Page 94 of Deliria

I seize the moment, launching myself at her and I claw at her skin, at her face, at any bit of skin I can get hold of. I can feel the chunks of her collecting under my nails, I can feel the wetness of her blood. Her fist slams into me, knocking against my jaw, making my brains rattle. I can see from the expressionon her face that she thinks she’s beaten me now, that that hit was enough.

As we stare at one another I can see the scratches all down her face. Her hair is fraying off at wild angles like she’s been dragged through the bushes.

“He’s going to kill you.” She says. “Alex, he’s going to kill you and I can’t wait to witness it.”

The way she says it, the way she says his name, it makes me pause, makes me frown.

“You’re fucking him?” I guess. Where does the man even have the time? But then, it’s not like he’s the only one abusing me. Maybe that’s where he slinks off to while his father is raping me.

“I’m going to replace you, I’m going to be his next wife, the one he actually wants.” She boasts.

I laugh, I throw my head back and laugh so loudly. As if. Alexander won’t marry her, she’s a maid, a nobody. No, once he’s gotten what he wants from me, he’ll want someone with status, with class. “Oh sweetheart,” I coo, “You stupid, stupid fool. You think he’ll settle down with some small town girl born in god knows where? Look around you, look at this place. He’s a Forster. He’ll marry an aristocrat, an heiress. Not some hillbilly bitch.”

Her expression flickers for a second. An expression of uncertainty before she folds her arms across her chest. “He won’t need anything else. Not once you’re dead, because we’ll be rich enough from your life insurance.”

“Alexander will never be rich enough.” I reply. He could inherit all the diamonds in the world and it would still not be enough for my greedy husband to be satisfied.

“You’ll see.” She spits. “Well, no you won’t see. You’ll be dead, and all those pretty jewels you had will be mine too…”

I don’t let her finish. I don’t care enough to hear her pathetic words. I lunge at her, scratching at her face again, driving my thumbs into her eye sockets.

She screams.

She screams so loudly this time and it’s literal music to my ears.

I don’t care that he was fucking her. I don’t even care about the fact that he cheated on me. But she knows what he is, what he’s doing and yet he’s happy to play along with it? To witness this? Nah, this bitch won’t get a free pass now. This bitch won’t get a pardon, not from me.

I curl my fingers into the sockets, squishing the eyeballs, scooping them right out. They pop like little golf balls down onto her cheeks, dangling by a few tendrils of bloodied flesh.

She’s howling, clawing at the air but she can’t defend herself, not when I’ve taken her sight.

I rip the eyeballs free. Holding them up as if she’s able to witness this and then I squeeze my hands, curl them into tight light fists as both of them explode into much. The blood and the gunk pools between my fingers, it streams over my knuckles and down my wrists.

I toss the entrails at her, covering her in her own mess. She can lay here, she can whimper and cry and wait for her precious Alex to come find her. As if he will show her any mercy.

I turn, checking on the other maid, and see she’s out cold with that syringe still buried in her throat. At least I can get a moment’s respite before I need to deal with her.

I dive under the bed, my fingertips frantically searching for that tell-tale sign in the floorboards. That raised bit of wood that tells me there’s a secret space beneath.

Only, it’s not there.

Why the fuck is it not there? It’s like it never existed. The realization hits me like a physical blow. Am I truly mad? Have I imagined it all?

And in that moment, that final thread of my sanity goes.

I needed that gun. I needed…

Rational thoughts die. Logical actions become obsolete.

I glance back at the maids. The blind one is rolling around, grasping her face, making a right racket. But the other one, she looks so peaceful, too fucking peaceful.

She doesn’t get to sleep soundly, she doesn’t get to simply wake and continue on, as if she wasn’t a part of this. As if she hasn’t contributed to my pain and suffering.

I scramble over her immobile body, straddling her.

It’s an easier job to do it when the bitch isn’t fighting me. But I take her eyes. I take her sight too.

And then that rage that’s been going off inside me like an atomic bomb fills the void left by my despair. I launch myself at the room, tearing at the walls, the furniture, the very air that surrounds me. I want to destroy it all, to leave this place in ruins as they’ve left me.

---