Dave

“Dave, let me in – this isn’t funny anymore.”

Dave sat on the floor, his knees against his chest and his arms wrapped tightly around his legs, gently rocking himself back and forth.

“Can you hear me? It’s dark and cold and I’m scared. Dave? Dave!”

He glanced up, sweat beading on his forehead and started humming to himself, his arms tightening further.

“Why are you doing this to me? What did I do? Please answer me! All these years I have stood by you! No matter what you did I was always there for you! When everyone else turned their backs I was the one that was always on your side. Dave! Don’t I at least deserve an answer?”

Dave got up from the floor, and headed toward the kitchen. Still humming to himself, he removed a large knife from a wooden block and tilted it into the light, examining his reflection in its blade. His face was a cruel caricature of its usual well groomed appearance. Hair plastered to his scalp, eyes sunken, darting nervously in their sockets and three days growth of facial hair.

“I know you are under a lot of pressure Dave. I know things have been hard – but I can help! All you need to do is let me in and we can talk about things. We can sort things out, like we always do.”

He raised the blade up to eye level, tilting it slowly back and forth under the fluorescent bulb, causing reflected light to race along the walls, a small smile playing across his pale lips.

“You still won’t even talk to me? Well in that case screw you! You can sort your own mess out. I want a divorce you asshole! And if you think that anyone else will put up with your crap then you have another thing coming. You get to spend the rest of your life alone. You just throw away fifteen years of marriage like it was nothing. You hear me?”

He looked up, his brow furrowing. He had been under a lot of pressure lately, but this was Karen – the blue eyed, smiling woman that had been his best friend for most of his adult life. How could he ever hurt her? He must be losing it!

Dave put the knife back into the wooden block and walked to the living room window of his 14th floor apartment, throwing it open to the night. Karen floated into the apartment, her feral yellow eyes wide and a smile on her lips as she embraced her husband with cold dead arms.

copyright Graeme Reynolds 2009