i think i killed someone
For once, it’s me waking you up with a phone call in the middle of the night.
I’m so agitated I don’t even thank you for picking up at 3am. “Raven,” I say, my voice a little shaky. “I think I fucked up.”
You sit up in your bed. In a brief second of silence you picture all the ways I could mean that. Was I in trouble? Had I brought trouble to you? Was I seeing another predator? The absurdity of that last thought would make you laugh if you weren’t already so concerned. “What is it?”
“Thirteen. The news report said thirteen. I think I killed someone.”
You talked to me on hands-free as you drove. Calmed me down. “I just wanted you to be safe,” I’d said. “A feast like that—even the safeguards I’ve set up couldn’t hide that. You’d leave, and I couldn’t— I couldn’t—”
“Breathe,” you’d told me, in that calm manner you have. It was all you could do to keep me calm until you pulled up at my house.
Presently, I open my door before you knock. I smile when I see you—I always smile when I see you—but one arm is folded behind my back and gripping my hair. “Thanks for coming.”
“You needed me.” You step into my home. I turn to lead you to the living room but you grab me and give me a tight hug in the hallway. It breaks something inside me and I sink into your warm, comforting body like you’re a life raft. You feel my shoulders heave as I sob silently. “It’s okay. It’s going to be okay.”
Eventually the storm passes. You feel my breathing slow down and become regular, so relax your grip. I lean back and try a smile that doesn’t stick. We go into the living room and I make us tea.
You look up as I come back with two steaming mugs. Mine is sweet: yours barely has milk. Curled up on the couch you take it in both hands. “Andrew… don’t take it the wrong way or anything but… I haven’t seen you this upset about, y’know, someone dying before…”
“Hm?” The look of puzzlement on my face is absolute. You keep silent, let me work it out. Eventually, realisation dawns. It brings with it an astonished bark of laughter, as I realise how I must look. “Oh! Oh, fuck. I never thought… I never thought about it like that. Hah! Isn’t that…” I wander off into my own little world for a moment, staring into the middle distance. This happens. You’re used to it. You watch me while you sip your tea.
“So… Yeah, this is nothing like when I bring you prey.”
“People,” you say, leaning heavily on the word as you try to work out what’s going on in my head.
“People, yes. When I bring them to you. Hah. Isn’t it the funniest thing?” I bite my lip as I think, then my expression clouds with shame. “It couldn’t be more different. When I bring you people, you feed. It’s a perfect end. I’m… It feels almost like a religious impulsion. That’s how the world is, right? Predators and prey?”
You nod easily, neglecting to mention that the prey usually have more of an issue with this setup.
“But what I did was kill someone. Accidentally, I suppose. Manslaughter. My own short-sightedness and stupidity, assuming the building was closed, and she died upstairs. In her little rent-a-studio making hand-made fucking bandanas for dogs. And she died.”
You can see me getting worked up again so you stop me with a finger to my lips. “So you’re upset because you caused someone to die and I didn’t get to feed?”
After a moment I give a side-to-side nod, indicating ‘pretty much’.
Your warm smile shines on me like summer evening sun. “Then I think we can make this right, pet.”
It’s dangerous to revisit what is now a crime scene. Cameras have been set up. However, your night vision is excellent and this isn’t your first rodeo. We pick an odd approach to the cordoned-off building.
From the outside there doesn’t appear to be too much damage. Some newly-installed wooden fronting has curled and broken away, revealing concrete that looks untouched. Most of the external indication lies in the large soot streaks above windows near the north wing of the building.
We slip through the doors and you motion for me to stand still. The air is still thick with the smell of carbon, but all is silent. I’m not really paying attention, I guess. I’m looking at your silhouette, curvy and puissant. In the next room over, fourteen lives ended as they flowed into you. They’re gone, now. Only you remain.
“This way,” you say, then smirk when you catch me looking. You don’t wait for me, so I hop to keep up.
“You know the way?”
“I can hear her.”
You take us confidently up concrete stairways to the soot-blackened second floor. There, more police tape, which you sever with a gesture. “She’s inside.”
I let out a breath I didn’t realise I’d been holding. This won’t be in vain, then. Her death won’t be in vain. “What’s she doing?”
You seem to listen for a little while, then smile, sadly. “Hurting. She doesn’t know how to get out. She’s trapped. The maintenance guy must have locked her fire exit years ago.” A pause. “She’s screaming.”
In the reflected streetlight that makes it through an empty window I look pale. “Help her, please.”
You nod. Unspoken is the knowledge that ceasing to exist will hurt too. But it will be an end, in a sense.
The room to me seems silent and empty. In it, you stalk to a supply cabinet, deep enough to hide inside and door shiny metal ever the paint peeled away. You open the door with a grating squeal, then whirl around like you suddenly heard something behind you. Your tendrils extend from your shoulders and stretch. A snap through the air seems only to frustrate you. It seems like nothing more than a weird, one-person game of hide-and-seek.
“She’s fast. It’s hard to hunt a spirit. You have to make them come to you, really. Do you have a lighter?”
“You’re joking, right?”
“Hmph. Go get me something burnable, then. I think there were papers behind the reception desk.”
I bustle away and retrieve singed documents. You take the the stack of paper and roll up lengths of it, putting a little bend in each paper-tube to prevent it unrolling. These you lay out around the room in a sort of grid, leaving a space around the cupboard clear. This you stand in.
“Okay, suppertime. This is for you.”
The tendrils are gone—I didn’t notice you dispel them—but in the low light I see red flame play over your hand. With a click of your fingers a spark bursts into scarlet being, then dances from paper to paper as you direct it. Where it lands, smoke and then flames spring up, mundane yellow instead of magical red.
You start from the outside of the room and keep a perimeter lit, constantly lighting new paper to replace those that quickly burn out. Naturally, this means the ring of fire creeps closer to you.
I don’t see anything untoward until the flames are about half-way to you.. Then, the pale white smoke seems to gust oddly, like a breeze moved through it. Your face snaps towards the disturbance. “That’s her. Can’t bear to go near the fire.”
It takes five minutes to gradually ease the fire towards you. I spot her twice more before she’s trapped.
The supply cupboard door slams spontaneously shut. Before the firey barrier behind you burns entirely out you throw it open, step forward, and inhale…
… I don’t see anything clear, but sweet clean air twists and morphs like it’s fighting back. You keep inhaling, like your lungs are bottomless pits. Yes, the clear squall is shrinking as you pull it into your being.
I realise my hands are shaking. It might be my imagination, but I think I hear a high-pitched scream at the edge of hearing, growing more distant…
You snap your jaws shut and hold your breath. Stock still, you look like a statue. I stare for a minute while you do your work; then, slowly, you let out the held breath.
The screaming is gone. This place is silent.. White streamers of exhausted smoke float upwards, undisturbed by strange gusts.
“It’s done?” I ask, strangely hopeful.
“I’ve got her,” you confirm, now perfectly relaxed.
“Thank you, Raven. Thank you thank you thank you.”
“It’s just a meal.” I think maybe you’re bashful about my earnest gratitude. “You’ve watched me eat hundreds of times before.”
I smile, broad and bright in this gloomy place. “This is special. You took my mistake, something ugly, and you made it holy.”
That gets a snort of laughter out of you, but I’m not offended. “Sure. Holy. She tickles, you know. She’s not stopped trying to escape since the fire, and she’s still trying now.” You touch low on your chest deliberately.
“She won’t escape, though, will she?” I kneel before you to put my hand on the generous curve of your belly, looking directly at the place you’re rubbing.
“No. She would have left this place eventually. Gone wherever. But she won’t leave here. Not till I’m done with her.”
I kiss your belly reverently. There are tears in my eyes.