Choose, he hissed, bitter and disgusted. It’s the fifth time I have gone through this hellhole, but how his voice echoes within my head never fails to send a shiver down my spine, though I focus on his lips that mouths the same words in front of me.
Yes, choose, his other pair of lips slithers the words in my skull, but filled with laughter and glee from my seemingly endless pain and misery. His two heads eye me with greed like the sadist he is, tossing the key from hand to hand. The once-shocking sight of the two heads sprouting from a singular neck no longer surprises me. In fact, all I feel is dread.
The doors appear in front me and the god disappears, but I still sense their presence in my head, ready to taunt and mock me to add to my distress. Both doors are alike: mahogany, glossed over, with a silver doorknob. But I know the difference.
My senses change towards the first door I lean forward to. The one of the right clogs my nose of her shampoo when she tucks her head in the crook of my neck. It fills my tongue of the taste of hers when she’s kissing me passionately. I feel her gentle fingers entwined with my calloused ones in the empty air. I hear her high laugh, making my heart speed up with happiness and utter despair. And I see, oh, save me, I see her smile, her bright eyes full of life and enthusiasm, her dimpled cheeks as she beams at me with such joy that it makes me want to cry and scream and rage and die.
I’m addicted.
I give a cry of desperation as I fling myself to the door, not once considering the other, lone choice. My eyes prickle with tears as I claw at the door, hoping against hope that maybe, in this pathetic show of mine, he will give me mercy. I howl and sob with need and want, not knowing the difference between the two anymore, nor do I care.
His laughter fills my head to the brim, and it echoes, my head throbs violently and I smash my head against the door relentlessly in poor attempt to stop the pounding. All the while, her senses do not leave my skin, crawling, inching its way to take over my head. Her smell. Her skin. Her taste. Her laugh. Her smile.
Her. Her. Her. HER. HER. HER. HER.
HER HER HER HER HER HER HER HER—
My limbs halt to a stop against my will and all goes silent.
Choice granted, his two voices echo, and a blinding flash takes me back in to my nightmare.
“It’s so beautiful,” she says softly, her eyes reflecting the moon light from the glistening waters of the lake. She gazes at the view how I would at her; like it’s art, not nice, but made to be appreciated.
It’s calm and silent, the only occasional hoots of the owls and the tiny splashes from the fish below, contrast to my withering self. I’m here, but not me. The real me withers in pain and relishes the drug she is, wanting to clasp her in my arms and never let her go, wishing that could be forever, or if maybe, my ending. I only look out through the mere memory of this man who would be ashamed to see his future self so pathetic and vulnerable. I hear myself hum in response, but I don’t break my gaze from her.
We walk back to the main road which had to be crossed to get to our car. When we arrive, my heart speeds up, but the memory of me does not react. I feel my lips curve into a laugh as she jumps excitedly at the thought of the Ferris wheel we would never make it to.
She darts onto the street as my old self laughs as she goes ahead. My heart wrenches in my chest, twisting, turning, why did I choose this door? Why did I choose a choice that would never change? Why, why, why?
My head turns a second too late, and my eyes widened. My heart jumps to my throat but I’m too late. I was too late.
I see the car speeding towards my angel, my life, and my scream launches to my throat just as the blinding headlights illuminated her last laugh, unsuspecting and carefree, and again, again, I see her lie bloody on the road, my dreams, my future, a part of me, gone, just like that.
I fall to my knees, and this is the only moment in this demonic flashback of mine where I feel I can control my body freely. Him and I scream clutching her limp body, coating her blood on my hands, but I don’t care; I don’t care, I don’t care…
Choose.
I open my eyes, wary and tired. I see the doors again.
What lasts of her presence still crawls on my skin as I lean towards the first door. But I pull away with a harsh stumble, falling to my knees, tears pricking my eyes.
Now, I gaze up with tired, strained, puffy eyes at the left door I failed to reach out to.
It smells like her. Only… faint. Like a lingering reminder. Not an obsession.
I reach my arm weakly, and my fingertips only graze the cold wood before everything shines bright, white filling my vision.
Choice granted.
Perhaps it's time to see what lies beyond the unopened door.
ns 15.158.2.208da2
