Bound for Nirvana

by Kendra Leigh

  I awoke to the sound of my own voice piercing the air with a spine-chilling scream, my arms and legs thrashing wildly in the air, using more energy than my body could afford. Tears coursed down my face, melding with the sweat which drenched me from head to toe. The stench of vomit clung to my hair and face from throwing up in my sleep.

  Why wasn’t I dead?

  My body was depleted, my bones and heart heavy and aching from decaying desolation. Somehow, I dragged myself to the bathroom and turned on the shower. Then, stripping out of my clothes, I stepped under the steaming hot spray. The water cascaded over my fevered skin which seemed to cling to my gaunt and wasting frame. Evil and ugliness had saturated my soul and broken through to the surface of my skin. I could no longer hide my shame under the fake exterior of a beautiful body. I took the soap and began to wash, but no amount of scented sanitizer could cleanse away the foul stink of my own self-loathing.

  Exhausted from trying, I slid down the shower wall and sank to the floor, the powerful rush of the water drowning out the raw, strangled sound of my abandoned keening.

  When I finally gained the strength to move, I emerged and after drying off found some old sweats of Alisha’s in a drawer, pulling them over my weary bones. As I brushed my teeth with the spare I always carried in my backpack, I gazed at the unfamiliar woman in the mirror. Her face was alabaster pale, her cheeks sunken and dark, haunted circles surrounded red-rimmed eyes.

  I found myself wondering what Ethan would say if he saw my neglected state. And with the sound of his voice in my head came the desperate longing to see his beautiful face. I yearned for the feel of his skin against mine, the warmth of his breath on my face. And deep down in my soul, I knew that without him, my heart would no longer beat.

  Until I met Ethan, I’d always imagined that Hell would be my final destination. But when he came into my life and I finally began to face my demons, I began to believe that maybe I was living life in a purgatorial state and that one day I would be granted absolution and my sins would be forgiven. That’s when I took my first breath. I began to imagine a celestial peace for my soul and that when my demons were finally silenced, I would reach my nirvana.

  Now that would never be possible, because my sins were more evil than I could have ever imagined. When I look back now, it seems so obvious. The connection we had, the way we were drawn to each other. He was part of me. Part of my soul, part of my flesh—part of my blood. My sin was the simple act of falling in love. But it was a love that was immoral—forbidden. And it was a sin I would never—could never—atone for. So it seemed I was right all along, my destiny had been decided. I would always be bound for hell.

  And right now—I welcomed it.

  Pulling a blanket around my shoulders, I grabbed my backpack and slowly made my way outside. The sun was only just rising in the sky, the only evidence that I was witnessing the birth of a new day. An icy wind whipped across the gardens from the ocean, the salty sea air beckoning me with a claw-like finger.

  It was all very different now to how I’d remembered it on Claudia’s wedding day: the warm sun on my face, the place buzzing with the sound of clinking glasses and laughter; my heart missing a thousand beats when I laid eyes on Ethan, watching from a distance as he strutted around wearing his seductive charm like a second skin. Now it felt cold and abandoned—desolate.

  Mustering all my energy, I made my way across the lawn and through the iron gate. Cautiously, I descended the wooden steps to the beach, the image of Ethan with his arms snaked around my waist at the end of the jetty flashing through my mind. The feel of his warm, velvet kiss on my lips and the safety of his strong arms was as real as if he were there, and the memory almost brought me to my knees with grief. I closed my eyes to the pain and swiftly blinked it away.

  The rain must have fallen heavily in the night because the expanse of sand wasn’t soft and rippled like it had been that day, but instead was a smooth, even layer with a firm, crunchy texture. As I walked across the beach, my bare feet rupturing the surface, I noticed my footsteps were the only ones to violate this otherwise intact carpet of sand. Other than the raucous cry of the seagulls and the crashing of the waves, my labored breathing was the only sound to infringe on the peace. I was a trespasser in this world—an interloper.

  My inadequate energy supply had depleted rapidly, I could walk no further. Turning to face the ocean, I pulled the blanket tightly around me and sank down into the sand.

  The ocean seemed perplexed by my presence, the waves rushing forward suspiciously and crashing against the shore in a portentous demand to know what I wanted. I shivered as loneliness folded around me like a heavy cloak, enveloping my heart in its icy clutch. But I embraced it readily, the familiarity of it almost comforting, because I knew it so well.

  Glancing over my shoulder, I looked back at the beach and the path I’d taken, the single set of footprints almost an ironic representation of my life—like they were mocking the fact that, like most of my life’s journeys, I’d taken this journey alone.

  For a few moments, I allowed my thoughts to wonder about how it might have been if I’d grown up with Ethan—mindful of the true nature of our relationship. I’d have felt protected, cherished, loved. It would have been a different love, but wonderful, and special, and everything it should have been.

  But I didn’t just love him. I was in love with him. With every breath and every fiber and every cell in my body, I was in love with him. And I would never—not ever—apologize for that.

  But I couldn’t live with it.

  Fumbling with haste, I pulled a notepad and pen from my backpack and scribbled down the words in my head, each flick of the pen eating away at my heart and my last remaining drizzles of energy. When I was done, I tore the page from the book and shoved it into the pocket of the sweatpants.

  The freezing cold air stole the breath from my lungs as I undressed, and leaving the pile of borrowed clothes in a heap on the sand, I made my way to the inquisitive ocean. The wind lashed at me as my feet entered into the icy water, each gust like the stinging, brutal snap of a thrashing whip. This beating would be life’s final punishment—my last penance before I was plunged into bottomless perdition.

  I was ready to satisfy the ocean’s curiosity.

  And I was ready to take my place in Hell.

  Terror consumed my soul as the freezing water rose to cover my body, squeezing the last breath from my lungs, the last beat from my heart.

  Breathe! Breathe!

  I breathed in, inhaling the freezing salty water into my lungs, the ocean opening up and swallowing me. The silence engulfed me as my mind and body began shutting down, and I surrendered to my fate.

  Searching for my peace.

  “Gonna kiss you if I catch you,” Ethan threatened as he chased me around the tree giggling. His face was marred with mucky smudges, his honey-blond hair tousled from the wind.

  “Eww, no you’re not—won’t let you.” I let out a puerile scream and ran to the next tree, taking refuge as I used it as a barrier to catch my breath.

  “I’ll give you ’till the count of three, then I’m coming.” His wicked grin revealed the gap where his baby teeth were making way for new ones. The Tooth Fairy had left him a dollar which he’d promised to share with me.

  Thrilled by the threat of a chase, I made a face, scrunching my nose and pulling my tongue out before running off as fast as my feet would carry me.

  Behind me, I could hear his voice getting further away as he counted, “One—Two—Thwee!”

  I held my tummy as I started to giggle at the imperfect lisp in his speech caused by the missing tooth.

  “Angel, watch out!”Ethan suddenly shouted.

  It’s a trick, keep running.

  “Angel!”

  His voice sounded peculiar, earnest, so I stole a glimpse over my shoulder, my eyes widening as they fixed on the shape of two slobbering, spotted dogs hurtling toward me. Suddenly, the world seemed to collapse on my back, the ground risin
g up to meet me. My knee took the impact, the excruciating pain rippling through my tiny body. I screamed as the claws dug into my back, turning in vain to push the frenzied animal away.

  It crouched on it haunches, its forelegs on my shoulders pinning me to the ground as it licked my face greedily, its tail wagging manically with fervent pleasure.

  A man’s voice scolded the animal as it was pulled from my body, and suddenly I was folded into my mommy’s arms. I sobbed into her neck as Ethan looked on, his lower lip trembling, face etched with concern.

  “You’re okay, honey, I’ve got you. It’s going to be okay.” Mommy’s voice was soothing, reassuring, her arms warm and safe as she held me tightly. The familiar scent of honeysuckle and jasmine filled my nostrils and the tears began to subside. Wiping a sleeve over my runny nose, I gazed over Mommy’s shoulder at Ethan.

  “You okay, Angel?” His lip twitched into a cautious smile.

  I nodded, splaying my fingers in front of my face and peeking through the gap. I didn’t want him to think I was a baby.

  “I want E,” I said to Mommy, watching as his face broke into the widest grin, his chest puffing out with pride.

  “Okay, honey. Let me just take a look at your knee. I think you might need a Band Aid.”

  “I can do it! Please let me do it. I want to make Angel better,” Ethan shouted, beside himself with eagerness.

  “Please, Mommy. Can Ethan do it?”

  He tried hard, but he just couldn’t get it to stick, and his face grew redder with each failed attempt. I began to giggle, but Ethan glared at me, his countenance a blanket of hurt feelings.

  “It doesn’t matter, silly.” I threw my arms around his neck and squeezed him until he pretended to faint. “Look…” I stuck my leg out to show him “…it’s mended now, anyway. It doesn’t even hurt.”

  “Time to go, honey.” Mommy was calling me.

  Ethan’s eyes filled with panic, his hand reaching out to clasp mine tightly.

  “I don’t want you to go, Angel. Please don’t leave me.”

  I squeezed his hand, reciprocating the silent declaration of love. “I have to, E. It’s time. Mommy’s calling.”

  Kissing him chastely on the cheek, I turned to Momma, her hair billowing in the wind, an aura of bright radiant light banded around her.

  “Angel?” Her voice was distant, flimsy as it resonated in the air toward me.

  Turning, I ran toward her, reaching for her outstretched hand, an overwhelming sense of peace and safety washing over me like a warm, comforting blanket.

  Before I left, I turned to catch one last glimpse of my love, my lips gently mouthing the words: I will always love you.

  Ethan fell to his knees, the tears of abandonment and heartbreak streaming down his cheeks, and the desolate keening of his mournful cry fading on the breeze…

  Chapter Fifteen

  Ethan

  Five days it took to find her. Five endless, mind-fucking, gut-wrenching days…

  When I saw the Volvo parked in the driveway out front of the Miller’s house, it was the first time rays of hope had shined through the dark doom of dread that had shadowed my world. It hadn’t lasted long. The house being unquestionably deserted and locked-up saw to that. Mom and Dad searched around for a way in, frantically calling her name, but something drew me around back to the pool house.

  The place was a mess, the air dank and fetid with hopelessness, but devastatingly empty. With no sign of Angel in sight, I ran out into the garden, hands fisting into my hair as I spun around, my eyes scanning in search of her whilst I helplessly screamed out her name.

  That’s when I saw the gate standing open at the bottom of the garden, and I knew instantly where I would find my Angel. I started running before my mind had even processed, my feet tearing down the path, through the gate, and down the steps to the beach. All the time, my mind recollecting the day I found her submerged under the water in the bath, her words of explanation almost as fucking bizarre to her as they were to me. I was blanking out—finding peace—shutting down. A sign of how difficult it was for her to face the demons that had chased her through life, and the depths she would go to run from them.

  By the time I reached the jetty, my head was so fucked with hope and despair and pure, unadulterated fear, that for a moment, I thought I saw her standing there at the end of the runway, like I had that day—arms outstretched, floaty dress and bare feet, like a fucking angel blown in from the ocean. The vision disappeared like a vapor on the breeze, a fresh influx of panic and misery hitting me like a sucker punch to the gut. Desperately, my eyes scanned the beach to both sides, my breath catching in my throat as suddenly I spotted a set of lone footprints leading through the otherwise unblemished sand. My eyes squinted through the morning mist, following the trail until they fixed on something lying in the sand, maybe sixty or so meters away.

  “Angel! Angel!” I screamed her name at the top of my lungs, the piercing sound getting lost amongst the cries of the gulls and the sound of crashing waves as my legs raced across the beach to the bundled shape. I tried to make it out as I neared it, the contours forming no decipherable shape, the color muted like that of sand… or bare flesh.

  A blanket! A fucking blanket!

  “Noooo! Angel, where are you?” I rifled through the heap with futile hope—a blanket, some sweats… Angel’s backpack.

  I picked up the trail, the direction of the footprints forcing my mind to consider the unthinkable. And then everything became a blur…

  Suddenly there was no other sound than that of my heart, a resounding percussion gradually slowing and fading, until there was nothing but a sequence of uncorrelated vibrations—just white noise.

  Everything moved as if in slow motion, the waves undulating to and fro at an unnaturally sluggish speed, like a hostile predator stalking its prey, slinking deviously back before pouncing forward in their relentless attempts to snatch her from this world.

  My Angel. My fucking Angel!

  I don’t remember the shock of the freezing water as I waded in toward her, because it wasn’t as ice-cold as the blood running though my veins in that moment. Because inside, I was dead. My heart encased in a frozen chamber, unable to breathe, unable to live. I grasped her limp and lifeless body from the clutches of the depraved ocean as my voice finally shattered the window of silence. My piercing scream was a grieving lament, a desolate cry of utter desperation as I cradled my broken angel in my arms and begged her to return.

  I stared down at the tattered piece of paper in my hand, torn at the edges where it had been ripped from the notebook, crumpled from where it had been crushed inside the compact space of a pocket. I knew every dip and curve of the hastily scrawled words—Angel’s delicate, mindless state plainly evident in every letter.

  I read it again, anyway.

  Ethan x

  I don’t know where to start.

  It’s so cold here, E—and empty. It’s dead inside. My soul’s already dead. My heart doesn’t beat.

  My chest moves up and down, but I can’t breathe, can’t think. Don’t want to think.

  Please don’t hate me. I couldn’t bear it in Hell, knowing that you hate me.

  I can’t face this world as anything other than your lover, your wife—I so wanted to be your wife. Can’t live a life in which it feels like I’m constantly dying.

  Loving you was the happiest time of my existence. You taught me how to breathe—laugh—make love.

  You mended by broken soul.

  And, E—if loving you is a sin, then I am Hell’s biggest sinner.

  Forgive me for being weak. But without you, there is no place for me here.

  The Devil has me now—he’s taken my soul. And the darkness and the pain—it’s endless. Unforgiving.

  I have to go now. You see, I just can’t breathe.

  I think maybe the water will help me—and then I won’t be so afraid.

  I’m sorry—so, so sorry.

  I will love you for eternity. I
t’s the choice I make—my soul be damned.

  Your Angel x

  I rubbed my fingers over the growth on my face, swiping at the never-ending tears, cursing myself. It was the fucking pain I couldn’t bear—the pain in her words. The torment and agony in her voice was as if the Devil himself were raking his fingernails through her mind, her soul. A slow, twisted, relentless infliction of suffering, until he’d finally stolen her sanity. Fucking torture.

  One minute, the doctor had said. One lousy fucking minute is what had stood between her dying and living. One red light, one minute’s delay in making a crucial decision, one pointless phone call, one minute hunting for that fucker Sloane, one minute listening to her jerk-off dad spouting his toxic poison.

  Images of her lying face down in the water and then crumpled on the beach, her body broken, skin pale and drained of life, lips gray—the color of death, keep flashing through my mind. I remember the sound of my own suffering as I wailed helplessly, my hands pumping her chest, my mouth closing over those swollen gray lips to breathe the life back into her—wanting the cock-sucking Devil to take mine instead. I recall my father pulling me away, my mom holding me as I rocked with desperation and hopelessness.

  She shouldn’t have spent one of those five days alone—not a single one. I went over it again in my head, what had happened, where I’d gone wrong. Why I hadn’t gotten there sooner to pull her from the depths of her despair.

  At first, I thought she was mad at me for not trusting her. For believing what those pictures of her and that fucker Sloane were trying to fool me into thinking. Thought I’d find her propping the bar up at Paddy’s just to piss me off. That’s where I’d looked for her first.

  When both the gallery and Jia turned out to be dead ends as well, I really started to panic. Jackson scoured Central Park with the boys, and I called Mom and Dad, hoping they’d heard from her—they’d become so close over the last few weeks. I told them all about our meeting with Ernest Schrader and they shot over to Manhattan straight away to help me look.