Pearlescent Peril

Trigger Warning: This story contains graphic depictions of self-harm, suicide, and intense emotional distress.

The knife ripped the skin above Alise’s wrist, pulling it apart like the stretched strings of a violin, one by one, string by string, paving a road for the cascading crimson rivers to pour down and drown the sanguine room out of its misery.

Her contralto voice parched, vocal cords torn and eyes dried.

The snow-like tiles stained in red and dampened with salt surrounded her, from the cold floor to the sordid walls, enclosing the petite woman, with only a sink and a magnificent mirror. She lay leaning on the door, inspecting the mirror reflect the ceiling.

Water drooled from the sink to the floor, making its way to her solemn ballet socks, turning them translucent. She would have cursed if she could, for the knife was dull and rusty, and cutting one’s wrists required finesse, a trait she lacked. Turbid mind, couldn’t tie a knot to end her life, couldn’t swallow a pill for the fright of betterment, and a gun would leave her ugly.

Only a tired knife.

Blood engulfed her left hand; the dainty girl lay sad. Sordid thing, she had cut too deep, for her disillusionment infinite, the tendons now torn. The plan consisted of both wrists to bleed, but how was she to know, how deep was too deep?

A virtuoso at failing, her mascara sagged, eyes scorched, like a fresco from the great Michelangelo, she lay still, soaked in the bog of dread.

Sister Fate had a way of dealing cards, some got the aces, others the nines. Alise got dealt four cards, one of which sliced in half, all threes.

Her soul so buoyant, a ship navigating through a merciless storm, atop the red sea. One anchor gone, but the other remained, keeping the ship under vociferous clouds. “Help me”, she pleaded with lost ghosts, “help me escape this cruelty!”. The knife slipped from Alise’s numb hand, for the scarlet crisscross stained it from tip to hilt. The girl clenched the tool with her right, healthy hand, kissed it with her primrose lips, and bit the unpalatable hilt, hot iron taste simmered on her tongue. Charged her hand towards the edge, impaling the wrist.

A heart of stainless steel slid, pieced up from the blade, and swam across the devilish floor, a locket with the initials A and K. The last anchor, the last cartilage to connect her to this mortal hell.

The finale had yet to come, for the knife stuck inside, served as a dam for the rivers, blocking the artery with its rust. All she could do was to laugh. A sense of mirth, the last thing she felt, for death crept closer, for the anchor cracked, freeing the ship to sail on the wide salty sea. There she stood, naked as a newborn and observed her own lifeless body lay, with its tender brushes painting the tiles red, crashing with the tap water in a medley. To purge the soul and to cleanse it from the wrinkles of life.

For the locket crashed with the waves of the sea, marred in devilish wine. 

Alise observed how from one edge of the mix came to be a baby, dripped in red, crawling its way to her left hand. It wept and pushed, “wake, wake, wake” it cried. Opposite of it, deriving from the makeshift Bloody Mary, emerged a maple cane and a wrinkled, sagged, haggard woman. She limped towards the laying girl and proceeded to hit her, “wake, wake, wake” she cried. The girl’s spirit watched their futile efforts. After all, the dead void of emotions, as hearth smoked out of their stone-cold hearts. 

The soul tarried. The mirror fogged.

“Are you pleased with yourself?” An echo. The body spoke to its ghost.

“I…” She fumbled with her words, feeling as if flung from one hurricane to another, bombarded with questions; questions she would have preferred to leave unanswered.

“You have let me down yet again, Alise. I had anticipated something similar, but always thought that you lacked the guts.” The body whispered, rippling through the spilled beverage.

“Who are you?” The soul inquired.

“I am the truth! The one and only! I am your ego, for you listened to me and chose this path, abandoning your closest, cursing them to fend for themselves! I am your fright, for you felt afraid of life, enough to throw it away, enough to embark on the journey of death! I am the memory of those who you left behind, for they will seek your last breath! I am you despair incarnate!” Voices vibrated stemming from the body, yet the lips remained cold and motionless.

The girl closed her eyes, to discover her transparent eyelids.

The girl shoved her palms to her face, to discover her transparent hands.

Stuck between life and death, inside the lifeless mirror, constrained to watch her body squeeze all drops of life.

“It was not fair! Not fair! Unjust life!” She cried, tearless.

The truth laughed.

“So, you threw away the one sacred thing you had! Is this how you battle, how you rave against the unjust sister Fate?”

“SHUT UP! SHUT UP I TELL YOU!” the girl wept, muffled.

“I am the truth! Everyone gets to meet me once! Only once! Next time, The Truth will take the one truth away from you…”

“Next…?”

“Alise! Alise!” a distorted voice throbbed the walls and shook the tiles apart.

A thud, someone kicking the door with might. Followed by another thud. And another.

“Remember me girl, for I will reminisce of this moment, of this instance.”

The girl’s body flew forward, propelled towards the sink, the tainted blood had emigrated outside, the door swung fast, and a silhouette dashed in for Alice, holding her wrists and screaming.

Voice filled with pain and sorrow. Futility.

A briny drizzle ensued. Squishing her wrists and dragging the girl outside, screaming, screaming for help. Drop by drop, the girl’s life faded, yet it dimmed languidly, for the being of smoke was fast and strong, carrying her away. The girl’s soul yanked back to her body, leaving the unscrupulous mirror.

She had failed yet again. Failed at the single task she had to overtake. Failed now, failed then and shall fail forever. Another soul stuck inside this purgatory we named life. She was to live. She was to breath. She was not to succeed, for a victory over Sister Fate was impossible by oneself. A delicate thread woven, strung, and played by the convent.

But the lonely wept for naught but themselves, and the loneliest of them scattered around the living, breathing dead, lost lambs stuck in somber states.

Al-Qadr known to some, The Moirai to others, unyielding strings delicately intertwined, puppets to the show called life. Breathing marionettes, some cursed to live others to die. The savior escorted Alise, but bled in return, for the knife’s tip remained unnipped, overran with rust. A grave neglect, for the ship and its captain survived the torrent, but the price was paid in crimson. A life for a life.