Revisiting

She stands back, apart from herself, watching the thoughts coalesce. She sees them as she would see someone else's life. Scenes - colourful, picturesque events - happening as though they were a movie with a narrator talking unceasingly about one character's thoughts, feelings and motives.

One character. Herself.

She's not sure she likes this blend of her past and present. It's discomfiting, the way everything seems to flow so easily together until it's all a blur.

She wishes she could pause, let one idea roll around her mind, taste it and absorb it before moving on, but it refuses to be stilled, flowing seamlessly into the next image from something so irrelevant that it's a strain to try and find logical sequences in this train of thought.

Faces of old loves flash through her mind, sharing space with the awkward fumbling of lust-driven caresses. She remembers trying to stifle her laughter at the ridiculousness of the whole thing, knowing that she wouldn't be able to deal with the hurt and lack of comprehension in his eyes.

She sees it all again, as she did then, detached, aloof, refusing to surrender all of herself to the heat, the sweat, the urgency of the moment. She watches herself watch them, a story within a story.

She hears the commentary in her head and wonders if it's like that for him. Evaluating it critically, she doesn't think so. He appears lost in the growing tension between them. She knows she's in control and doesn't want to be. She wants him to force her out of herself. To make her stop thinking, stop judging them, debating the rights and wrongs of what they're doing - just to force herself to let go and to drown in the mindless passion that should be consuming them both.
She feels the tension growing, drawing her inescapably toward climax and wonders how she can still think -why she still can't let go. And then it's done.

Physically sated, she's still left with a gnawing sense of discontent - a nagging sensation that something wasn't quite right.

The thoughts run on, exploring other avenues, digging up old questions. She can't sleep.

Back and forth

She sighs. Thoughts of him fill her mind, and she closes her eyes and lets her thoughts drift back to him, a small smile playing on her lips. He never fails to make her smile. Then why does she push him away, she wonders, thoughts of his impending departure pushing the smile off her face entirely.

She realises that she can't help it. Whenever he gets too close, she feels stifled. Claustrophobic, penned in by his sweetness, his similarity to her, everything that brought them together. She wishes she didn't feel that way - she's grateful for the good things, she knows... but what use is gratitude?


She's drawn to him... she loves all the little things that he does that make her feel so special. She doesn't want to let him go. But she knows that if he doesn't leave for a while, if they don't spend some time apart, she'll leave. It's almost as though the passion with which she's attracted to him pushes her away from him with its intensity.

And then she'd regret it.

Until the next one.

Rebirth

She closes her eyes and slips into slumber but at the stroke of midnight, wakes. The darkness surrounds her, making her claustrophobic. She feels trapped. She closes her eyes to keep the darkness out, but that just brings it closer, into her. She sets it aside, makes it part of her, and yet apart from her.

She watches over it, nourishes it, makes it grow...

She watches and waits. Somewhere inside her there's a stirring. Something fighting free.

She lets go... and it is born.

Freedom's price

She watches, jealous, as her other self flies free. Wishing she could go along, but tied to the murk that controls her mind. Writhing streamers of envy reach out after her higher self, who laughs as she evades the gloomy strands...

Just once, she would like to be the one that escapes. The one who tastes of the freedom and the joy. But she is trapped. Trapped by her lusts, her hatreds, even her loves. Her love of the light keeps her here; bound, so part of her spirit may remain free, unplagued by the demons tearing at her now.

Sacrificed to the darkness, she pleads with her alter-ego, begs for rescue from this cloying fog that surrounds her. But she is too far away, drowning in the mud of deception and death, while somewhere in the clouds, the joyous soul flies free.

She is free. She is trapped. She knows that the Light One is part of her, born of the consumation of her love of Beauty. But the cord has been cut, and Light One, nourished by all the power that she had to give, has taken wing.

She is left incomplete.

Alone.

Empty.

Defeated.

Witchcraft

She knows what these witches can do to her. She has thirsted for their knowledge, longed to learn their craft. She sees the allure of the darkness they worship, perhaps better than some of them.

She would have been one of them, but threads of sanity hold her back. They tie her to her family, to love, to all things good. They keep her from releasing life, and embracing the darkness. So she clings to all that is pure, shutting out the demons, not letting them near.

She prays for redemption. Not really for her soul, but to ensure the safety of the ones who hold what's left of her heart.

She wakes...

... to shame, guilt and fear.

Shame that she could forget herself, her values, her God.

Guilt that she could hurt those she loved. And enjoy it.

Fear that dreams will haunt her waking.

She dreams...

.... of murder, of torment, of mutilation.

Blood is streaked through her dreams, glaring crimson through the night. She is repulsed, and yet revels in the river of gore.

Death is not to be feared, but welcomed. Pain... so much pain. Not just her own, but of those she loves. She sees it and feels nothing but a strange sense of elation at their sufferings distilled into her dreams.

She fears what she becomes, a Hyde wrested from her waking Jekyll. And yet, there is power. Such power she cannot resist. She needs to feel it fill her, strengthen her, infusing steel into her own blood. She drinks it in, glorying in its pulsing pungence.

Then she wakes.