It’s vicious this violence that lurks within you. It lies just under the surface, eager and waiting for the opportune moment to spring. Awareness of it has brought you closer to controlling it, but still you struggle with the reins on days like today, where too much energy, sexual or otherwise, has been left untapped - festering, blistering on the leather of your control.
When it snaps, you are almost always alone, untrusting of yourself near another who would see you quite as the demon you see yourself. It is that distance you keep between them and your true nature that keeps them distant in every aspect. So you rage in the walls of your home, thankful that only she might remember that vase that used to sit on top of the mantle and only she might - or might not - remember it.
Explanations are difficult because you won’t lie even as you are aware of the subtle change in her demeanor - the way she leans back from you, the slight frown that lightly dusts her brow. You wonder if it is her fear that your rage will turn on her.
Your knuckles are bloody - you’ve forgotten to tape them before beating the bag which despite your efforts, remains in one piece. It stands as a testament of strength, not yours, but its ability to yield to each punch while still keeping its strength intact. Were it to be that you could match its abilities.
When you are done you sit on the floor. Physical exhaustion always gives in before the mind finishes with its war. And while sweat sheets off of you and your chest heaves with exertion, you still feel better, worn out, bathed perhaps in the sweat, but more likely in the energy that washes away from you. It is a baptism of sweat and blood that has been repeated countless times in your life.
Still, despite the pain, you find yourself smiling as you push yourself up from the floor to stand.
‘Let’s go hunting’ He says as we sit down on the patio for lunch.
‘Hunting?’ I pause for a moment, catching the appraising way he looks at one of the waitresses and then I smirk. ‘I assume you don’t mean the kind of hunt where you go out and kill a deer, then.’
He catches the slight inflection and returns his own look of amusement. ‘Yes, that’s what I’m talking about. I’m bored with the same old stuff. We could make a weekend of it.’
‘What is the last thing you’ve killed, Dan? A duck when you were two? You aren’t exactly an avid hunter.’ I turn my head and met the nosy gaze of the woman sitting at the table just beside ours. She has the courtesy to look away, but I can see her interest remains.
‘And you are?’ The sarcasm in his tone is the dripping sort, oozing from each word.
I simply look at him and smile before shrugging my shoulders. The waitress comes over and takes our drink order. I try to determine if those are nipple rings I see pressing against the white material of her shirt. As she walks away, I turn my attention back to him.
‘I don’t hunt just for the sake of hunting, and I don’t find it a challenge to slaughter something because it was stupid enough to walk in front of my gun while I sit in a shack and wait.’ My fingers toy with the rim of my water glass and I pull out an ice cube.
‘See! That’s what I’m talking about! We could hunt bears or those moose, mooses, meese…what’s the pural for moose anyway?’
‘Moose.’ I glance and catch the woman’s head snapping back to the plate in front of her. I’m not certain if I should be irritated or not.
‘Yea! We could kill something like that.’
‘They aren’t exactly common in this area and the same thing applies. Perhaps a rabid raccoon would be more your speed.’
He laughs, ‘Asshole.’
‘Mm.’ The ice cube starts to melt between my fingertips and I bring it to my mouth, crushing it between my teeth as I bite.
‘So what are you planning on doing this weekend anyway?’ He rolls his eyes. ‘Another weekend with N?’
‘I haven’t really decided.’
‘Yea.’ I can see the boredom written on his expression.
‘So, what are we going to be hunting, again?’ I ask and his face rekindles with the excitement of a moment ago.
There is a single chair that sits in front of a table, you can see that it is intended for you, it always is at this time of the year, when reviews are done and explanations demanded for the failures of the quarter. Failures. They sound as if each person lost and gained are like dollars, lost and gained. The beast is what it is, you remark in your head just before you open the door and feel the weight of their gaze upon you. It hasn’t changed since long before you came, and it isn’t likely to change despite your interference and objections.
The cold comparison bothers you, and you remind yourself, again, that you are not entirely damned for feeling something for strangers. They are names to you also, most of them you could never set apart from the person behind you in line at the store, or the clerk behind the counter at that coffee shop you favor. Somehow, with their lives tucked neatly in the manila folders clasped between your fingers, you feel closer to them. Their spirit, however forgotten in their life, has, with death, been cleansed of stains - and you think perhaps God does listen.
It takes hours to go through each one, case by case and you find yourself rubbing your closed eyes. Your answers are becoming clipped, crisp and there is the briefest of realizations that you are about to lose your temper with this part of the process. Your teeth are grinding against one another as they as for clarification - again - on the final subject. As you glance back down at the picture, fastened to the page by a paper clip, you note just how young she appears before your eyes move to the mug shot, and the age is added back 100 fold.
Her eyes look helpless as she stands there, the tips of her fingertips appearing below the black sign holding up her number. They are sunken, surrounded by dark circles which you hope are makeup, but somehow know are not. Her skin seems loose, sagging over cheek bones and you can’t help but stare. Your eyes seem to focus, you feel it happening, but don’t turn your gaze away.
An irritated voice says your name, and you look up knowing somehow that it wasn’t the first time they spoke to you.
It is over. You close the folders and stack them into straight piles on the table before shoving back your chair. The walls feel as if they are closing around you - that muted green color, hollow halls and cold flooring are abrasive, shadowless and soulless. You nearly shove someone aside getting out of the door and you don’t apologize.
As you take the quickest route home, you loosen the tie that strangles your neck in formality and leave it to dangle, drunkenly. Opening the compartment to pay the toll, your eyes dart down to the razors and your fingers flip through and pull out three, closing your hands around them as you use the other hand to toss the change into the mesh bucket.
Home is only a short distance away.
The door opens as you step out of the car and it is her, wrapped in a robe, her hair piled on top of her head. The smell of ginger hits you and you inhale sharply. God you love her scent.
She doesn’t say anything as you enter, perhaps because you are silent, or she can read the aura coming off of you in waves. Silence is greeting enough sometimes. You feel the razors, each in their sheath, biting into the fist of your right hand. The briefcase you carry is dropped unceremoniously onto the floor and as she moves to pass you, your free hand wraps around her upper arm.
A moment later, she is shoved into the wall with a razor blade held against the pulse in her neck. It is a challenge, an ugly one that only precipitates the movement that nicks her skin and draws the faintest line of blood.
She sucks in her breath and you feel the aggression start to boil. Her eyes carry that startled look of prey, you’ve seen it before when you went hunting as a child. It is a look that calls out silently for the predator.
When you feel her fingers move from your back, you tense and dig the sharp edge of the blade in further. Yet even as the liquid finally gathers enough of itself to trail down from the wound, her fingers slide into the hair of your head and she moans, turning her head to give you better access.
The warmth of her response seems to throw cold water on you and you drop the blade as if it burns you.
You realize then that it was the fight you wanted.
And you wonder what kind of person that it makes you.