I felt her next to me. Whether it was the way the guy next to me crossed his arms, or the way her voice was constantly lingering on my mind, I felt her presence in the room. Her skin rubbing on mine, her voice whispering softly in my ear. The guy next to me was talking about some random topic. I didn't know what it was about - I must have zoned out about two minutes ago. I couldn't focus. Nobody could in my situation.
"So?" The guy spoke a little louder, snapping me out of my daydream. He tried to smile at me through his crooked , stained teeth and he smelled of alcohol.
"What?" I forced a smile back, although my heart was beating so hard that I was surprised that I got a word out.
"What do you want your last thought to be, silly?" He shrugged, staring at me intently, as if he cared for what I had to say.
I have to say, he raised an interesting question. Even though he looked like a bum with his tattered jeans, shoes with the soles hanging out and his ugly, grey jumper, he sounded oddly posh. A noticeable accent that rang in my ears, and once i noticed his thick, british accent, i couldn't unhear it.
"Oh, err, I don't really know-" That was the truth. To be honest, that was the last thing on my mind. I had to think about my response for a long time, humming and sighing a little in order to not let the silence engulf the room.
"I guess when It's my time, I want to imagine a reality where everything worked out. Where I didn't do the things I've done." That was the truth. And I truly did wish that everything worked out the way I had planned. I hadn't even got married yet.
"What about you? What's your last thought?" I asked quietly and quickly. I didn't want myself to be the subject for so long. Probably because my life was an absolute trainwreck.
"Didn't you hear me? I'll be thinking of my cats. Caramel and Pancake. Lovely, soft cats, although they did scratch me quite a bit." He smiled, which was good to see.
"Caramel and Pancake? So you were a food man, eh?" I waited for him to laugh until I did. To be fair, he was on the plump side.
" Oh, hell yes. Have you ever tried Mustard on toast? It sounds disgusting, but it's the most glorious thing I've ever tasted. My mum used to cook it for me whenever she wanted me to shut up." He snorted, looking at me for some sort of assurance.
"You're right. It sounds disgusting." I stared down at my feet and forced my smile. It was nice to hear a voice other than mine.
"I'm Todd, by the way." He piped up, his voice rising a little as if he was asking a question.
I winced a little at that name. I couldn't remember why, but I felt like the name was cursed.
"Gilles" I answered reluctantly. It felt weird saying my name again. I had avoided saying it for so long.
I see why his mum wanted him to shut up. His scent lingered in the air, a sort of sickly-sweet odor that outstretched around the blackened, brick room.
The man quickly dipped into his pockets and fished out a large bottle. He gulped it down his mouth, some of the rich drink spilling through his rough, filthy, grey beard and down his shirt.
"What is that? What are you drinking?" I glared at him as he neatly tucked it away in his jacket pocket.
"It's ale, silly. "A rich man's drink. Tasty, too. It's from France. Want some?" He flinched, raising his hand, ready to dig it out of his pockets again.
"Hell no." I didn't want to yell. Technically, he had done nothing wrong. But seeing one of those sent my mind in a spiral of pity. The silence engulfed the room after that, and I was so tired, so drained of life that I just let it.
I don't remember anything else he said. I kind of just stared down, zoning out for a few more moments before the guards swung the door open, creating a deafening creak that snapped me out of it. I was so concentrated, I forgot that I was in prison. Death row can really screw around with your head, sometimes.
Mumbling to themselves, the two of them grabbed both my arms and used their long arms to swing me out of my seat. The force was so strong that I would have stumbled to the floor if they weren't holding me. In fact, the force was so strong that I woke up.
I immediately shot up out of my bed, sweating and shaking violently. I turned to my right, and she was in my bed, next to me, holding my arm. That was probably what I felt in the dream. Her blonde hair looked scruffy in the middle of the night, and her delicate touch on my arm made the room a lot warmer than it actually was.
"What was it?" She gazed at me like I was her idol, never losing eye contact.
"What?" I mumbled, still confused and dazed.
"Your dream. What was it?" Her voice was still high and angelic, and it was sort of soothing.
"I was in prison or... something, it was nothing." That was a lie. I just didn't know what else to say. It felt too real. I knew it wasn't. But it was too real, too strange, that I felt like I was losing my mind.
"Go back to sleep, ya dope." She laughed quietly, tossing back over the other side of the bed. I thought I should clear my head in the morning. I could've thought things through right then. It wasn't like I wanted to picture myself sleeping, even if it was next to her. Eventually, I decided to sink back into my bed, and wait for the brightness of the daytime to snap me out of it.
We got married. I proposed to her during easter whilst we were watching a movie and eating chocolate on the sofa. We got married in a massive, white church. She was religious. I'm not. We had two kids. They grew up to be quite violent boys but they were charming in their own way. As a toddler, anyway. One time, she got worked up because the youngest one couldn't form proper words at the time and he was three, so I took her to see the sequel to the movie that was playing when I proposed at the cinema. It took her mind off it for a while, but we still got a speech therapist. She was caring like that. Now they're seven and six. And yes, he can talk. Not as well as his big brother, but still. She became obsessed with getting a dog for christmas. I remember getting her one even though I was allergic. I had to hide that from her a lot, but it was worth it.
And I couldn't help but think about that day as the dog sat in his bed, gawking at me, panting loudly. It was quiet, but the echoes made it feel like someone was screaming in my ear, crying out for something. It was eerie. And so I sat there, drinking my milky coffee, waiting for the sound of her soft steps to echo down the stairs..
"Morning." She stated softly as she tiptoed towards the toaster, and pulled two pieces of bread out of the bread bin.
"Is it morning? I didn't notice." I laughed loudly, twisting to the edge of my seat to see if her face had formed a smile. She was chuckling a little.
"You are the worst at making jokes!" She exclaimed, still smiling as she twirled around to kean on the kitchen side. The toaster was glowing a shade of blue that I never really noticed. Something about her smile was so full of life, so infectious that it made me smile just as much.
"Hey, can you pick up the kids from school today? I have a meeting with Todd at four." She shrugged, turning back towards the toaster. My smile faded.
"Again? Seriously? I hate that guy!" I exclaimed, hoping to get a similar opinion from her.
"You've never even met him! What's your problem? I bring his name up and now you're all..." her voice wandered.
"The guy has met you three times this week and you said they've all been pointless. He's just finding excuses to go out with you." I twitched my arms.
"Well, he's my boss, so I can't exactly say no, can I?" She shrugged. "It'll be fine. If he hits on me, i'll let you stab him." She smirked, flinching a little as her toast loudly popped up from the toaster.
"Yeah, and i'm picking the knife, too." I smiled a little, even though I was still on edge. Ever since she mentioned Todd's name, everything grew louder. The clocks, the dripping tap by the sink, even the toast popping up made me jump.
I couldn't help but wonder what Todd must look like. Obviously, Todd from the prison wasn't the same person. I would love it if the real Todd was that unattractive. Does he wear a suit? What is his real accent like? Is he an alcoholic? How long until he stops trying to bang my wife-
"Gilles!" I heard her raise her voice. I was daydreaming again.
"Huh?"
"So you'll pick them up for me?" She asked, clearly annoyed.
"Yeah, sure." I nodded slowly, as if I had just woken up. My senses were still a little numb. Thinking about that 'dream' left me exhausted. Although, I could still smell something sour rotting in the air.
"What on earth are you cooking?" My leg started to shake under the table. I knew what she was gonna say.
"It's mustard on toast. You know I always have that, silly!" She said.
"What?" I was hoping that I had misheard her.
"Yeah. It's probably because my mum force fed me it when we were poor. Or maybe it was just to shut me up-" she left my head spinning.
Immediately, I gulped the rest of my coffee and stumbled out of my chair, nauseous.
"What's up?" She frowned at me, her eyesight resting on my face.
"I gotta go." I tried to sound angry, but I probably came off as more nervous. Frustrated, I clutched my coat from the coat hanger, and rushed out the door, slamming it before letting my breath linger in the free air of the outdoors.
Drowsy, I spotted the quiet, dull pub. The bright, neon red sign reflected on the collective puddles of rainwater that ran over the pavement like a cold, wet blanket. I had to drive through patches of trees just to arrive at the car park, and it was completely empty - no other cars in sight. I wasn't too bothered because it was dark outside anyway, but i was hoping for enough people there to drown out the silence.
As I got out of my car, I listened to the sound of the gravel rolling underneath my shoes for a moment. I heard the sound before and yet it was so soothing to hear something when nothing else was there.
Instantly, I swung the wooden door open and stumbled into the bar, where a man was waiting for me.
"Busy day, huh?" I joked, a little too loudly. He still stared at me with a blank expression on his face.
"How you doing? Good? What'll it be?" He finally piped up.
"Erm... not great, honestly. I'll just take an ale." I nodded hesitantly. The man remained silent as he stomped over towards his cabinet to pull out a glass.
I had to soak in the silence for a moment..
"Why don't I feel so good, you ask? We'll that's actually quite a complicated question." I was expecting a laugh, or a noise or some reaction out of him. He shoved the glass below the beer tap..
"I don't know, really. Everything has just felt off today." I stared at the man, who was busy concentrating on filling my glass with ale.
"It's like none of this is real, ya know? My wife keeps mentioning these things and it ... sets me off. I don't know why. It's just that nothing feels right." I tapped my index finger on the wooden table. The man had filled the glass up, with only a little froth at the top. Not bad.
"What? Did you say something?" I asked the guy jokingly.
"Oh. No, I thought you were asking about my wife. She's fine, if you want to know. She's... really perfect. Almost angelic. Like it isn't her..." I spilled out. I didn't mean to, honestly. The man had served me my beer by this point, and was sitting down by the cash register.
"This isn't what I want to spend my time thinking about. My wife is off on some meeting with Todd. Christ, Todd sucks. He's so desperate to get with her. She just doesn't notice it. And all this stuff is from the past. I want to be thinking of a perfect moment to capture, but every time I try to think of one, my head ends up in this... spiral." He wasn't listening at this point. I didn't blame him. I didn't care.
Fed up, I gulp down the last dribble of ale from the glass. It was so sweet. So delicious. It reminded me of older days.
"This is amazing! Where did you get this?" I asked, a little louder this time. He looked up from his phone and checked the label from the tap.
"Ah. The rich man's drink. The label is peeled off, but I think it's from France."
Oh, now he decides to listen to me.
The description sank and rang in my ears. I was hoping to escape this déjà vu, and then that sank in. I stared out at the pitch black sky beyond the windows, the neon red from the sign illuminating the floor, battling with the dark green of the tall trees outside. I stared back at the man, who had sunk back into his phone. I was sick of this.
"Thanks for the great advice." I said sarcastically as I raced out the door and towards my car.
Everything else was a blur. But I found it unusual that, when I woke up in my bed, she wasn't there to clutch on to my arm.
It wasn't a cause for concern. But it was for me. Because deep down, I knew what was going on. I couldn't get it out of my head, like a constant loop in my mind.
Hesitantly, I tiptoed down the stairs before the kitchen, and the quiet of the house immediately got to me, and forced me to shake a little. I didn't want to see this again.
Silence goes when you need it most. Noise is always there. We just don't register it until we need it to block out the important stuff. The nasty stuff. When it's quiet, it's hard to keep stuff in. It's hard to control when your thoughts decide what you hear. It creeped me out as I stumbled through the kitchen, full of clear white tables and chairs that overlooked our small, isolated, unattractive garden. But there were occasional splatters of red present as well. As soon as I realised, I noticed that it was everywhere - on the carpet, on the tables, even on the palm of my hand. You could barely see the white of the tables anymore. It made me sick. At least, I thought it did, until I looked behind the door.
They lied there, slumped in the corner, bloodied and bruised and slashed. All three of them were lifeless and pale behind the door, smothered and oozing red, their eyes wide open. Her wedding ring fell on the floor. Her eyes were glaring through my heavy soul. That was when I started to understand. But I was getting sick of the loop. Sick of remembering.
I remembered parking my car and staggering home, drunk and dizzy, and swinging our door wide open. I remembered seeing her face, seeing her acting all bubbly and happy, and knowing in my head that something was wrong. I remembered hating her for being so perfect in my head that I knew it wasn't the real her. I remembered getting into a fight about something, I forgot about, I was drunk. I remember grabbing a kitchen knife and trying to remain calm as my kids walked down the stairs. I remembered my hands shaking so much, my face so red, my eyes so fixated on her lips - and I remembered thrusting my knife into her.
I think the kids were scared. Either they must have fought back, or I got scared that they would tell the police. I couldn't remember that. But either way, they-
I staggered back at the sight of them on the floor, and blinked hard as everything came rushing back to me. Hearing myself put my head in my hands and sob quietly was the most pathetic thing I had ever heard from myself. My breathing was so fragmented because of my crying that I couldn't form proper sentences. I saw the knife on the table, radiating red, stained with hatred. I glared at it, although my tears filled up most of my vision.
"That's not how it really went, was it?" I heard a loud, cutting voice that forced me to stop and swing around. It was her.
"B-but I j-just killed you." I stated, pointing at her with my long, white, nervous fingers.
"Just? It was six months ago, silly." She laughed. It made me panic.
"H-huh?" I turned around to stare at her dead body again. It was still there. Then I turned back to see her standing up straight in the doorway, and it made me shiver.
"You don't want to admit the real reason why you killed me. It wasn't because you got drunk, silly." She scoffed and smirked a bit.
"W-well I did have a few t-to drink-" I started.
"Don't you remember? " she asked, a little more impatient this time. "Isn't that what this is all about?"
She was right. It started to come back to me. Everything, all of it.
"Todd! Seriously!? Out of everyone, after all we had been through, you..." I bellowed, circling our table as she sat there, gazing at me.
"Gilles, I'm so, so sorry. We ended it, I swear, I didn't mean-" she insisted, her lips shaking a little.
"Is that why you two had been hanging out all the time? Huh? It wasn't just 'work business' was it? An-and you wanna know something else? I said from day ONE! I said that he was dirty-" My face was filthy red, and my shoes were tapping on the floor impatiently.
"D-don't blame him! It was all me! I came on to him, I suggested it..." she covered her face with her hands, looking defeated.
I slowly looked down to notice that the knife was in my hands. I couldn't remember getting it from the drawers. I think my mind was on autopilot.
"Please, honey? Sweetie? Put it down, okay? I can leave if you really want me to but we can work this out-" she pleaded. But every time her lips moved, all I could see was Todd with her, smothering her with his sloppy lips. And when I looked at her bright red face, all I could see was the woman that I proposed to. The woman that decided to become a loving mother with me at her side. The woman who screamed her lungs out twice for my kids. The woman who comforted me, and always brought me back a sausage roll when she was working late. The woman who wasn't 'working' late, but was instead having the time of her life away from me. The woman who was willing to throw a grenade into my life just to get more pleasure. The woman who lied and smiled every time she told me she was working late.
She wasn't smiling now. Even then, her eyes radiated fear instead of regret. She probably enjoyed every moment and never looked back. She still didn't care about hurting my feelings then, did she? She only cared about me when I was holding the knife.
"I love you." She spat, quietly and timidly, like she knew she was going to die the moment she said it.
Quickly, I shoved my hands towards her mouth and covered it. I couldn't bare to hear any more from her black hole of manipulation. It was then that I realised that my knife was cutting into her throat. Shaken and agitated, I drew my knife back from the side. The side. It was the goddamn side.
Blood started spilling out from her throat as she tried to gasp for air. Shocked and dizzy from the noise that gathered in the room, I dropped my knife on the floor. My whole body was numb and slow upon watching her. It was like I was possessed, out of my body or sleepwalking. It was as if I wasn't there.
Her eyes lingered on my pale face one last time as her bleeding mouth gargled, and her twitching legs pulled her onto the ground.
I didn't mean to do it. I don't think I intended to do it. I was injected with rage at the time and my head wasn't clear, but I didn't want to kill her. I don't think I did. My subconscious head controlled my half-dead body, pulling puppet strings over my arms. I wasn't sure of anything at that point. But I remembered acting calm as my kids stomped down the stairs.
I was agitated, and tired and alone, and the silence was driving me. I was scared that they would either see me as a monster, or try to call the police, or even try to fight back. I tried to send them to bed, but they said that the noises were keeping them up. They kept trying to run past me to the kitchen, either to get something or to check on her. Either way, I...
I... I'm so sorry that I killed you." I suddenly piped up. I knew that something was wrong by the way she stood, but I tried not to notice it.
"It's my fault, really. I shouldn't have cheated, it was a really scummy thing to do." She gave a half-hearted smile. I really needed to hear that from her.
"But I mean, murder is a little excessive-" I let out a quick laugh. It was hard to keep my defenses up around her.
"It's over now. I forgive you, Gilles. I need you to hear that." She strolled towards me and put her hands on my shoulders.
"Well yeah, but you're just saying that because you-" I stuttered.
"Because I what?" She asked in a sympathetic tone. I couldn't tell her. It sounds stupid but I couldn't.
"Listen. I'm saying it because you need to get over it. You need to come to terms with it before this is over. You don't need to beat yourself up, the chair's gonna do that for you." She smiled weakly, her face close to mine.
"You don't think I've tried?" I snapped. She wouldn't care if I yelled or not.
"I keep trying to imagine this... this... perfect reality. Except, every time I close my eyes, it all loops back to the bad stuff. All I can think about is the things that you used to eat. The ale that you used to drink. Your face just before you stopped breathing. Your neck, and how everything poured out of it-"
I started to break down into tears. She tried to speak, but I wasn't done.
"This is not what I want to spend my time thinking about! The point of this was to imagine the good you! The you that I would have married, instead of..." my voice wandered off. "I don't know, man. My head is driving me and I can't tell what's real anymore and I-" she leaned in and kissed me, something that I wanted but didn't expect nor deserve. I only realised then that my body felt a little lighter after spitting all my thoughts out. All the anger, the rage, the fear, the hatred for myself had lifted into the air upon her kiss.
"You can't take back what happened." She stated in a soft, soothing voice, "so why kill yourself over it? You're going soon. Make it a celebration." She shrugged, smiling and gazing at me. She was waiting for me to smile back. As soon as I returned the smile, she hugged me. Suddenly, the silence didn't seem so loud anymore.
"Gilles?" She whispered softly in my ear, tickling my soul.
"Gilles." She said, louder this time. She started clutching onto my tattered clothes more tightly with each passing second, and it made me anxious. It was about to end.
"Hey! Gilles!" The bum grabbed my tattered shirt and shook me, snapping me out of it.
"H-huh?" It took me a second to realise. Nauseous, I let my eyes scan the dark, brick room. She wasn't there anymore, and my head felt dizzy again.
"I said,'' What do you want your last thought to be"silly?" The bum pierced through my soul with his glaring eyes, awaiting my response. It was then that I remembered his name. Todd.
I shut my eyes and breathed heavily. How was I so stupid? I opened my eyes slowly and allowed my thoughts to run wild and infect my mind. I can't believe that, for a moment, I believed that any of that was real. The cell seemed a lot darker after that.
"I guess, when it's my time, I want to imagine a reality where everything worked out. Where I didn't do the things I've done." I nodded, too ashamed to make eye contact with the guy.
"Well, I'm going to think about my kit-" Todd began to speak.
"You know, this is exactly how I thought you would look." I nodded, a little venom in my voice. "From my wife's description, I hated you." Things started to become clearer now. I could see what everything really was. I thought I did, anyway.
"Actually, you weren't married. You were engaged. The wedding was in your head, remember?" He laughed in my face as he gulped down a bottle of ale.
"How do you know what was in my head?" I asked indignantly.
"Oh, boy. Your head is more messed up than you think. No wonder she left you." He laughed again.
I sighed. I didn't care anymore. Nothing mattered anymore.
"So you're a food man, huh?" I asked reluctantly. I needed some noise in the background to give me time to clear my head.
"Oh, hell yes. Have you ever tried mustard on toast..." everything else he said was a blur. The next thing I remembered, 2 guards burst into the room.
Mumbling to themselves, they grabbed me by the arms and thrusted me on my feet. Petrified, I tried to grab on to Todd, but he wasn't there anymore. He had dissolved into my thoughts.
One thing that I've found is that thinking is a dangerous thing. It can mess with your reality sometimes. And if you let your brain do its thing, It can create an image that's beyond your control. It scared me the first time around.
As the two guards thrusted me around the corner, past all the prisoners' cells, the prisoners started to summon loud noises. Some of them swung around their bars, some of them threw toilet paper at us, some of them just shouted, too. I could see the broken side of them as I stumbled past. And when I heard this symphony of yelling, all I could think of was the loudness of the people cheering when we'll get married. Getting married is part of my perfect reality, something that I've always wanted to do.
The guards struggled forward in robot-like movements, hands firmly tugging on my clothes. It reminded me of the way she would always tug on my arm when she wanted me to listen to her. Also, it prompted me to think of how she would have held me tight through her 3rd pregnancy had we ever gotten round to it.
The metal floor rattled as I shuffled along it, and towards the electric chair, which was finally in sight. The rough feel of the floor forced me to picture what the sticky carpets of the cinema would be like to walk along on our trip to the cinema. The thought of her cuddled up next to me along red velvet seats, mesmerised by the booming screen in front of us made me smile brightly.
The mumbling of one of the guards snapped me out of my daydream. They pushed me in the chair and held me down as they strapped everything on to me. But all I could focus on was the spectators looking in through the window. They were mainly just reporters and people in suits. However, a woman stood by the window, touching the glass gently and smiling at me through it, making me feel warmer than I actually was. It was reassuring to think that someone really cares.
I felt like I was suffocating once they had finished strapping me in. I couldn't inhale with my stomach, but my eyes never left that woman. She was crying real tears and shaking wildly but she was still smiling at me. And as they pulled the black mask over my eyes, I was left alone with my thoughts. And all I could do was picture the rest of my life with her. I couldn't help but imagine her and I growing old together. Seeing our grandchildren go through school, dancing in pubs and discos, venturing far out through the woods to find the perfect spot to eat our lunch, crying with laughter and grabbing on to each other in front of the TV. Tapping my fingers to the sound of her heartbeat, waiting for her to pass away slowly and naturally, of old age. That last one lingered with me. We looked like we were in our 90's. The sounds and smells of the hospital felt bittersweet. But the sound of the machine grew louder.
As I heard a switch turn on, and felt a swarm of electricity possess my head, I pictured one last moment of us, in an unknown place, smiling and laughing before my head went fuzzy, my thoughts faded to black and the reality of the real world slowly, finally... Snapped me out of my daydream.