Christopher
I skimmed the rough pad of my index finger across the smooth, tempered glass. As I did so, the light brown Bourbon swished inside the cup in a slow, calming motion.
"Would you like some, babe?" I slurred, picking up the shot glass and offering it towards the empty bar stool beside me.
My throat burned from the previous shots of alcohol, and my eyesight was blurred, leaving my treacherous imagination to connect the dots from what I could see, to what I thought should be there.
And I could have sworn it was her, sitting on the chair beside me; where she should have been.
She was wearing that sequined, black dress that I absolutely adored to see her in, and loved even more to take off of her. It clung to her curves perfectly, making her look innocent, yet also contradicted otherwise. The dark hair upon her scalp was pulled into a sophisticated bun, in which I knew she spent hours on end, alone in the bathroom, trying to perfect. Her eyes, well... it seems I'm at a loss for words. It's one of those things that no one could ever truly describe with all the words in the world. Even if you tried, and did as best as you possibly could, you would always find yourself downgrading it. Just as I am doing my best to explain what she would look like. Although, you will never understand... until she is there, standing before you; beautifully and perfectly in every way imaginable.
I reached out a lonely palm to touch her, to feel her warm skin upon my own.. which always seemed to remain cold without her touch or welcoming presence. However, my hand felt nothing but the icy air surrounding it, and it went straight through her thigh. Revealing that I was alone all along, speaking to an outrageous figment of my own imagination.
"Ashley?" I asked, not to confirm her absence, for I knew she was long gone. But just because I loved the way her name tasted on my tongue.
Slowly, I began to watch her dissolve into the atmosphere around her, leaving me to desperately grab for any tangible part of her that could be saved.
But she slipped right through my fingertips.
Then, the next thing I knew, she was gone. Causing me to feel even more lonesome, even though I knew all along that she was never here. I'd rather be occupied with a synthetic hallucination of her, then come to the realization that I was alone, sitting by myself, talking to myself.
I grabbed the crystal flask of whiskey and lazily poured a waterfall into my transparent glass, spilling along the way. The liquor dripped onto the granite counter top, but I was far too drunk to care or clean it up. The alcohol burned, leaving a trail of fire down my throat, and I welcomed it. I embraced the horrific feeling, unsure as to why I was doing so, but my mind was too clouded to think deeper into it.
Soon enough, the glass was empty, only for the couple droplets that were lucky enough to stray away from their own oblivion. I smiled, half-heartedly, before forcefully clutching the cup and throwing it harshly towards the tinted grey wall across from where I was currently sitting.
"Fuck!" I screamed to no one in particular, if anyone, it would be directed towards myself. I heard my own booming voice echo inside of the large, isolated mansion, giving the atmosphere an eerie touch.
The shot glass shattered into a firework of a million, tiny pieces once it collided with the wall. It fell to the floor in a transparent heap of debris, a visual representation of the state I currently found myself in. I was, am, and always be a worthless pile of trash, lying silently on the cold, hard floor. Physically, mentally, and spiritually.
I stood up from the velvet cushioned stool, making my way to the somewhat spiraled staircase. The glass pierced the bottoms of my bare feet like daggers as I walked over it. I suppose that my extraordinarily stupid, and overly drunken mind couldn't make the connection that it would be better to actually step over the shards.
Oh well.
A line of burgundy blood trailed directly behind me, leaving rather suspicious-looking, bloody footprints to to stain the dark hardood floor, due to my injured feet. I scaled the grand, marble stair case, and navigated myself though the intricate halls of my own house, stopping in front of a light wash wooden door, decorated with a singular, brass doorknob. While pulling a ring of various keys from my denim jeans, I cringed. They made this constant, annoying jingling sound which made my headache grow even worse.
I decided to ignore the immense, throbbing pain in my head, for just thinking of it drove the ache into a full on acceleration.
With the flick of my wrist, I twisted the reflective, metal object into the gap in the doorknob.
Click.
The barrier was pushed aside to reveal the unknown wonders behind it. The room I had chosen to avoid for such a long time, the room that sat untouched and unoccupied for years, finally met my eyes.
And it was so breathtakingly beautiful.
Every single wall of the room was painted, each with a different, yet equally astounding mural. Even the ceiling was painted, for God's sake.The designs upon the dry wall were so intricate, so complex. It was amazing how this.. this supernova of color, and imagination could be whisked from a single, imaginative mind. How one person could construct such a thing of beauty.
And even as I stood alone, isolated in an old room, the stars shined brightly above.
They had too, all because they were painted so vividly across the ceiling. When looking up, one could almost be convinced that they were actually looking at the night sky. However, the only thing contradicting this, was how the constellations made such strange, unknown figures, and the daylight that would pour through the white paneled window on fair days, ajacent from the entrance.
Ashley hated frames, easels, or any type of small, claustrophobic painting surface, which is the obvious reason why the room held none.
"Art cannot be restricted." She had said to me once upon a time, in this very room. "To frame your artwork is to cage it, to restrict it from it's full potential."
Argumentably, a wall had it's owm boundaries as well, just like any other canvas or frame. Although, Ashley didn't seem to mind walls and their precarious borderlines, in fact, for the most part, she ignored them. She would continue the same painting from one wall, to the half of another, or whatever she saw fit. The corners, or boundaries in the wall were never noticed, simply because they could be so easily manipulated.
The floor was decorated with many different, colorful tiles, each a unique design, and an irregular jagged shape.
In the original plan, each tile was supposed to be 8 inch by 8 inch squares, painted with white, puffy clouds that she painted herself. However, being the clumsy man I am, when I was walking up the stairs to deliver the box of tiles, I tripped. Causing the square pieces of porcelain within the box to break into smaller, sharper pieces.
But Ashley loved them even more.
So, we installed the broken tiles into the room anyways, and after that, I couldn't get her out of there.
She would spend days and nights in the damn room, painting the day away. And when she ran out of space, she would paint over her previous designs, so the room would always look different every time I set foot in it.
One time, I remember that Ashley has fallen asleep there, only to wake up at 1:00 in the afternoon the next day, wondering why a paint brush still rested her dainty palms.
I smiled at the memory, it seemed like ages ago, a time I wish I could visit once again. This room was the key to so many wonderful, unexplored memories in my mind. However, it was devastating how those precious moments were tainted by the vicious outcome of our relationship. Hence, why the door was, and will remain locked.
I also remember how Ashley wanted to paint the entire house just as she did this room, and for some reason, I didn't allow it. And I couldn't stop myself from thinking that... maybe she wouldn't have left if I did. Or.. maybe if I just hugged and kissed her more often every day, or told her she was beautiful at least once, she would still be here; standing right next to me.
These were the questions that always lied on the outskirts of my mind, waiting, and longing to be answered. One thing about them though, is that they were always centered towards myself. I had never asked what would have happened if Ashley wasn't so insensitive, or if she was more dedicated to our relationship.
I couldn't. I just simply couldn't. I knew that none of this was her fault, I was the one to blame.
In a slow motion, I kneeled down upon the light blue floor, speckled with white tuffs of clouds. Stray tears dripped down my cheeks, then rolled silently to the floor. I covered my face with the palms of my hands, excluding my vision of the beautiful, yet haunting room.
It's all your fault.
My subconscious whispered. Once. Twice. Thrice. Then again and again.
It's all your fault. It's all your fault. It's all your fault.
It repeated continuously within my mind, and it wouldn't stop. It became so repetitive that the words within the sentence sounded disjointed, and unlike words anymore.
It is all my fault that Ashley is trapped in a mental hospital, and it kills me, knowing she is there because of me.
The scars upon her skin have healed, but the deeper, more emotional scars still lie where they were so violently placed.
And those cannot be healed.
You can only persuade a person that they aren't there.
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A/N: What!?!? Is that foreshadowing I see??? Sorry for the short, rather sucky, and depressing chapter... but I wanted to update before I went to camp for 2 days... so, yeah. DEDICATION GOES TO @THEFALLINGRAIN BECAUSE SHE IS SUCH A NICE, CARING PERSON, AND HER BOOKS AND WRITING STYLE IS ABSOLUTELY FANTASTIC!
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