Page 447 of Eternal
“I will. Take care of yourself, you avenged her, they’re all dead now. Don’t worry about us.”
Fucking grief.
“Damir,” Elijah calls while I’m already walking back to go home. “You finished what she wanted to accomplish. She saved so many lives that night.”
I smile, but it hurts, “At what cost, right?”
Saving so many lives but never living hers fully…
“I’m glad you’re here,Volkov.” I say, getting out of the complex and grabbing her bike. The same one she loved somuch, the one I’ve been riding all year, like carrying a piece of her everywhere.
I start accelerating, like I'm trying my best to outrun the weight in my chest.
In my mind, I replay the process over and over.
I have it all, everything, locked away on a USB key. Pictures, videos, names, faces, horrors. They filmed everything, during those parties, on private islands, in restaurants.Disgusting fucks.
They thought they could bury her story, hide behind their lies.
But I brought it all to light.
Her real name, her truth.
The media quickly picked up on it, whispers, then screams. The “Avenging Demon,Voron,” they called her. Some said she was insane, so I killed them. Others called her a hero.
But none of it mattered, because all I wanted was to make sure they never forgot. She was my partner, the most beautiful person this earth has ever birthed in a world of trash.
Now, it’s just me and her bike, and a path that leads mehome.
I picked up a burrito on my way to the bench.
I see the stars we named together, I hear your laugh, smell your perfume, taste your mouth, your skin, feel your hair tangled in my hands.
I miss it. I miss you. I miss us. I miss the hope in your eyes, the one that said you imagined forever with me, even if forever scared you.
Eternity was the solution. But eternity felt too short, too brutal, too bloody, too cold.
I miss the possibility of you finally being happy. Being free.
And I hate it. I hate it so much I can’t do it anymore.
I can’t get up, I can’t sleep, I can’t breathe, I can’t smile or talk, I can’t hear my thoughts, all I hear is your voice, your laugh, your humming. I hear your crying, your tears, the screams, the nightmares. I can hear your fear, the unworthiness you kept in, the sadness you hid. The one you carried in silence, the grief you kept quiet. The love you gave for others that didn't deserve it and who ruined it for you, the one I gave you but didn’t think was genuine.
My heart feels empty, or maybe too full. Full of pain, of frustration.
We could’ve been happy, the happiest.
That was my mission…Make you the happiest person ever.
And so after staying at that bench eating some tasteless food you loved, I go back to the house I built for us, the one you never saw, but the one that has seen you everywhere.
Because I do see you there, in every place, in the kitchen, in the garden, in the bed, next to the bookshelf, in front of that TV.
Happy.
Alive
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