Deep Wounds

“That’s the last one, you’re good to go now,” I tell my sister as I give her the last box.

“Are you sure you don’t need me to help you with anything else?” She is taking a long time getting all the boxes inside her car. She was supposed to be on her way home an hour ago, but as always, she refuses to leave me alone.

I get it. She’s worried. Ever since Richard died she’s been more paranoid than usual, but there is no reason to be worried.

Not anymore.

“You know, I can spend the night in here, that way I don’t have to come pick you up in the morning.”

“No, no way I’ll let you do that. I just need you to take all these boxes to the address I gave you and I’ll see you in the morning, okay? Everything will be fine.” She doesn’t look very convinced, but at least she stops insisting.

“I can’t believe you really are selling it” We both turn to look at the big, old house behind us.

Richard loved it from the moment he saw it, but I never liked it.

It is too far away from the city, hidden in the woods like a quiet beast, lonely and forgotten. From the outside, it looks like an ancient castle no one has lived in for a hundred years—a trap, a predator, waiting for its prey. The red brick looks especially pale during the winter.

Inside, all the rooms are exactly the same. Colorless and covered in dust. There is always dust in the house, you can almost feel it suffocating the life out of you. It is easy to get lost inside that endless labyrinth of painful memories and dust.

I had my doubts about the place when we moved in. I didn't want to be here, but Richard did. It’ll do you good to have some fresh air, Richard said to me that day, and I believed him.

It’s not old, it’s classic, he said.

It will give us space for the children, he said, and I believed him.

I always believed him.

But the truth is, I never felt safe inside that house, and yet, the worst part isn’t the house at all.

The worst part is the pond.

“Well, it is such a big place for me now, so I think it was about time”

“Yeah, but don’t you think you could’ve just waited to–”

“Goodbye Jess, hope you have a safe trip” I give my sister the keys to her car and help her find the way out. She waves me goodbye, giving me her classic “call me if you need anything,” and I just wait by the door until I make sure she is finally gone.

She has no reason to be worried, no reason at all. I have everything under control. Soon, this nightmare Richard trapped me in will be over.

As I climb up the stairs to my bedroom, I take a look at the emptiness of the place. Everything is gone. Everything that belonged to Richard, and that fake life he made me play as his wife, all of it was gone. The portraits of our wedding, the porcelain figures his mother gave us, the little dresses he bought for me, the broken alcohol bottles, the scratches on the walls, the blood in the curtains, the lies, the secrets, it is all gone.

The smell of cigarettes is still there, but that never bothered me.

I could cry with joy. Ten years. It took me ten years, but I have finally won my freedom. He never thought me capable of doing it, he said I didn’t have the guts, but he always thought less of me.

I got rid of everything. The house, the pond, Richard.

I slip a bottle of wine and play some music. I open every window, letting the light in. I throw away my shoes and let my hair down, dancing all around the place. It is so easy now. Living is easy now. Without him.

It is so easy how sneak into his old office and find the place where he hid the money. I lit myself a cigarette and sit on his chair, the way he always did, with both feet on the desk. It’s so easy now, just like it was so easy to get rid of him that night when I found him gone in his sleep.

I take a minute to enjoy the sunset from his office. He always had the best view. From there I can look into the depth of the forest. A beautiful view if it hadn’t been for the snow, but it doesn’t matter anymore. By this time tomorrow, I will be in the city, and from there I would go even farther. I don’t know where yet, but it has to be far. Maybe I could get a place in the South. I’ve heard summers are better in the South. I blow my cigarette and I follow the silhouette of the smoke through the window. I can almost imagine it, my new life, away from the fights, the abuse, and away from the pond.

I can see it through the window. Frozen. Somber. Quiet.

Of course he had a view of the pond. He always loved that hideous pond. Now it was looking straight into my eyes, reminding me I’m not free, not yet.

I jump to the bathroom, packing the last of my clothes. I never understood why he liked to spend so much time with that pond. He would always be there, fishing, feeding the ducks, chatting with some new lady he met on his way home.

He was always working, and when he was not working he was in the pond—that nasty, cold, dirty pond. He spent more time taking care of it than he ever did with me. He built a bench beside it and planted flowers all around it. He cleaned the rocks and made campfires every weekend. All while I rot inside this house, just watching him, waiting.

I guess I didn’t make it easy for him, he always said I was so demanding, so hard to please. He said I was a sickness.

I find his old medicine as I clean the mirror cabinet. Dozens of bottles filled with all kinds of pills. I take one of them, letting the bottle dance through my fingers. I don’t stop when two pills fall down my hands and into my throat. They had helped me to sleep in the past. It's a shame I can’t say the same about Richard.

A lung infection, the doctor said. That was the cause of death as far as it concerns me, but if I’m being honest, it was no infection at all. It was his laziness, his lack of attention, his heartless cruelty. It was all the times he took me for granted, all the times he said I was weak. It was the ease with which I hid from him during that nigh, how I went down the kitchen and took out a knife. Yes, it was very easy, so easy.

I take two more pills and put the rest of the bottles in my bag.

So maybe I was complicated, but he wasn’t perfect either. I might’ve been demanding, but he was too simple, too distant, like a ghost. He was dead long before my sickness killed him. Still, nobody saw that, because he loved to be the victim.

The problem was that nobody ever understood how unbearable it was living with him. The last months before his death I couldn’t even look him in the face. I hated that face—the wrinkles around his face, the dirt in his mustache, his yellow teeth. Even dead he was impossible to see, that’s why I asked for a closed cassette. The memory of it makes me laugh. The day of the funeral my brother made a joke about that. He said "it could be empty for all we know". It could be empty he said, and I laughed. Of course it could be empty, but then, if that would've been the case, why was it so heavy?

I drink another cup of wine and I go downstairs to clean the kitchen. From all the rooms in the house, that was the one I’ve spent more time cleaning. I have mopped the floor for hours every day since Richard’s death, and I always check for stains around the table. It is always clean. It has to be clean because I have to prove to Richard I can do this.

He said I couldn’t, he said I would be caught, that somebody would find out the truth, but I will prove him wrong. I’ll clean every stain, every wound.

I look inside the drawers; everything is in place, except for the knives. There’s one missing, but it’s alright. No one will notice. No one will know. I will get rid of him, just like I will get rid of his awful, precious pond.

It wasn’t always that bad, I repeat to myself as I walk outside the house, another bottle of wine in hand.

There was a time when I used to like the pond. Back then the grass was so green and soft. The perfume of the flowers was sweet and the water was so warm. He used to take me in his arms and he would spend our summers swimming in the pond.

Now it was dark and cold. Now there are only thorns where the flowers used to be. Now there’s only dust and mod where the worms live. The smell of spring has been replaced by the pest of rotten fruit and dead fish, and the clear water is now infested with ghosts.

He made it that way. It is his fault not mine, but it will all be alright! Everything will be alright as soon as I get rid of that vile, disgusting pond where I threw his dead body and the knife with which I cut his heart!

I sit on the bench next to the pond, taking another sip of wine. I lean to hit the ice with my feet. It cracks a bit and I smile.

I have everything under control. I have won my freedom, and no one will ever know the truth. Sure, summer is getting closer and eventually someone will see Richard’s ugly face emerging from the water, but by then I will be far, far away from him.