A Griever

Flash Fiction

Dandelions danced on your grave. Stray twigs and photographs clawed at the carving of your name, scattered memories and ants' nests on bones and soil. The world around shuffled while you stayed dead - six feet under, naked, dead; no sense, no words, no mind, dead. Dead, dead, dead. The blood on my shovel had completely dried. The sun circled and dropped and rose and dipped and flew above. It had been many, many years.

But I saw you in the grocery store this afternoon.

You were wearing the same f*****g outfit you always wore, a stupid jacket in a stupid beige color. A smug smile. An alive smile. A breathing smile, drawing air in and exhaling it out. Good f*****g riddance, I knew I had to kill again. But I was so sure, it was so confusing. I was more certain than the routinary tick of time, more certain than the blueness of the sky that I murdered you.

I walked over and you hugged me. You said it had been a long time. You wanted me to be happy.

You didn't respect the efforts I had to go through to murder you. The rain of sweat as I dug the ground, the blister on my finger when I engraved your name, the washing off of blood. I smiled back. I said, "I'm glad to see you too."

We walked along the shelves and out into the road. You told me about the things you did after you died. You got a new puppy. You worked a new office job, there on the main street, where the serious businesspeople are. You've been working on your dreams.

You asked how I'd been. I'd been fine. I was on the other side of the main street, I said, doing my own things. I didn't tell you this, but when we sat down on the roadside bench, I searched for that old wound on your arm. You were talking but my eyes were on your skin, looking for that final scratch for when I shoved you down your tomb. It was a nice early morning and you were lifeless. I heaved you down your grave and a branch caught your sleeve and you bled. But your skin now was smooth. Not a hint of your death.

You said you were glad that things turned out well for me. And that you wished for me to heal from this scar etched below one of my shoulders. A scar the shape of a thunder. You said it looked pretty bad. I said yes, I didn't know where I got it from.

You said you visited me a lot. You said you brought me white flowers many times. You said that your last visit was in November, though I didn't see you then. I didn’t remember it.

You said that you're sorry that I died. That you wished you could have done something more than helplessly watching me build my own coffin, bury my own self.

I said, that's not what happened. I killed you, not me. But you only cried.