing into my mouth.
I could feel the edges of my vision darken, thankfully. I’d always had low blood pressure, and I’d hated it, but now? Now I was grateful.
The black spots widened as my knees began weakening. I tilted forward and the man dropped me onto the ground.
“A pity. They usually last longer.” And then the world around me began to warp, dark bricks giving way to a pitch-black sky, wavering and spinning.
Death was colorful, I thought, hysterically.
ᵂʰʸ ᵈᵒᵉˢ ᵈᵉᵃᵗʰ ʰᵘʳᵗ ˢᵒ ᵐᵘᶜʰ?
Death is colorful and I am dead, I am dead and I never-
I didn’t get the chance to-
I was dead and no one would know, not until-
ᵂʰʸ ᵈᵒᵉˢ ᵈᵉᵃᵗʰ ʰᵘʳᵗ ˢᵒ ᵐᵘᶜʰ?
Bile and spit burned my tongue-
The moon, a full moon (and wasn’t that strange, I was certain it was a crescent) shone ominously in the sky, and I was on the ground (but it wasn’t paved, the dirt scraping under my fingernails) and the sense of wrongwrongwrong didn’t go away as the wolf (a wolf? In the city? What-) pounced and I
s̻͎c̡͉̪r̞͖̼e̢̪̟a̡͉̘m̡͔̪e̺͇͇d̡͍̘
i͔͍̼n͎͇̫ ̺̻͇
a̝̦̙g̺̪͜o͇̟̟n̡̻͜y͎͎̞
a͕͙͕s̠̠̙
it tore up my shoulder and my pale skin was drenched in blood as it’s huge maw stunk of meat and death and I gagged on my own tears-
and it’s eyes, the eyes were bottomless pits of darkness and I screamed as it howled at the moon, the evil, torturous moon that witnessed my death-
and the wolf bounded away-
(but I was killed by a man, not a wolf, wolves aren’t men-)
(the city didn’t have opens spaces, mulberry bushes, my skin-)
(I could see the muscles and tendons and my pale, pale skin-)
(I reflected the moon in my tiny, tiny, body but I wasn’t this small-
(my hips are wrong, my breasts are gone, my skin was never this soft-)
and I looked down at my spilling insides
and I thought, suddenly calm at the face of my ongoing suffering-
There’s something visceral and unsettling about seeing your innards.