Suicide Code

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The core of my own home collapsed long before I added to the fires that have shaken and torn the walls that I built to protect me. Night by night, fumes continue to steal every particle of oxygen from my lungs, engulfing my blood cells as my veins turn black with vengeance. My mind races with memories I want to erase and yet they prick my nerves and the spasms shoot through my torso and down into the sides of my arm, sharply and uncontrollably. I feel them in my heart sometimes, the devilish worms clogging my arteries as it makes its way through just like when five-year-old's would slide through virus-filled tubes at the McDonald's outdoor playhouses. I fight this suffocation with every ounce of love I have left for myself, but it drains the life out of me. I pace around in my head, wanting people to believe me until an empty shot glass of my dignity remained. Sick out of my mind, loud ticking sounds echo in the tiny corridors of my brain, talking to each other in Morse code, knowing full well I would not be able to understand. I blink a couple of times as a way to cope with my madness. Surely someone had to have noticed, but I do not care. Maybe I do.

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There was no one else around. The agitation of death lurks beneath my skin, yet I stand next to my mom silent as I walk beside her, heading to the shower rooms. She asks me if I want to pretend to make donuts later in our cell. Funny to think I still have a “later” to look forward to. I look at her and force a half-smile, then quickly look back to my shoes. The effort to carry my head was hard enough as it is. It was my only workout besides climbing up and down the bunk bed that I refuse to sleep in.

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One thought blurs my focus. Maybe I will laugh about it. Maybe I'll forget about it someday.

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The walk to the shower rooms was progress today, but little did it do for my mental deterioration. It was time to sleep and I kept fidgeting around to see where my secret phone was but I knew I left it underneath my pillow that rests on my bunk mattress. My mom got tired of pushing me away from her bunk, so I routinely sleep with her. I rolled over to glance towards my mom who knew me so well. She hid the disappointment on her face because she knew how paranoid I was. I could not sleep. I could not breathe, most especially when I try to sleep. Every five minutes, I would wake even before I had a slight chance of falling asleep just to make sure my mom was alive. I asked her to stay close to me and I would place my head on her chest. The sound of blood pumping in and out of her heart kept me sane for only that moment. When she would tell me to get some sleep, it was an entire reset and my heart-worms would start trudging through like angry soldiers ready for battle. It is self-imposed heart failure in the making.

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I remember my heart failed a couple times. It had resuscitated on its own with little voices that chanted, “Just expose him and run.” It was my only drive to stay in that situation for that long. What a stupid and immature move on my part. Small lie, big lie, what is the difference. I disappeared because he was a criminal out to kill my family. I knew he truly never cared about me. Someone else held his heart but he would not admit it. I should have left without a fight. He lied. He blackmailed me. He robbed me of a life I wanted.

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This was one of the few times my own mom was not able to ease my mind. I did not tell her that a steel rod was stabbing my heart with each breath I took. I did not tell her that I was scared the military would separate us if they find out how mentally disturbed I was. I look at her as if every glance would be my last. She is the only person I want to hold and it seems as if my tears hug tighter onto her cotton tee every time I roll over to her side of the bed to check her heartbeat.

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What was I thinking? I played games with a monster. My hands tremble more and more when I clasp them together. There's blood running down my neck and I can now see my own flesh.

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I lost track of my mom's voice. A cloud of shame kept pulling me out of my conscience.

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I pace in and out of my brain like a mad pig preparing to give birth to a goat. I suppose that bastard got one thing right. I am sick in the head but I can rightfully say it was his story that cost me my sanity. How can a “wanted man” be capable of offering a real life of stability, let alone marriage, to any woman?

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I disappeared under the white sheets of the bed and closed my eyes one last time.

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I show up at the war-torn building in the sacred heart of the city, with weapons built beneath it. It stands 10 stories tall with nostalgia for unity. Rich history blows around in the ashes, scattered across the land around it. Dark brown smears paint the wooden beams and cement walls. No windows, just empty spaced levels tower next to shallow constructs of an assassinated society. Wired fencing and ditches close the building off from the rest of the city, untouched by corruption and money laundering fools. It is no less of a presence than the crawling bustle of nearby villages; the building is a seal of triumph embedded in the blood of generations that came before and after. I could barely hear faint whispers of some sort, like wind chills gracing my ears ever so slightly. The air was clean, but my steps echoed as a reminder that I did not belong there. I feel my heart tighten but something in the air dragged my feet forward, one in front of the other. With each step closer to the building, I felt a metal nail slowly drilling into the sole of each foot. I did not bother to check and walked on unfazed by the heaviness and pain engulfing my entire body. I have my eyes locked on the most accessible escape route on the side of the building. I climb up a rusty iron ladder that ended mid-structure. I swing my leg over onto the open ledge, rolling my body onto the dirty pavement of the fifth floor. I see an ashtray on the floor and a freshly-smoked cigarette. Next to it, a gold, heart-shaped locket with a picture of a fair-skinned woman. Brown-eyed, beautiful long, brunette hair. Anyone could tell the genuine purity in her smile.

A white plastic chair just five feet away and a shadow that beams out from the corner of one leg. He sits there in silence. I only see the back of his head and the phoenix tattoo on his right arm, slightly hidden under the sleeve of his white shirt. He says nothing, well aware of my guilt-forsaken breaths. His head turns slightly, overlooking his right shoulder. He lifted his forearm so that his index would sternly press his chin. His pensive silence urges me to move closer to him. My throat closes up, but before it could even close me off from life, I clasp my hands close to the pit of my heart. I was the reason he lost the love of his life, but I was the other woman. I wanted to save her.

“Kill me,” I said.

A gunshot sounded through the building.

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The next morning, I watched my mom cover my body with the white sheets of our bed. She helped one of the guards carry me to the prison basement. When they left, I nestled my soul back into my body but I couldn't bring myself back to life.

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