ihavebeenfloated

Here’s a little bit of a story I’m working on, this is an extremely small piece and all I wrote in about twenty minutes. I don’t find anything wrong with posting it because the story has been discussed with so many people, in so many ways, posting a bit of it here wont hurt it in any way. The working title for the story is *XXXX XXXX: A Tale of Unrelenting Tragedy”. X’s define a part of the story as of yet undetermined or not yet avaliable for viewing.

Emily lay on the bed on her side, watching the stream of images from the television screen wash the wall in front of her in undulating colors. When her head clears up enough to realize that a significant amount of time has passed from his exit into the bathroom, she gets up. She knocks on the door a few times, calling out his name.

“Jack?”

…

“Jack? Are you still in there?”

…

“Jack, I’m sorry, OK? I didn’t mean any of it. Fuck, I don’t even know what the hell we were screaming about, now. Can you please open the door?”

…

She tries the doorknob, but it’s locked from the inside.

…

“Jack?”

…

Silence.

…

“Jack!” She pounds on the door. “Jack!?”

…

Silence.

…

Five minutes pass, and Emily walks away. She grabs a small flathead screwdriver out of Jack’s toolbox, and returns to the bathroom door. Sliding it into the tiny little hole of the knob, she twists it and hears the click telling her the lock is disengaged. She pushes the door open a little, calling out his name for the last time before allowing the door to swing open the rest of the way.

That’s when Emily starts screaming.

XXXXXXX XX

Emily would later recount the way his body looked, slumped up against the far wall of the bathroom, one arm dangling loosely over the lid of the toilet, to many therapists, psychiatrists, psychics, new age healing gurus, and various boyfriends over the years proceeding it.

The blood that drained from him was everywhere, pooling on the floor, slowly dripping off the edge of the toilet bowl and mixing with the blue water inside. Deep crimson lines ran from the bottom of his hands to the ends of his elbows, the skin nearly hanging off his arms in places.

The medical examiner would note the complete lack of hesitation cuts was highly unusual for suicide, but not unheard of. He’d fail to mention, however, that he’d never seen a suicide so thoroughly executed. In fact, it seemed as if Jack had gone to the trouble to actually lift his veins out of his arms and split them down the middle.

Emily’s memory of the event ends there. She doesn’t even remember the screaming which would bring the people in the neighboring apartments to her. The police reports would contain similar testimonies from six other people in the same building, describing how the girl’s screaming continued on for nearly twenty minutes before any of them headed up to her apartment door and started banging. Eventually the largest of the neighbors, Jonathan Truant, would have to body slam the door open due to the pleas of the others.

Two of the neighbors stood just outside the front door, just as a precaution. One ran back to their apartment to call the police. Two others ventured inside, staying close behind Jonathan, the first to head in. He wound his way through the living room, down the hallway, into the bedroom, and finally came to the doorway of the bathroom.

Jonathan’s testimony to the police would be the most detailed, and thus the most useful to the investigation. He would explain the scene as follows,

“Well, the first thing I noticed was all the blood. Shit, there was so much blood everywhere. So much that I couldn’t tell if it was coming from Emily or Jack, they were both covered in it, tangled up in each other. She just kept screaming, staring down at him, didn’t even seem to notice me standing in the door. I said her name, but she was somewhere else, or something. She had the blood caked in her hair, just absolutely soaked in her hair. He wasn’t moving, so I assumed the blood was coming from him. I asked her if she was hurt, but there was nothing. The other two who came in behind me had ran out, already, at this point.

“I kneeled down beside her and grabbed her from her armpits and started to drag her out, screaming the whole way. I yelled back for someone to grab him, but they were all gone at this point, I think. I heard the sirens coming, so I dragged her as far as the living room and headed back into the bathroom. I touched his neck and it was cold, no pulse either, but I figured that much as the bits of him that weren’t covered in blood were pale and blue, he looked like a goddamn fish. I stepped out of there, knowing there was no use in dragging him out of there. I went back over to Emily and she just kept sitting there, screaming away. Finally you guys showed up, and my part of it was done. I’ll never forget all that blood; I didn’t think there was that much blood in a person, Jesus.”