FICTION

Broken Bodies, Broken Souls

It is disgustingly quiet. You try to bring some life into the room, telling stories of his stubbornness and her lack of self-control, but what use is there when everyone is already half dead. She snorts, he stares, and it is only your laugh that ends up bouncing off the walls in that tangled up head of yours, mocking you like a child in a game of echo. You sit as far away as you can, trying to make a home out of the blanket that’s probably covered in particles of somebody else. You cannot bring yourself to look him in the eye, so you focus on your leg as it bounces - up and down, up and down, up and down…
	“I’m going out for a smoke, I’ll be back soon,” she finally says, shifting her chair away from the victim’s bed. Her shoulders are tense and her cheeks soggy, but unlike you she cannot glue her eyes away from the sight, even as she pats her pockets in search of a lighter. She checks under the pillow, pokes under the covers, and if she could she would dig into his heart, shake it around a bit and force it to start working a little better again.
	“Take mine,” he tells her and she stops. She takes the lighter, forces her gaze away and places the cigarette between her lips. But she stands there, contemplating still, her body struggling to catch up.
	A knock on the door and finally she wakes. She takes a step towards the exit, and the person outside the door asks if there’s anything she can do. You say no.
	“Wait, I’ll join,” he says, and your head threatens to snap off. Shoes screech against the tiled floor and you feel your heart making its way up the walls of your throat. It slams and bangs and hammers, looking for a way to burst through.
	“Wait, no” you start, but they’re already at the door. Your mouth hangs open, and you stretch out your hand. Nobody takes it. It is simply left there, hanging.
	“We’ll be back in a few minutes,” she says, “Call if you need anything, all right?”
	The door slams behind them, the sound of it screaming in your ears. And suddenly, you are painfully aware of the machine’s steady hum, the dent in the wall, and the shallow wheeze. And it is only then that you notice a figure standing in the corner of the room, watching. You see it inch closer, so you move faster, throwing the blanket away and taking a seat in the chair that she once occupied.
	But what now? Everyone tells you to talk, but you can’t do that. The words are stuck in your throat, and even there they don’t sound right. Your mouth twists and turns, begging the letters to find a way to slip through. But why bother when even the flies would struggle to hear you?
	You look at the door, then back to the fate which lays before you, then the door, and again at what’s left of him. You wait for their return, but they don’t come, the clock ticks, and you wait for it to happen. Because it will at any moment now. It will. Just wait, because it will.
	And then somebody laughs at you. You feel them nipping at your ear and then you hear something between truth and an insult rolling off their tongue. It is a pity, really, that even honesty cannot seem to give you a push.
	But words will never be enough anyway, will they? So you decide to move your hand instead, hugging what’s left of the thin flesh and bones. You cup it gently, brushing it against your lips, your cheeks and beating heart. Somebody shifts closer, and you close your eyes, leaning your head back into their feather touch caress. And even though you’ve come to accept it, you cannot help but ask: “Will we be okay?”
	I pause for a second, feeling now two heart beats at once. The sudden clarity of your voice is new. But still, I manage an answer, and I tell you simply, honestly:
	“Yes. You will.”