"One Too Many Days"

His fist felt heavier on the second back swing, for the blood across his knuckles. Maybe it was. He planted it again at the bridge of her nose, a snap coming in tandem with the inevitable caving in of cartilage. Her frantic words had deteriorated to screams and in turn to gargles, she was swallowing blood. Her eyes were glazed and no longer finding focus... his, never so wide.

*

He stirred, feeling his arm lying across her curvaceous body. He was almost comfortable, except for that rough feeling you get only after the worst of dreams. He ventured to open his eyes. Slowly and tiredly, he hoped he would see his wife sighing in her sleep, her blonde hair billowing upon their pillows and her overly-comfortable nightgown draped over her small frame. She felt different to him…

And the dream had started out so well;

He’d woken up and flown through an average day of scouring the internet when he should have been working, and taking far too many breaks. It seemed so real, so mundane.

Then, as he got into his car, he now remembered feeling as though he’d lost many hours of that ‘day’. Now awake, he reasoned that that was fine – it was a dream afterall. He could have skipped days and it wouldn’t have been more than seconds in reality. He found himself easing a little.

He’d been stuck in traffic, which he vividly remembered. Even now, though it was fiction to him, he felt his heart start to race with pure road rage… but he was in bed. He was holding his wife… His oddly rigid wife…

He’d watched the traffic lights flick from green to amber to red to amber to green, over and over. It had enraged him to see them change but get no nearer. He was stuck. It was such a trapped feeling that he remembered wishing he’d driven off into the sea, just for some personal space.

One word popped to mind that almost made him smile – Freud. What could this dream mean? It was the first time he’d dreamed in months. It had to be…

He was running out of petrol, and patience had long since gone. His hands throttled the steering wheel. A sharp fear hit him between the eyes, accompanied by awful images. Images from later in the dream…

He finally made it to the petrol station and the decrepit old oaf behind the counter only made his heart race more and his anger build. He didn’t want to even attempt appeasing his hunger there to be served by that man. He’d go to the corner shop on the way home…

And so suddenly he found himself there that he finally felt convinced it had all been a dream. He let out a slow sigh and nestled into the woman by his side, momentarily forgetting that he wanted to open his eyes to see her. She smelt different – a kind of nice different.

The corner shop was cold and cramped as usual. Being run by two older women, taking it in turns, the shop easily undercut everywhere else for price. No one cared that the two old biddies opened multipacks of everything and sold them separately to get their small margin. It was fine. They had a good business going, but one lady still had to live in the shoddy apartment upstairs.

With barely enough room to move, he remembered wanting some crisps, but as he reached them, fingering their crumpling packets, he decided that it would drive him insane. He turned to the fridge for a drink.

“You alright there, love? Looking for anything in particular?”

“I’m fine, thank you,” he gritted his teeth.

He heard her smile, which just made him feel worse. He didn’t know how much more he could take. Wasn’t it enough that this happened every single day, grinding into his mind, wearing down his constitution, making him a batty old man before his time? Now he had to endure it in his sleep too? What did he do to deserve this?

He squeezed her body closer to him, wanting her warmth, but finding none. At the same time, he squeezed his eyes tighter, making it darker, but scarlet images flash brighter… He would get to those in a moment, his subconscious droned, throwing him back to the counter of the shop.

“Yeah, she’s fine,” he forced himself to answer.

“And how’s-”

He hadn’t heard the rest of the question. She’d already asked enough questions for him to lose sight of what he was doing. Enough questions for him to lose what little patience he had left. Enough questions for him to want to scream…“ENOUGH!”

The lady jumped, startled into silence. Normally he would have mumbled an apology, but it had gone too far this time. He’d lost himself.

The woman’s heart throbbed in her chest, her breathing disjointed as she tumbled backwards into the shelves of chocolate and sweets. The cigarettes tumbled into messy piles at her feet and she sobbed loudly. He didn’t know he was jumping over the counter until he landed with a thud.

“What’re you doing?!” the woman whimpered, her throat compressed by a large, now purple hand. All the blood in his body now pulsed with releasing rage. He made no answer.

She could no longer stand. It wasn’t long before she slumped into the corner, hidden from view, the night closing in over them as he planted the first heavy blow upon her skull, followed closely by his other hand. The first took aim again.

His fist felt heavier on the second back swing, for the blood across his knuckles. Maybe it was. He planted it again at the bridge of her nose, a snap coming in tandem with the inevitable caving in of cartilage. Her frantic words had deteriorated to screams and in turn to gargles, she was swallowing blood. Her eyes were glazed and no longer finding focus... his, never so wide.

And that’s where he’d woken. He had no more to remember. All he knew now was that his head was throbbing and his heart was in his throat. He felt inexplicably awful as he kissed the temple of his wife and slowly opened his eyes.

Breathing heavily, he huffed hair from his face and blinked. It was dark. Why was that a surprise?

He shivered a little and felt, for the first time, that he was uncomfortable. He was lying on something hard.

He blinked again. What he saw made his heart stop. There was blood dripping silently onto the floor between himself and the woman. Not his wife, but the shopkeeper. Images flashed before his eyes, but none more disturbing than this.

He threw himself off her, turned around and immediately vomited onto the wooden floor behind him. All thoughts of hunger drained from him in an instant. He wanted to die.

Death… It now took a whole new light in his mind. He sprang to his feet, feeling like he would just collapse back to the floor, he tumbled to the door of the shop. The day had lost all light, so he must have been unconscious for many minutes. He didn’t even care that someone might have already seen them. All he could think of now was; what do I do? I can’t be caught here like this.

He locked the door and left the light off. ‘Good’, he mumbled, ‘looks like we’re closed.’

He would never have imagined doing this… what the hell was he thinking? But he wasn’t himself. He wasn't thinking.

He closed the single curtain and, trying his best not to look at her he took her limp arms and dragged her to the door that joined the shop and the apartment together.

He found himself at the opening of the bathroom door, so, having read it somewhere, he dragged her in.

Struggling to get her in the bath, he found a knife.

Soon enough, after cutting and tearing bones, skin, muscle and soul apart in the flowing water, he wiped his brow. He couldn’t remember what had happened next in that story, or even what story it was.

He cried over the body.

He didn’t know what to do next… Then a sudden knock came at the door… It was over.

No time for the tell-tale heart. It was over.