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Time stood still as I froze in place. I kept waiting for her to open her eyes and laugh at me. Telling me that her new bath salts gave the water its pink tint. Some had splashed out, and the pool grew from her dripping fingers wasn’t a big deal. My legs shook as I slowly took a step toward her. My heart was pounding against my chest, and I thought it would break my chest plate for a moment. As I came around to face her, my eyes closed to try and buy myself another moment of false hope. My mind screamed that I already knew what I would see, but my heart refused to believe it. The second my eyes opened, I screamed as my legs gave out. Her empty eyes stared back at me. I gripped the side of the tub and pulled myself towards her. Blood soaked instantly into my jeans.
“Baby, come on, baby, look at me,” I pleaded as tears ran down my cheeks.
I reached out to touch her, to try and wake her up, but the second my hand made contact with her cheek, it snapped back at how cold her skin felt. She was gone. I looked down at her wrists, and it brought a deep pain radiating throughout my body. Each one had a single deep cut going down her arm. Her head suddenly turned and her dead eyes were glazed over as she looked at me.
“Why did you do this to me?” she asked, blood dripping from her mouth.
A sharp breath filled my lungs as I shot up in my bed. The cold sweat that clung to my shaking skin was not foreign. I wished this had been the first time I had that nightmare and seen the horror again. But it wasn't. I’ve had to relive that night more times than I could count over the past four years. Sometimes, it would end with me finding her, while other times, she would blame me or beg me to get her justice. I knew that grief could linger, and it could take a long time to finally disappear. Just like I knew that I would never truly be over Alexis.
She will always have a special place in my heart. She was the first woman I had ever truly loved. She was the woman I wanted to marry and, most importantly, the woman who would be the mother to my child. A loss like that would never go away, but I had been hoping it wouldn’t continue to hurt this badly.
Tossing the covers back, I got out of bed and threw on some pajamas before I went down the hallways and the stairs. I needed to get some fresh air. I knew there was no hope of me getting any more sleep tonight. I never could when I dreamt of Alexis. I wouldn’t have minded the dreams if they were of all the good memories we shared together.
I hated that her death had overshadowed all our shared joy and love. Now, whenever I try to think of her, all I saw was her pain. The pain that I couldn’t see when she was alive. I had been so blind to it all. I knew she was struggling, but she was smiling and looking forward to the future. Looking back, I should have seen the signs. I should have noticed that she was hiding so much pain. I thought we were working through her trauma together, but I hadn’t done enough.
I looked at the stars sprinkled all across the dark night sky. One of the few things I remembered from my Mama was her belief that every star in the sky was the soul of the dead. When someone dies, a new star is created from their soul and energy left by their body. After her death, I used to spend hours staring up at the sky, trying to figure out what star was her. Every night, I would keep a mental map of where the previous stars were to see which ones were new, but over the years, I couldn’t seem to keep up that belief.
Now more than ever, I wished I could believe again. I wished I could look up at the sky and know that Alexis was up there and at peace. I didn’t know what came after death, but I had long since stopped believing in Heaven or Hell. I’d seen too much to have any sort of belief that there was justice in the afterlife. There was no justice here, so why should death be any different?
I didn’t know how long I sat here on the back steps before the door opened. I looked over to see Natalie making her way toward me. She looked amazing in her shorts and tank top. I hadn’t expected to have sex with her again, but when the offer to join her in the shower was presented, I couldn’t turn it down. This was a dangerous game I was playing - that we were both playing.
I didn’t doubt for a second that Natalie wasn’t trying to devise a plan to make her escape. I knew she was trying to get me to let my walls down so she could slip out. That would never happen, and it only put more pressure on me to kill Dom. I had to get him before she tried to sneak out one night.
Normally, I would never think that any of the girls would be able to pull it off, but Natalie wasn’t like the other girls here. She had something deep to fight for and wasn’t some weak, delicate flower. There was a fire within her, and she was going to need it if she was going to get through all of this.
“What are you doing up?” I asked because she should be resting. She needed as much sleep as she could get.
“I woke up an hour ago, not feeling too great. I thought some fresh air might help,” she answered as she went and sat down on the step by me. We weren’t right beside each other, but close enough that if I shifted just slightly, my thigh would press up against hers.
“Morning sickness?” I asked, worried that something else might be wrong.
“That saying is completely misleading. I can feel terrible at any given point in the day. I blame the nap. I might have been able to sleep through the night if I hadn’t had it.”
I noticed that she had been getting more tired throughout the day. She had been sleeping a lot, but she was moving around and eating when she wasn't. I knew it was common for women to be sick for a good chunk of their pregnancy, especially during the first trimester, but that didn’t make me worry any less for her.
“Anything I can do to help?” I didn’t know what I could do to help, but I was more than willing to do anything for Natalie.
“I just have to wait it out. Hopefully, things get easier in the next trimester.” I could hear that she didn’t truly believe that, though. She knew better than I did that the stress from her situation could make her sicker and put her and the baby at risk. “Why are you awake? I didn’t wear you out enough today?” she asked, with a slight smirk.
The shower sex had been a great workout and I would be happy to experience again. “You got my heart rate up. Came out for some fresh air.”
“You just randomly decided to get some fresh air at three in the morning?” she asked, skeptical and clearly not believing me.
I let out a soft sigh. Natalie already knew about Alexis, but I didn’t know if I wanted her to know that I still have nightmares over it. Nightmares were a weakness I had been groomed to hide from a very young age. Weaknesses were never allowed to be seen by anyone. At the same time, she had been vulnerable with me, and I was trying to earn some form of trust with her. I knew I would never achieve all of her trust, but if I could get something that might be what keeps her in line so I can have the time to kill Dom.
“Once or twice a week, I have the same nightmare about finding Alexis. It’s always the same. I find her in the bath. She’s already dead and when I get to her, she looks at me and asks me why. That part changes; sometimes, why did I not help her? Why did I let him hurt her? Why did I kill her? It always changes and I can never get back to sleep afterwards.”
“I’m sorry. I couldn’t imagine finding someone I loved and wanted to spend the rest of my life with dead. It never should have happened to her,” she said with true sympathy.
“She had a lot of demons, but she had a beautiful soul. She didn’t deserve anything that happened to her. I was naive and foolish to think she would recover from what happened. I got her out of the trafficking ring, but she never got free.”
I felt the tears building in my eyes and fought to keep them at bay. There wasn’t much to make me cry, but Alexis still had the power to bring me to my knees. She reached over and placed a hand on my knee as she spoke.
“No one deserves to go through that horror. I’m sorry she had to, and I’m sorry that you lost her. That you lost both of them. I have never gone through what she had, but there is no going back after you experience a trauma like that. You will never be the same again and unfortunately, you either learn to live with who you are now and fight to stay healthy or lose yourself to the demons. You couldn’t have known that she was considering ending her life. When people are in that much pain, they are very good at hiding it. You didn’t miss any signs because she didn’t want you to see them. I’m sure you did everything that you could to help her.”
I thought I did, but obviously I didn’t, because she was still dead and I was left to try and pick up the pieces. I felt a tear roll down my cheek before Natalie wiped it away. I covered her hand on my knee and took a few shaky breaths. I had to try and get myself calmed back down. The last thing she needed was me falling apart. She had enough on her plate.
“You, um,” I cleared my throat before continuing, “You should go back to bed and sleep. You need all the rest you can get.”
