Whole Again

  Don’t move. Don’t move. Don’t. Move. 

  I repeated the silent mantra as I took in shallow breaths, trying not to make too much noise. I could hear the woman’s footsteps, and the porch light clicked on.

  I braved a glance at the front door. It was creaking open, flooding the rickety porch with light. I pressed myself tighter against the house, praying that the woman on the porch wouldn’t see me, and ask why I was creeping around her yard with a knife in my back pocket. 

  She turned her head my way, ever so slowly, and I held my breath. What would I say if she spotted me? She looked rather weak, shivering in her nightgown. Maybe I could fight her. But if I killed her out here in the yard, it would be messy. Neighbors would hear. 

  Why did I have to choose a New Years resolution that was so damn difficult? 

  After another moment, she let out a little hmm and turned on her heel, closing the door gently behind her. I exhaled, peeling myself off the bricks of the house. 

  Now for the hard part. 

  I crept around the side of the house, leaves crunching under my feet with every step. I had studied this house for weeks beforehand. It was easy. Their home was right across from my tiny, unassuming house, and my windows aligned perfectly with theirs. It was part of my nightly routine to watch them come and go through the kitchen, a perfect, suburban family. Pretty, blonde mothers who played the part of housewives to their suit-clad, dull husbands were bad enough, but what really made my blood boil was their bouncy, blue eyed son who pranced around with no worries in his perfect little head. 

  Children like that made me forget I had a conscience. 

  I studied all three of them, their routines, their habits, when they sent their son off to bed and what time he got up in the morning. I calculated the perfect time to make his pretty-boy skin run red. 

  That perfect time was five minutes to eleven pm, when the wife let down her bleach blonde curls and her husband got out of his business clothes, and they headed off to bed. Then was the perfect time to tick my first resolution off the list. 

  The little boy’s room was on the first floor, and in his innocence, he left his window open just a bit, so let the breeze float through his room. Tonight, he was getting much worse than a breeze. 

  I pried the window open the rest of the way, wincing when it squeaked loudly. But the kid barely stirred. A strange jealousy was creeping up my throat, seeing him so peaceful. I hadn’t been that peaceful in years. 

  The envy burned through my body and I tightened my grip around my knife. I crawled my way through the window, landing lightly on both feet. 

  I kept my eyes trailed on him, counting his breaths. I envied those too. I wanted the air he breathed. I couldn’t stand him having it. This little boy, this perfect, disgusting, precious, awful little boy, had stolen it from me. 

  It was mine. 

  I pulled my knife out of my pocket, sucking in a breath as the moonlight reflected off of it. It was beautiful, in the best, most wretched kind of way. 

   I summoned that burning jealousy in my gut, letting it turn into something more; worse than anger, worse than hate, worse than pain. 

  And then I let it out. 

  When I brought down the knife, he didn’t even have time to scream. I heard the faintest whimper, and then it was silenced. His little body writhed in pain, just for a moment, and then fell limp. A tear traced down his lifeless cheek, one last promise of pain. There was blood everywhere, spilling gracefully onto the clean white sheets, like a twisted kind of art. 

  I promised myself this New Years resolution. After all the pain and suffering, after the screaming and sobbing and the loss, I would let my anger out. I would release it on those who deserved it, those who had the perfect life I could not. They would suffer, just like I did, and I would watch them cry together out my window. I would pass on the pain I received, and become whole again. 

  As I climbed back out the window, my job done, I mentally checked it off my list: 

  New Years Resolution: Murder.