Demon Stories

Cheol: Cabbage Rose, 1880, England

Cheol

Cabbage Rose

1880, England

She has gone. She has taken the things from her room and there is no trace left of her. 

"It was your fault!" she had screamed at me the night before. "Your fault he died, murdered! You just stood there and let them...you just stood!" 

In her screaming, she had fallen to the floor in her grief, holding her head. I had wanted to hold her, but how could I? She wanted no part of me. Yet my heart yearned, burned to hold her and comfort her. I did not care that she was mad at me, I just wanted her to be comforted.

"How dare you," she wailed, crumbled on the floor, "how dare you!"

"...We can not interfere with human lives. He was meant to die that way. We are demons. We can't--" I began, but her face looked at me like the devil if I ever saw one.

"Screw you and all demons," she had growled then, her voice slithering down my spine like ice. 

I stood now in her empty room. It looked too large now, nothing on the walls, not even the bed left. What had she done with that bed, the one we had spent many mornings spending company together in? 

My heart jarred as it remembered the touch of her soft fingers, so soft and well cared for. A feeling of unease spread up my arms, a creeping feeling knowing I would never feel those fingers in my hands again. 

This morning, as I had joined the others in the guesthouse for breakfast, there was no talk of her. The humans had acted like she had never existed, never came into their lives. It was very eerie though I knew it would happen based on our demon way. I tried to listen to their conversation about their fallen friend unbiased. They had no idea I had been there that night. There was brief talk about what they would do now. The man who had been murdered had been  the owner of this house, afterall. 

"What will you do?" they had wanted to know of me. "Where will you go?"

I did not have an answer for them, and I did not care if they knew.

Now in her empty room, there was not even a memory of her on the walls and I was crumbling. Where had she gone? Where was she now? If only she had told them...but I knew in my heart whatever she would have told them would have been a lie. They would not have remembered anyway. There was no way possible for me to know. 

I found myself touching the carved English roses on the doorframe. She had liked this room because of these English roses, because she was the Red Rose. Her long red hair, the pink blush blooming on her face. Her red lips, like a rose bud on her face. Her milky white skin, soft like the petals of a rare white cabbage rose. She looked like a rose. 

I heard something dripping, and looked down. Blood. I knelt down, and wondered how it got there. Where...? But then I felt the warm on my face. Touching my cheek and looking at my fingertips, I realized the blood was my tears. I stared at my fingertips for many minutes, unable to comprehend.

She had always complained how cold I was, never showing much emotion. 

Was this enough emotion for her? These tears.

There came more, until the floor next to the doorframe was speckled in crimson color. I'll cry for him, I thought, my thoughts flooding me now. I'll cry for him, just come back. I'll show you how sad I am about him. How I wished I could have helped him. Come back. Just come back.

But I knew in my heart it was not enough. She would never forgive me, and now she was gone, out in the world for me never to find. She did not want me to find her. She did not want me.

Covering my face in my hands, I sat in a corner of the room and just wept. Wept like I had not wept in my life. 

Just come back, I thought over and over, just come back. I am sorry.