Stigmata

There was no running from it anymore.

Standing on the wooden, wrap-around porch of his property, feeling the afternoon rain peck at his exposed hands and face, the sunlight still shining through the thinning clouds while the leaves danced at the arrival of a colder draft of wind from the North, Lucas was so far away in thought that all of these things, including the distant but sharp sounds of gunfire from the nearby range all blended into a swirling package sent firmly to the back of the mind, waiting for him to return.

The neighbors were throwing beer bottles again, something he would usually smirk and roll his eyes about while enjoying his second or third coffee of the day. He would usually find himself back inside at this point, cleaning or sorting through the chores of the day before finally giving in to a fairly random but usual schedule, flitting about the house in a high heeled step back and forth through rooms, almost haunting them with his indecision.

He wouldn’t usually be standing here, cup of now lukewarm coffee in one hand, burnt through cigarette in the other, staring off into the yard, lost in a place that defied his reality or ability to communicate, memories superimposing themselves into that space in his vision that he struggled to define for himself.

Lucas Reed was lost to something that made his head spin and his heart quicken. He was lost to something that he always understood, but continued to run from.

Even now as his ear and face stung with the prickled pain of altercation, his hands shaking still from a combination of too much caffeine and too little sleep over the course of two weeks, he found himself numbed by the terrifying decision that was going to have to make. There was no time left. There were no paths that led to what he wanted anymore.

Lucas Reed was going to have to leave this place.

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Lucas quickly ran his hands through his hair, the cool wetness providing him an hook back to the present. A stronger gust of wind blew one of the emptied plastic pots that hang over the edge of his porch off of its nail and onto the wet ground. Snapping out of his trance, he attempted to adjust his glasses, just then realizing that the were no longer on his face.

He sighed at this realization, now feeling the pain at the side of his head, hearing the gunshots in the distance, feeling the coldness of the rain seeping through his clothes.

Superstitiously conflating these senses, as he tended to do. He scolded himself for a moment. Repeating three simple words that he had heard so much in the past few days. They sent spikes of pain through his body, like blows to the chest from a tear seeking missile.

Stick to reality

The words were like needles to his head and heart. He knew that there was a very real threat here. Ignoring that fact was what got him into this mess in the first place. Of that he was absolutely sure. Red flags were the flame to his moth-like mind, the feeling of striking nausea the unhealthiest of his vices. He couldn’t begin to master walking away from a situation, even when he was in danger.

Especially when you’re in danger

He hushed this voice, realizing that he was still standing in place, staring off into an abyss of thought and fear, it was keeping him. He turned, looking at his truck, the white, dusty spider web of collision on the windshield, and the small bits of glass made icelike and golden by the falling rain and shining sun.

He felt nothing while looking at this mess made of emotion and intensity. Instead of continuing to stare at it, he turned again, walking slowly to his front door.

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Walking through the door he felt a wave of anxiety course its way through his body, and as he locked the door behind him, he was met with the crippling attack of the mess that lay before him. Broken glass and wood and smoke attacked his eyes and tore at his soul as he inspected the wreckage.

A clock he had built years before he moved to this place lay in the kitchen, violently separated by its impact with the island in the middle of his favorite room. A pile of ceramic that used to be his decorative fruit bowl bowl sat in a threatening heap a few feet away from where he stood, its dry, dark colors in contrast with the yellow-brown oily texture of the wooden floor.

The hallway fared worse, its walls punched through in random order and height, its wooden floors littered with broken glass and drywall. Overhead, a ceiling fan screeched in difficulty, missing two of its blades, leaving it unbalanced.

See what you made her do?

The words stung. They wrenched at his heart as images of her verbal posturing forced their way into his present mind. The stillness of this destroyed place gnawed at his carefully constructed emotional walls, each mess adding so much more weight to the tsunami of emotion threatening to flood his body, leaving him to drown in the aftermath of its wake.

He breathed in, attempting to quell the feeling, but this only strengthened the will of the flashing memories and sickening reality, adding every instance and evidence that brought him to this present place of destruction.

Finally, either from fatigue or acceptance, Lucas walked three steps into their living room and fell into a crumpled mess on the area rug of their living room. Atlas, their pet Chihuahua’s,shrill whines and barks from his cage the only interruption to his sobbing fit of tears.

You were not enough

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Lucas held each of his crossed arms in trembling agony as he wept, constantly searching for the end of this fit of raw emotion. He was going to have to leave before she returned, he understood that. She wasn’t going to allow him to leave. This thought struck fear into him, and that was enough for him to snap out of his episode. He was going to leave, and she wasn’t going to take this as anything other than a complete betrayal.

He would be leaving his family, one that he had put considerable effort into maintaining. Their son, Alexander, would be devastated. He found himself at the doorway to his son’s room, the difference startling in comparison to the rest of the house.

Neat and tidied the room seemed displaced. Posters of trains, trucks, and Paris covered the walls. Jars containing small preserved terrariums of their adventures together sitting on a shelf that they had built together, mocked him, beckoning for more tears and memories.

He took off his necklace, a sea glass turtle that Alexander had expressed interest in last week, and hung it on a metal sculpture of the Eiffel Tower before leaving the room and closing the door.

Leaving this room and heading carefully across the hallway he recognized a vast emptiness within him. His tears and waves of nausea had been replaced with a coma-like void of anything.

Moving into the room that he and his partner shared, he numbly walked around their bed and into the closet, pulling out the luggage that had been casually stuffed into it.

He felt nothing as he pulled clothes from their dresser, neatly organizing them to fill every space that he could.

He felt nothing as he gathered his more valuable belongings and placed them upon the couch that they had purchased together, agonizing over choices and color.

He felt even less as he dialed the number of his trusted friend, not even having to explain fully what had happened, but constantly stressing the importance that they arrive before she returned.

Lucas didn’t know how permanent this betrayal would be, but at least for the moment, as he sit on the steps of his wrap-around porch, anxiously gazing into the sunlight cast through the leaves of his home, the rain giving way to a sunlit and clear sky, Lucas Reed was going to make the right decision, this time.