Irikuri (Formerly known as "LOCA")

32- ọgbọn meji

I don't know how long I sat on the blood-soaked sand, tears dripping onto Ximenes Asier Moreno's now cold body. The sun was setting, my voice was hoarse, and I could taste the salt on my tongue. I still couldn't stop crying. I wasn't sure if it was just Ximenes or the fact that it was finally over and every emotion I had suppressed for months was crashing back. Bloody faces flashed in my mind as I produced shoulder shaking, hiccup inducing, sobs that wracked through my entire body. This is how Ade found me. The sound of his footsteps brought me out of my trance and as I looked at him I wondered if I was hallucinating. He ran towards me but I didn't move an inch. I just blinked at him trying to determine if he was a figment of my imagination. He crouched down and I decided I didn't care if he was real or not, I jumped into his arms, knocking him over, and wrapped my arms around his neck. He didn't ask any questions when I kept crying into his shoulder. He didn't ask about the blood, or the body, he just waited for me to cry myself out, and soon I felt tears that weren't mine splash on my shoulders as well. He started silently, then his shoulders began to shake too and I looked up into his bloodshot eyes. I wiped the tears from his cheeks with my palms, slightly annoyed that his skin remained clear, brown, and smooth while all the stress had shot mine to hell with acne I hadn't had since eighth grade. Eventually, I stopped crying, but he didn't. I let his head rest in my lap and ran my fingers over his hair. When he stopped, I looked down at him and smiled weakly. He smiled back. He didn't know the difference it made, but I needed that smile. His dimples and white teeth may have annoyed me before, but after wondering if I'd never see them again, they gave me life. I bent and kissed his temple.

"I missed you." I sniffed "And I love you."

"I love you more. Are you okay? I know it's a stupid question-"

"I'm fine, as you can see" I gestured to the body "he was torturing you, wasn't he?"

"Not much until this morning. He was starving me, yes, but I don't think it's been more than a week. He would just come and taunt me with hot food then eat it in front of my face while he talked about how you were with him now and y'all were gonna live happily ever after and I was going to rot in that cell. I didn't respond, till this morning, when he said he was going to fuck your brains out and I started laughing-"

"Bitch-"

"Don't cap, that shit was hilarious because he meant consensually. He expected me to believe, that after a couple of days, you'd fuck him - a human trafficker- consensually. That's the definition of fucking delusional. I told him 'good luck with that' and well I'm assuming you can tell what happened."

My eyes focused on his face and I jumped. I was so happy to see him that I didn't realize he was battered. He had bruises all over. He was shirtless, and with the bruises around his ribcage, I wouldn't be surprised if he had a couple of broken ribs. His wrists were raw from struggling against some type of restraints. He had a black eye, and his full lips looked like they just stopped bleeding. His prominent wide nose was now crooked. It was worse than I could ever describe. All I can say is he looked like he had gotten the shit beaten out of him. I didn't realize I was crying again until he started wiping my tears.

"He came home....covered in blood. " I started tearfully " I don't know why, or how. But I could tell it was yours...I could just tell. It made sense logically but that's not what made me realize. I could just tell. I-I got so mad. I realized if he was torturing you that meant you were here, and alive. He told me you were dead. I started screaming at him. I asked him where you were and he wouldn't tell me. So, I ran out the door. But then he caught up to me and grabbed me so I slapped him and he choked me. I... I'm so sorry I- I wasn't thinking I just wanted it to be over and everything went red and I attacked him - or I guess we fought and I won? I don't know either way by the time I realized what was happening a knife was stuck in his chest, and he...he was..." At this point my voice was probably unintelligible through my hysteria, speeding up with every word but still, Ade listened. "He was dead."

I couldn't look at Ade. My heart pounded and I looked at my clammy palms but he brought my face to look at him.

"I love you, always, and regardless of anything and everything. I will never judge you for this. Now what we have to do is erase all the evidence. Is there anything flammable in the house?"

"Yes. But wait, first how did you even get here?" I blinked the tears out of my eyes.

"When he started hitting me I was restrained, obviously, or his ass would've been dead a while ago. But the beating loosened my restraints. I pulled on it as hard as I could at the right angle and eventually it gave away, then I picked the lock on the other one with my free hand. The restraints weren't meant to be long term and it seems like he wasn't expecting to hurt me. He's more of a psychological torturer. He told me the second you gave it up he'd move me to the basement of the house to listen. Clearly, that never happened. I knew that none of the islands Ximenes bought exceeded a certain size which meant even if you were on the opposite side of the island I must've been less than a mile away. When I got free I just chose a direction, followed it, and there you were." He pulled me up and we walked to the house, dragging Asier with us and dropping him in the kitchen. The goal was to create a gas leak and make it look like the second he lit a match everything exploded. As we cleaned up, I gave Ade even more detail about my time in the house than I'm giving you, but I never told him Asier loved him, or that he was trying to change. Part of me felt like he'd see the sympathy in my eyes and be annoyed - but maybe another part of me felt it made my crime unforgivable, and for some reason, I desperately needed to be forgiven by him. Deep down, I think the reason was I felt I owed it to Asier to keep his last words between us, even if I didn't want to admit I cared about what I owed to him. We both took showers before changing and decided to find a way out before we burned down our only shelter. We began walking and finally, we reached the helicopter we had arrived in. It seemed Ximenes killed everyone that helped him escape, including the pilot so there would be no one to snitch on him. It also meant there would be no one to testify that we were ever there. It meant I could get away with it, completely, and no one would know a thing. It also meant, if we couldn't get the helicopter up and running, we were stuck here with no way out. Ade finished inspecting the plane and reported back to me.

"It looks like there's quite a bit of fuel. I have a good idea which of Ximenes' islands we're on, but if I'm wrong we could run out of fuel before finding land."

"First things first, do you know how to fly a helicopter?"

"I have a good idea how. I thought I wanted to be a pilot at one point so I did some of the teen programs. I've flown a small plane before, but no helicopters of this size."

"Look, either we stay here, away from everyone else we love, or we take a risk. We've survived this much."

"We have, but there's no rule saying this won't be the thing to kill us."

"Can I be honest?"

"Always."

"I'm just exhausted. I can't...I can't do it anymore. Whether I get home and it's over, or I die and it's over, I don't care anymore. I just want it to be over."