Sanity

A Story by Isaiah Dunn

Just a moment

A girl and her boyfriend are sitting on their couch watching a movie. In the movie the main character is forced to kill her boyfriend by shooting him in the head because it was the easiest way and would allow her to live. The girlfriend jokingly turns to her boyfriend with a smirk and says

“What would be the easiest way to kill you?”

The boy looks up and then makes a serious face to make it seem like he’s thinking very hard. The girlfriend laughs but when she looks back at him somethings changed. His eyebrows are deeply furrowed and you could see in his eyes that something was wrong. She’d seen him look like this once before and that was when he got the call that his mom had passed away.

“Babe what’s wrong” She asks. Almost as if he was coming out of a trance he looks up at her and smiles.

“Sorry I was thinking about your question.”

“And” She prompted

“Look at me” He says

“I am psychopath!”

He laughs and says “No I mean really look at me, the way we look at each other when we are having a really cute moment. The look that tells me that even if were giving each other s**t or getting into an argument that everything is going to be ok after.”

She feels her face soften and she smiles as she can feel the blood rushing to her face.

“That’s my girl.” He says smiling at her.

“Ok dork but what does this have to do with the easiest way to kill you because this might be very pertinent info for the future.” She asks

She can feel the energy in the entire room change. His face loses the soft loving gaze and is replaced with steel. He looks straight into her eyes and says “The day you look at me and instead of that gaze that lets me know that my world is going to be ok I look into your eyes and all I see is the fact that you no longer love me. That’s the easiest way to kill me”

“Someone’s being a bit dramatic don’t you think” She replies teasingly to break the tension.

He chuckles and says “Maybe, but I’m serious. You literally have no idea what you mean to me or what you do to me. The only way I can describe it is that you’re my sanity”

“What do you mean by that?” She asks

“Well it’s like theirs a grenade in my head and every second of every day it’s exploding. Sending bits of shrapnel to bounce around and wreak havoc in my head. It’s like I’m losing my mind and no matter how hard I try to focus or how much I’m trying to calm myself down to cease the endless bombardment of my mind that I just can’t stop it. So I feel like I’m just going to go insane until my psyche finally cracks and I’m no longer me just a broken mind in a pile of meat and bones.”

She looks at him with concern on her face. She’s never heard him talk about this before or just like this in general. She couldn’t remember how many fights they got into because something was wrong with him and he wouldn’t tell her what it was. Before she can think of something to say he continues.

“But then you came along and everything in my head just stopped. I’m no longer fighting to survive because you’ve saved me. I am so unhealthily obsessed about you that just the thought of you is enough to keep the explosions out of my mind. It’s like you’re a shield absorbing all of my doubts and worries. I know I never talk to you about what’s going on in my head and that it bugs you but the thing is I love you so much that as long as I’m with you. As long as I love you and you love me back that everything is going to be ok.

She’s completely taken aback stunned into silence at the insane amount of raw emotion she can feel coming from him. She wants to say something. It feels like she needs to say something but her mind can’t find the words to explain how she’s feeling. Somehow he seems to do so effortlessly. After a few moments of silence he continues talking but now his voice has taken on a very somber tone.

“Then there is my worst fear. That one day I lose you. If that happened then I would literally go insane. The grenades would turn into hydrogen bombs and annihilate me within seconds. The very fabric of my reality would be torn apart and id simply fall forever until I hit something hard enough and fast enough to end the pain that would be eating me alive. I need you like a fish needs water. You are my sun and moon. The stars that shine in the night sky and the gravity that keeps me bound to this earth. If someone were to walk up to me and say “Hey I can make sure she never feels any sort of pain, sorrow or unhappiness for the rest of her natural born life. The only thing you have to do is die.” Then I’d do it in a heartbeat, I would do it because your happiness and safety means more to me than my own life ever could. For as long as I can remember I have never loved myself but loving you makes me forget just how much it used to hurt before you.

He takes a deep breath and relaxes back into his seat almost like he’d been carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders since the day he was born and he was finally allowed to set it down. She slowly reaches her hands out and takes his face into her hands. She pulls it to her own until only inches separate them from touching. She can feel the tension building between them as neither of them wants to be the one that breaks this moment. She stares deeply into his eyes and says

“Look at me, really look at me.”

He smiles and she can see the steel walls drop from his eyes. His eyes warm and brighten as he returns the gaze back at her. Once she’s satisfied that she has all of his attention she says.

“If you die then I die.” And with that one simple line she breaks through the invisible barrier that was separating their faces shattering one intense moment to transition into a much more passionate one. Her heart starts beating faster and faster as their lips touch. His hand goes to the small of her back and pulls her in close to him. She wraps her arms and legs around his neck and torso and he responds by crossing his legs and pulling her onto his lap. He wraps his arms around her and buries his face in her neck.

They sit there for a while in silence. Both of them feeling the warmth on their necks where the other was breathing. Simply enjoying being this close to the other one. Each of them processing the moment that was just shared between the two. She can feel his head shift and start to move up to her ear sending a lightning storm of tingles down her back as she can feel his breath move from her neck slowly rising to hit her jaw and stopping right up to her ear.

“So how do I kill you?”

She giggles before stopping for a moment to think then with no emotion in her face turns to look at him and says “Change the Netflix password.” A smile spreads across her face as he begins to shake and throw his head back with laughter. They look at each other and simply laugh more because they don’t even have to talk to get each other to laugh. Then without another word they settle into each other turn to the TV and try to figure out what the hell is going on in this movie.