The Right Moment for a Goodbye

“You can’t keep doing this to me! I need you to leave! I need you to—”

Bang.

“Don’t do it! No!” The words barely had time to leave my mouth before the bullet made contact, burying itself in her head. She looked at me with tear-stained eyes, just once, before her body crumpled to the floor.

They always say time slows down in moments like this, but that was far from the truth. I heard the shouting in the distance, the pounding footsteps. Clearly they had heard the commotion and come to investigate. But I ignored them, everything else drowned out by the soft and steady beat of my heart. I focused on that pulse, letting it ground me as I ran the short distance to her body, crouched beside her, and applied pressure to her wound. I knew she was gone. The shot was perfect, planted right in her temple. Helping her was hopeless. Yet I did it anyway, knowing for certain my efforts were futile.

The tears came easily. They spilled from my eyes now, just as the crimson sea flowed from her head, puddling on the floor beneath her. She was like a doll of fine china, my doll, her face still, drained of all color. And she was beautiful. So beautiful. Even dead. Even staring up at me with wide eyes, mouth agape.

It was only a matter of seconds, all I needed to set the scene. I took her lifeless fingers in mine, feeling the last bit of warmth that lingered there. Ever so gently, I wrapped them around the gun, making sure to cover it in her prints, although I doubted they would check for them at all.

Then my hands were back on her wound, and I let my tears fall, let the sobs shake my body. There I was, the perfect grieving lover. Yet inside, I felt nothing, only the thoughts racing in my mind, my heart still calm and steady in my chest. She was gone. Really, truly gone. It was over.

And I remembered a moment from long ago. The first moment. When we had been dancing to some song I’ve since forgotten. When the record sat in its place, spinning at a slow, winding pace. When she’d turned the dial with her long, lanky fingers, lowering the volume until it was nothing more than background noise. And she had sat down beside me on the floor, her back against the wall, a faraway look in her eye.

“I think this isn’t working,” she had said.

I had pondered her words for a moment. And then I looked at her with that lopsided grin that always made her give in. “You think? Now, why would you go thinking a silly thought like that?”

    She turned her gaze to the floor, her hand twirling a loose strand of hair, her eyes darting back and forth as she plotted her next words. And she spoke, her voice cautious, gentle. “You and I both know this can’t go on. This,” she had motioned between us, finally meeting my gaze, “this can’t go on forever. We aren’t in love. We’re just young. And crazy. And stupid.” She had sighed. It was a beautiful sound, just one more thing I loved about her. Or did I love her? No, no, I didn’t love. I had made myself that promise. But I desired her, yes. I longed for her. She was my weakness. And I wasn’t ready to say goodbye.

    “No.” My voice came out abruptly, surprising even myself.  She looked at me, brows furrowed, lips turned just slightly downwards.

    “What do you mean, ‘no’?” There was a long pause as the tension hung in the air between us, the only movement being the gentle spin of the record, it’s tune barely audible.

    I stood up, walking back over to the record player where the last song had just begun. “Maybe this can’t go on forever. Whatever this may be. But you don’t get to say goodbye. You don’t get to decide. I do.” And I had turned the music back up, as loud as it could go, and her frown grew deeper and deeper. So I held out my hand and she took it, and we danced and danced until the light faded outside and the world became dark, and we kept on dancing until the sun rose again in the morning. It wasn’t discussed again, not until almost a year later. It became a sort of tradition for us, her attempting to deny our relationship, and I reassuring her, reclaiming her.

But this time. Just moments ago. This time, it didn’t go that way. This time, she was bold. They always said she was crazy, and this time, she proved it. When I had discovered everything she had done, it was the last straw. All these years, there were so many things she was guilty of: the lies, the cruelties, the crimes. Things I could hardly imagine. It was then that I realized she was finally right. We couldn’t last forever, no matter how hard I clung to the dwindling thread that connected us. Now was the time, I decided, for things to end. So I took matters into my own hands. I confronted her. And it happened, everything leading to this very second.

Here she was now, in my arms. Gone. It was over. The footsteps, the voices, all of it louder now, just outside the door. And in that last moment, they burst in. I could only imagine the train of thoughts in their head. Her, a lifeless heap, a gun in her hand, a bullet in her head. And I, her dearest friend, her lover, perhaps the only one she trusted. Sobbing over her body, tending to her wound. With her in her last moments, as she whittled away.

She always was crazy. So this day would be no surprise. It would be ruled a suicide before her body was even seen, and before I was even questioned. And I, ever the actor, the performer, would make sure no one thought otherwise.

They would never know the truth.