A Grave Called Home

A Grave Called Home

As I walked through the familiar streets of my decaying city, the grisly sights of what remained only a haunting memory of the life this place once held, I began to search for myself in dissonance. Where once stood memorials and shrines, now shakily leaned the marred attractions that remembered no heroes. A place where nature and beauty once met structure and machine had become the solemn wasteland where the dreams of the damned would rest. The vile, voracious vulgarity of the villainous vermin that vexed this place with their tyranny had laid ruin to the fallen construct that was once a garden for life. A sky once so blue had turned ash-gray against the silhouettes of the concrete and steel creations we all once climbed for safety, to live and work within and call our homes. The smell of reality rotting away from this place filled every breath, and the pain of realization with every exhale came. The structures which touched the skies with pride now crumbling in on themselves as if their hearts and spines had been crushed from the weight of what had come to pass. The passageways to the undergrounds had collapsed, and the pathways above were but a framework of sadness, outlining in broken ways the sights of where they once led. The seemingly invincible city that I once called my home…was little more than a grave. The verbose desires of man had met the horrid desires of the demonic, and hell was born through the volition of those who sought power but knew what they wrought. The intrinsic nature of such beings poisoned the very collective consciousness of our people until it spread like a disease across our planet and swallowed a world once filled with life. Cataclysm soon became the expectancy and destruction the norm. While we had great strength, it was misplaced along with our hope and belief in those who made promises that faltered under the weight of their decisions.

I arranged myself…my clothing and gear all that I had left of our life…the coat you bought me so long ago still somehow brand-new through all the hell we saw… my sword so hungry for battle…guns at my sides…and around my neck… the heart shaped locket you gave to me. I dragged myself into the courtyard in the center of the city’s main plaza, where a great statue of me once stood, now missing large chunks of its former self, cracked and damaged throughout… it now stood as a perfect reflection of me as a man. I kicked open the mausoleum-like doors and descended the stairs into the underbelly of the statue and meeting hall that lay beneath it in a large dome structure, which had also fallen victim to collapse. I continued downward… the faint glow of the only thing that was familiar to me growing closer as I reached the last step and moved into the room that held your memorial. The only place that felt close enough to home to ever return to…wide arrays of blades and other weaponry, gear, battle trophies, and ground scores decorated the walls of what was a crypt and makeshift shelter. I sat and slumped against the stone that held your beautiful memorial and began to scream with no regard for the night or the creatures that may come for a meal. As a vast flowing ocean of tears broke from deep within me, I took out the locket, and began to stroke it so softly and tenderly as I tried with all my being to remember what life felt like. What it meant to breathe, and be. To know happiness and comfort. Safety and light. I rose to my feet wearily, only to stumble across the room to the desk where the last letter I ever wrote to you in life remained. I fell lifeless into the chair… and into the very day I wrote the letter, and began to read it aloud.

My dearest love, I have a few things to say and would like them to be heard. May these words be my secret gift to you.

From the moment my eyes first met your face, I knew love. Even our names matched so perfectly, as if we were meant to find one another. I miss you so much that it’s as if there’s a hole in my heart. The wind blows right through to my soul, and it feels cold. You are and will forever be my other half. My loyalty has not once faltered since you have been away. I have turned down more women since you have gone than I have in my entire life, because none other than you mean anything to me. I have done everything that you asked as well as everything I said I would do. I wish for nothing more than to plant a smile inside your beautiful heart and water it softly each day, and to listen to the echoes of your soul for all eternity. You are the gold-rimmed lining on each morning cloud to me, and the rains that wash away all my tears. You will forever be my tree, that grew so strong and noble against the cold winter, whose branches gave life to the very fruit of our love, which tasted of our wildest dreams. You are the very fire that burns ever bright within the furnace that is my soul, my very greatest muse, and will always be my one true flame. The love that I have for you is forever unconditional and of the purest form. You are by far and truly the most overwhelmingly powerful, well-humored, staggeringly intelligent, and divinely beautiful woman that has ever existed in my eyes, to which none other can compare. It would take you but one look at me in person or one moment or conversation with me to know that it is truly the real me and that I am here. I am so sorry for what has come to pass. There was dark magic being used against us... and forces at play that we did not understand. I was sick, not in control of my body or brain, and far from my right mind. I harbor all fault in our life for all things that have ever gone wrong. Now… I’m just a normal guy who heals very fast, has incredibly high bone density, and has remarkable martial arts and guitar skills. Although the medical diagnosis I was given was wrong, and all brain scans and tests show that I am completely healthy and not diagnosable or sick in any way any longer, I would like for you to read the email you requested I send you from months back. Many of the things that you think, that have been said, and that people have placed in your mind are far from the truth. People used fear and an unstable time in our life to get inside your head, sway your thoughts, and pull you in the directions they intended for you. I love you so much, and would do anything to prove my love for you and prove my dedication to you. I am going to reach out to the car and rental company and continue to pay our dues as I said I would. I promise I am working hard each day to ensure this. Life should be simple and flowing, like a river. In my eyes, you do no wrong. You are guiltless, faultless, and blameless in my heart and mind. You are the perfect woman and wife, and our love story will always be my favorite. I would like for you to know that I will ALWAYS be here for you, and if you ever decide you want to talk or come home, that I will be here for you in a heartbeat without hesitation, or I will come to where you are. It makes no difference to me as long as I am by your side. We will hold hands and sing and listen to My Chemical Romance, Avril Lavine, Journey, and Lady Gaga and I will never let go of you again. I will teach you every form of martial arts I know and how to shoot and throw knives and play guitar and rollerblade together the right way like we always wanted. I promise you every part of the beautiful love we once shared with none of the darkness. I truly believe that we needed to be separated and that this needed to happen in order for us to have the perfect life we always dreamed of together; we can come back together and be better for it in every way. I don’t care what has happened. I do not care about the past. I do not care that you have been with someone else. I only care for you. It matters not what anyone else says or thinks; just as before, you will not owe anyone anything, and you will not owe an explanation. It matters only what you feel in your heart. I am the man you’ve been waiting for your entire life. You cannot help who you love, and I truly believe we were meant to be together. Life truly has no timer on it, and we never know how long we have or what will happen, and I wanna spend every second I have in this life by your side.

Home... a place that never truly existed without you. But children we were… when we met. All of time ahead of us and the promise and splendor of a life lived well. What lies. We raised one another from foolish kids into powerful people, and became one another’s heroes. The wars within our minds and within this world tore our lives apart, and destroyed me… PTSD and traumatic brain injuries... so many suicide attempts... Taking away our irreplaceable perfect love and the promise of all our dreams to be made of my hard work and efforts. Thrown away was the dream, and killed was the heart. Now I lay in silence on the floor with the letter clutched tightly to my chest, wishing only to hold you again. Kiss you. Feel the warmth of your breath against my neck once more. The candles on the desk flicker and dance against the wall forming figures that my mind vaguely finds resemblance to us in somehow. The candle on the left then goes out... and I begin to scream and cry again into the folds of my jacket as I move to the bed and wrap myself in the wolf blanket you bought me not long before you had gone. As the candle that remained lit on the desk began to flicker and fade, and the darkness crept over the room and to me, so too did the same happen within my mind. All of the lights on the outskirts began to fade, and I felt myself slowly begin to surrender. As I uttered one last I love you, I would finally know rest.