Alexis reached for her notepad, quill in hand. As she opened the leather bound capsule, she began rereading the previous weeks’ works. Flashes of images and choicely cut sentences play through her mind. In one such scene, she is standing in front of her self. All she sees is a look of disdain upon her face. Everything fades to black as she continues flipping through the blood soaked parchment, and a new image takes dominance. In this moment she is disembodied, no feeling of worldly connection surrounds Alexis, and she sees a shoulder leaking crimson. A deep primal hunger takes form, and then hunger gives way to shame. Shame towards feeling happy, shame towards wanting to be loved, and a nagging disgustedness that she has and is brought low by her emotions. She feels dirty, wrong for wanting anything, especially love. Her mind become erratic, changing the scene faster and faster, building to a crescendo she can’t avoid. It always ends the same. “I love you” Alexis whispers into her ear. And in that moment, she vanishes, and the scene changes to her watching a little girl in a turquoise dress running through a maze, scared to her wits end. Chasing her is a raging brute of a man, and in the girls mind is a little voice attempting to get everything together, but no one’s listening to it, and breaks the little girl into shattered glass, only to build her up and do it again. Alexis dips her quill into her ink pot, only to find it empty. Upon this predicament, Alexis rises from her desk, and reaches for her knife. A smooth, elegant, curved sickle like blade is in her hands, ink pot in the other. A slow, excruciating slice over her wrists, and she sees her own blood. That same deep hunger resurges, and she fails to supress it. Within moments, her mouth is clasped upon her wrist, drinking the fluid like a suckling deer. Still drinking, she slumps against her bed, addiction kicking in. mere seconds later, she feels tears tugging at the corners of her mouth.
Fifteen minutes later, she’s forgotten why she needs hers ink pot, her mind a crimson haze. As the bleeding stops, a weak “no’ escapes her throat. “No, don’t you stop. I need this” she whimpers quietly to herself, full of need and regret, whilst reaching for her knife. Before she can begin anew, there is a knock at her door. In a panic, she drops the ink pot and knife. “Shit!” she exclaims at the broken porcelain. “What was the Lexi?” a woman’s voice says from the other side of the door. “Sorry mum,” she replies hastily, wiping the blood off of her mouth and dragging the sleeve of her shirt down,” you just startled me and I dropped my ink pot. Come in” Alexis’s door swings open, and in front of her is a red haired woman in her thirties. “Lexi, are you doing anything tomorrow night?” her mother, Lindsey, asks. “Yeah, I’m going to Olivia’s remember?” Alexis states.
“That’s good, you should get out more,” her mother replies distractedly, exiting Alexis’s room. “Now where were we,” Alexis begins in a mumble, reaching for her knife. Within mere moments, the blade is kissing her pale flesh, reaping a new trail of blood in its wake. She places the knife upon her desk, reaching for perfume and earbuds. She unscrews the vial, and soaks the head in the sweet smelling liquid. As she wipes the bud across her cuts, the alcohol therein seeping into the fresh wounds, her breathing becomes hollow and laboured. Again she reaches for her knife, removes her shirts, leaving her arms cold and bare. With the knife in her left hand, she raises the blade to her right shoulder, and then begins carving slivers of her own flesh off, devouring them like a starving orphan would a five course meal, as her night becomes an investigation in carnal masochism.
Alexis stifles a scream as shampoo filled water cascades down her back, soaking into her knife marks and hashes. “Bitch,” she curses under her breath. She turns off the shower and dresses for school, then brews her morning coffee. “Mum?” Alexis yells, bringing the milk up the stairs with her. “Yes Lexi?” Lindsey replies groggily, rising from the couch. “Coffee?”
“You have to ask?”
“I’m on it.”
That afternoon, Olivia was in a mind state that could be only described as erratic. She could finally tell Alexis how she felt, but a million doubts plagued her mind.