He sat still at the end of the table. His eyes, droopy and rimmed with dark circles, reflected the dim lights of the dingy dining room.
Another failed gig, no doubt.
My friends had warned me about marrying him. Jason was a struggling artist, you see. He had big dreams but no one seemed to recognise his abilities. I was told not to settle for him, that even a poor country girl like myself could charm the richest man in town with my pretty face. “You’ll be broke your whole life if you stay with him,” they said.
Yet, when he got down on one knee and proposed to me with sincere and loving eyes, I decided to follow my heart. I vowed then, that I would stick by his side through thick and thin. And when Jason finally reached his dreams, I would be there to celebrate with him.
We always prayed for his big breakthrough, but failure after failure happened instead, and five years together brought us to this old and dilapidated apartment.
My head throbbed. Jason’s tiredness must be rubbing off me.
“Honey,” I whispered in the most reassuring voice I could muster, “I’ll always be with you no matter what, and I’m sure that everything will get better soon.”
He didn’t reply, dull eyes staring into nothing.
I sighed and headed to the kitchen. When I returned, beef casserole in hand, I noticed that he hadn’t moved at all.
“I made something special,” I said with a small smile, serving the meal on the table and rubbing my aching temple. “Go ahead and take a bite. I promise it’s good,” I continued as I sat opposite to him.
He remained listless, not even lifting his fork. Minutes passed like that, and I felt a tear roll down my cheek. I was devesated. Jason used to love my food. Even when I first started learning to cook, and nearly every meal was burnt, he’d beam at me and joke that he didn’t deserve to eat food made by an angel.
I couldn’t face him like this, not when I was supposed to cheer him up during this difficult time, so I got up and went to our bedroom.
I couldn’t help but wonder if I had failed as a wife. It was part of my duties to keep a clean environment, after all. Yet, no matter how hard I sweeped, wiped and scrubbed, dirt seemed to stick to every surface and every corner of the room.
Love, faith and hope had kept us together, but maybe Jason had gotten tired of it all. Would he give up on his dreams? Would he stop smiling forever?
Would he leave me?
My head felt like it was splitting open now. I hurriedly tried to make my way to the bathroom, but tripped along the way, on the glass wine bottles littering the living room.
Jason must have heard the commotion or at least my screams of pain. But he never came. As I layed there helplessly, writhing as I clutched my head, I wondered where everything had started to spiral.
Was it when he started drinking? Or was it when I told him that I wanted to work to support us instead?
Maybe it was when I told him that I was pregnant……
“A baby?” He had shouted, as he held me by my hair after punching me in the gut, “In this fucking mess?”
I sobbed for what seemed like hours, until the pain subsided again into a dull throb. I got up shakily and walked to the bathroom.
Staring back at me in the mirror wasn’t a pretty girl, but a monster. Disgusting black ooze trickled down from a grotesque hole at the side of its face. It was pungent, smelling of death. Brain matter, dark and rotten, slipped through and fell down, making a sickening squelching sound.
My mind whirred as I made my way back to the dining room. Jason still had not taken a single bite of the beef casserole, which was now rotten as if it has been left out for several days.
It wasn’t tiredness or sadness in his eyes, I realised— It was guilt.
Guilt from killing me.