BOOKSTORE

You breathe in. Slowly, steadily, letting the loud roar of laughter evade your earlobes. You breathe in because you just have to. You remember. Not the laughter, of course it can't be the laughter. It's the mouth odour. You remember because forgetting is not an option. It has never been an option. 

“You never forget things” His words blare through your ears like an unstoppable alarm clock.

It’s the odour that proudly clings to the one man that hates the sight of your closeup, and of every other toothpaste you own. You turn around. Slowly, steadily, letting the strong arms of the wind engulf you in it's warmest embrace. You turn around because you just have to. You see him before you open your eyes. You know, because you always know, that he is wearing a grey suit and a pink tie. You know his eyes are closed too. You picture the exact moment he realised it was you. Your imagination takes you to exactly three point two seconds from the present. You see his permanently teary eyes grow wide with shock. You notice a glint of shame flash through his countenance. You see when it is immediately replaced by a warm, collected smile. You know that he smells you too. He smells your eau de cologne, the one that lies confidently beneath your armpits. 

And then his smile fades.

You open your eyes. Slowly, steadily, willing him to savour the taste of your success and beauty. Your successive beauty. You are just on time to watch the smile fall off his face. 

“I thought I killed you”. He spits out.

How would you explain that you are immune to death?. You are immune to being killed. You’d only realised this after the ninth stab through your hips. 

“It was my nose” you confess. “It was my sense of smell”. He understands that the stench of blood motivates you to stay alive. You scold yourself for holding a sane, almost relieved, conversation with your intended murderer. They had told you he was toxic. They had told you how he'd just been released from prison on the day he met you. You knew it wasn't a conspiracy theory, because he'd admitted that the rumours were barely rumours. “I would fix him” you had said. You still can. But he has a right to be forgiven, because it has been over twenty years. Time heals all wounds. You choose not to remember him as the man who murdered your spirit and left your soul wondering. You choose not to see him as the man that left you drowning in a pool of your own blood. You would see him as your highschool sweetheart, the one who assisted you in burning off all your father's newspapers, and your mother's miserable wigs and high heeled shoes. You would see him as your highschool sweetheart because that is the only way you can see him.

"I have missed you Mon amour. Let's have a cup of coffee" you hear him say. For a split second you forget he is there. You stand still and let your mind travel through an unending list of events lying asleep in your memory, until you find it, the one you have chosen to bury for the rest of your life. And then you remember. "Let's have a cup of tea, Mon amour". You are young and naive. He knows this. You know he knows this. And so you thrust your life into the centre of his palms, believing he would keep you safe but knowing he won't. He leads you into the ground floor of his father's bookstore, assuring you that he's kept a cup of tea there. You know he is lying, you see the sharp edge of his stainless knife poke out through his pocket. He knows you have seen it, and so he doesn't bother hiding it. Or maybe, just maybe, showing you the knife is his little way of warning you to leave but begging you to stay. In the years to come, you would blame yourself for everything, but you would applaud yourself for keeping still through it all. You cannot blame him for anything, because you have failed to fix him. It is your fault. Your phone rings, Jesse is calling you because she had overheard your toxic boyfriend's plan to kill you, but you know his plans too, and so you refuse to pick the call. If you survive, and your therapist asks you to narrate everything, you have sworn to say "I was in a trance. I don't even know who stabbed me". You would defend your toxic boyfriend like your life depended on it.

"Pull off your clothes. Starting with that miserable shirt." he orders, but you have pulled them off already. He doesn't seem impressed.

"Lay on the floor". You take your sweet time, hoping he'd notice the thinness of your waist, the wideness of your hips and the swell of your breasts.

"Be fast" he orders, pulling out his weapon. It doesn't scare you, you are not afraid because he has taught you never to be afraid.

"How would you feel losing your life in a bookstore?" He doesn't wait for your response, because he knows you have no response. He kisses the knife and begins his work.

"Let's have a cup of coffee" he repeats impatiently. You are not the brave teenager you once were, you are afraid to die. But you must, because you know that history is bound to repeat it's course. He grabs your hands with a kind of force that is familiar to you , leading you through a large crowd of book vendors, just as you notice the tip of a shortgun poke out through his blazer pocket. There is no Jesse to warn you this time around, and you are grateful for the peace the absence of her judgmental advice has left you with.

"How would you feel losing your life in a bookstore?".

"Excited."