Bittersweet Oblivion

In a sad twist of fate, the ringing in her ears brought bittersweet peace for a moment. The sound of another bomb disfiguring the land wasn’t as scary anymore, as it was now expected. She had dealt with the torment of not knowing if the people she loved were alive. She had dealt with the destruction of her childhood home, her favorite book store, and the delicious Thai restaurant down the street. Honestly, there just wasn’t anything left to mourn.

Wren’s prized possessions were a dirty old cane and the heart shaped locket she wore around her neck, sometimes tucked under her shirt to protect what little she had left. There was an unspoken symbolism in feeling the cool metal beat against her heart when she walked. The chill it sent through her spine and the smattering of light bruises just under her collar also liked to remind her that she was still there. The thud against her breastbone served to ease her mind with its repetitive rhythm.

“Where should we go today?”

Wren’s voice was not directed at anyone, or anything, just her own curiosity. Without many people around, it seemed a lot less crazy to talk to herself than before. She tapped her walking stick on the ground and contemplated the options. The options were slim. She could pack herself up and head south, away from the recent blasts of awful wreckage, or she could return to the pile of scraps that was home. The locket resting against her heart somehow felt even colder than usual.

She clutched the cool metal in her fist before carefully pulling it off over her head. Despite the action being routine, her fingers still felt stiff and reluctant as they searched for the small raised lip that would allow the locket to be opened. She closed her eyes as she pulled it ajar, taking a deep breath before her eyes landed on the photo inside. “Monica.” She whispered the name to herself and clenched her eyes shut again. The resurgence of pain through her body made her breathing shake, emulating the vibrations under her feet.

Her feet, seemingly on their own, began to wander towards the well known wreckage of her home. The mirror on the left side of the open locket was staring back at her when she forced her eyes open again.

“If you don’t say goodbye now, you won’t have time.”

Monica’s voice rang through the air, sounding out of place. However small, the image of Monica brought her back to life, and Wren could almost feel the gentle caress of a hand brushing her cheek.

A chunk of shrapnel was likely to clip her arm, bruise her shin, or knock one of her eyes out, but Wren’s thoughts ventured far beyond that of one more bruise, scar, or lost body part. Monica was one half of her, lost to time and falling through her fingers like the sands of an hourglass. She would have stared headlong into a barrage of unrestrained fire if it meant she got to see- got to feel Monica just one last time. Her presence would be enough in those final moments.

Wren’s tattered shoes crunched through broken glass and fresh ashes, certain to leave their mark when she slipped the beaten and torn sneakers off later. The grey ash billowed up and against her bare ankles like smoke, and her insides burned red hot like a house fire to match. She coughed into the wind and spat down onto what could have been a sidewalk once.

“Almost there.”

She waved the ash away the best that she could and watched the skin at her ankles tint with charcoal.

She imagined that the smoke was instead from her mom’s cigarette, from a noisy truck rattling down the street, or maybe even an abandoned factory miraculously restored to working order. All that came was silence, the rumble of another man made earthquake, and the slight wince of a reaction that Wren could manage. The splintered floorboards and detached door knobs came into view and she found her street. Thank god for the instinctive directions built into her memory. There were no landmarks, no street signs, and certainly no front doors to knock on if she had lost her way.

All that she could think to do was unceremoniously throw herself into a crisscrossed sitting position and stare up at the last remnants of her home. Her eyes felt tired and lost. Her hand brushed through the ash on the ground, the drag of her fingers reminding her of playing in the sandbox at the park when she was eight. She wondered if the sand there could still be distinguished from rubble and waste, or if it blended into the monochrome dust that covered everything else.

“You know, you’re still allowed to have fun, right?”

Monica’s voice felt like warm honey, the same she always poured into her tea after a long day. Smooths out all the tension, she would always say, pouring Wren an oversized mug of fresh green tea with hints of ginger and mint. The steam from that tea nearly lulled Wren to sleep, and just the imagined smell brought Wren back for a moment to a better place. Wren knew that Monica wasn’t really there, but she’d made her peace with that.

“I can’t play in the sand all day if I want to survive.”

Wren closed her eyes gently as Monica’s hand somehow felt like it was resting on her shoulder, pulling her in close. Her thumb, gentle as always, brushed lightly back and forth on the exposed skin through a few tears in Wren’s shirt sleeve. Wren knew that she wouldn’t be able to hold back the tears when Monica’s warm breath ghosted across her skin. It just felt so unbearably real.

“You made it this far, give yourself some credit.”

Monica elbowed Wren playfully and brushed her free hand through the curls of Wren’s hair, pressing a gentle kiss to her face. A warm smile melted into Monica’s lips, detectable just from the pull of her facial muscles against Wren’s cheek.

“You even came back to say goodbye.”

Monica laughed and sat back up a little taller, gazing into their old home as if it was a sky full of bright stars and not a burnt out sun.

“Don’t say it like that- I’m not dead yet.”

The sun was setting, making it one of the only parts of the day where rich purples, reds, and blues tore at the edges of grey uniformity.

“No, but I am.”

Wren’s throat closed up, and her tears dripped down into her lap. She bit her own lip when Monica wiped them away with her thumb again, face being held up.

“And I know you’re here because of me, because I told you to keep pushing.”

Monica’s eyes, though spectral and almost ghostly, peered into Wren’s with an intensity unmatched even by the appearance of a flash of light in the distance. Her gaze made the explosion feel less like a threat and more like fireworks. Wren nodded and sniffled to herself, helpless to move out of Monica’s grasp. She didn’t want to. Barely a whisper, Monica closed her eyes too, pressing their foreheads together as the sky cracked with makeshift lighting and thunder. The sound was getting closer.

“You’ve done so well, my angel.”

Wren was openly sobbing without restraint as her face was cradled between two absurdly gentle, strong hands. She grabbed onto Monica’s wrists just for something to hold onto. Monica was the angel, not her. Without that driving force there was no way Wren would have made it this far. She would have fallen apart at the seams.

“I can hear you in there.”

Monica tapped the pad of her index finger to Wren’s forehead, and they both laughed, even with their faces wet with tears.

“I’m telling you, it’s your call. You’ve done so much, and I won’t be mad if you want to rest- if you need to rest.”

Wren’s stomach dropped, her lower lip trembling and she stared into the darkening sky.

“I would be here for you, no matter what.”

Monica clutched the locket under Wren’s shirt, humming appreciatively at its presence. She traced the shape of the heart and grinned when Wren took it into her palm and squeezed.

“Until the end of the world, right?”

Wren let out an ugly snort of laughter, barely able to see through the water beading over the surface of her eyes. She forced the tears to fall, breaking the tension so that she could stare into Monica’s brown irises just one last time.

“Until the end of the world.”

The images of Wren and Monica sitting on their porch, watering the garden, rushing out of the door for work, and hanging up Christmas lights, flashed before her. Birthday parties and baby showers. Family dogs and blow up swimming pools. For a moment she forgot that the house in front of her would never stand again before her eyes bore into the locket she held in her hands. A crash and clank of machinery shook Wren out of her skin, and before she could say goodbye, the same billowing smoke that had licked at her skin before roared over the wreckage around her like a tsunami.

All that was left was the locket buried in the sandy ash, flipped open in their last moment, and now reflecting a photo of not only Monica, but of Monica and Wren, smiling into oblivion- into the end of the world.