I .
It begins like a whisper. It’s susurrous and smooth, an idea only that slides along your snakelike skin. Its caress is sweeter than than the blade, which gleams silver underneath the moonlight. You crack open your windows at night, and watch the world breathe slowly, a sleeping giant. How many others, you wonder, are taking in red instead of dark? You had never thought you would prefer the blackened night, but as you toss sleepless, restless, in pain in your rickety bed, you wish that you could sleep, too. Hours wasted, perhaps, but here you are wasting blood, flesh, and mangling up your dignity. This cannot go on. And so, an alternative—wrong, wicked, weak, but it’s there. You begin to dream up a plan that will heal the scars on your sunken frame.
II.
It continues like a wailing song. Using gentle words, not your own, but coming from the treacherous psyche, you have ensnared a willing victim. Like a lamb led to slaughter, you lead him to slaughtering you. You tell him a lie; and gain his interest. Your supple, untouched skin is honey, and he is a dark fly—oozing pus and disease. You tell him the truth; and keep his interest. A dastardly plan is made to ruin some pretty girl’s innocence then and there. He is a keen participant, and that night, you fall asleep without using the blade. The cuts begin to heal.
III.
It climaxes like an operatic crescendo. He saw you leaning against the column, your skirt neatly to the knees, your white shirt ironed and bleached by your loving mother. You shook nervously, like a tree under a storm of emotion, and that made him smile. He walked up to you, and murmured your name; you nodded, unable to speak. Swallowing, you followed him underground, to the parking lot. He took your bag and put in the boot. He pressed his slimy lips to your own quavering ones, and shuddering, you moved back. A reluctant dance, you performed. Then, entrapped within the metal car, he put his hand on your breast. Then, the storm broke. You were at the eye of the storm, and once the screaming and wailing and kicking and punching and hurt had ended, you lay there; catatonic. You did not speak. You simply took it like a man. You simply took it like a woman.
IV.
It ends like a nightmare.
