“Are you relaxed?” I ask.

     Jeffrey Epstein looks up at me. His eyes are hungry.

     I’m going to let them starve.

     “Hell yeah,” he says. He spreads his legs and loosens his tie. I feel a pang of panic. What if it doesn’t work? What will he do?

     “I’m ready for you, sweet cheeks,” he says, and I put on my fakest smile. I reach into the pocket of my dress, searching for the one object that will save me from him.

     I find it, and it rolls into my fingers on its own.

     “Close your eyes,” I say. He does.

     “Now imagine me naked,” I say. He shudders with pleasure. “Easier done than said,” he says. I want to slap him, hurt him, but I need him to be relaxed. Otherwise, the hypnotism won’t work.

     “Can you see me?” I ask. Epstein nods his head, his eyes still closed. “Ohh yeah.”

     “Three. Two.”

     “What?”

     “One.” I snap my fingers. Epstein’s face becomes as blank as paper. He has an erection; I shudder, disgusted.

     “You will stop. And think,” I say. I hold up the object from my pocket: a little ball of amethyst crystals. With most hypnotisms, you cannot make a person do anything they don’t want to do. With these enchanted crystals, however, I can make them do anything I want.

     “You will think about all of the girls you violated. Every. Single. One.” 

     For a second, Epstein has that hungry look again. But that’s about to change.

     I squeeze the ball of amethyst, and I see his expression darken. He flails in his seat, but he doesn’t leave it. I won’t let him leave it. He’s caught like a fly.

     “Do you see them?” I growl. “Do you see what you’ve done to them?”

      “M-make it stop,” says Epstein. “I don’t want to be—no, stop—”

     “Do you understand what you did?”

       “Please, make it stop!” he cries. He flails again, jolting left and right from a phantom abuser.

     I drop the ball back into my pocket. Epstein slumps as if nothing had happened.

     I say one more thing before I loosen my hold on him.

     “Die,” I say, tracing the shape of a noose on his arm with my fingernail. He nods, as if in agreement.

     The private jet comes to a stop.

     I let go of my grip on him. He snaps out of it, his legs again splayed, and he looks at me like a cheetah would look at a helpless gazelle.

     “So are we doing this or not?” he says impatiently. I smile that phony smile again. “We’ve landed,” I say. Epstein peeks out of the window, then sighs in disappointment. “Maybe we’ll do this later, then,” he purrs.

     But I know about the police outside. I know where he’s going next. And I know that Epstein’s going to hell, regardless of who he pays off.

Lungs coated in sorrow

Eyes filled with despair

Bony limbs sprawled in the sea

I've always wondered what drowning would be like

Longing for it like the end of a boring movie

The water flowing down my trachea

Burning like hot cocoa slipping through frail fingers

Limbs reaching for everything and nothing at all

Neurons flying, landing nowhere

Begging the lungs to expand

To take air again

But the will to live is already gone

But now I don't have to wonder

I know drowning is like falling from the cliffs

And knowing I'm not going to make it back

Not caring to make it back

I know drowning doesn't burn

It freezes my veins into glacier

Takes emerald eyes, makes them cold marbles

I wish I could feel something

I'm already so far under

The undertoe has decided that this is my time

That today will be the day I know what the sea floor feels like

Waves flurrying, kissing me goodbye

Salt water hugging me until I cannot hug back

I'm already too far under

And my mouth opens for the last time

To scream or give up

Either way, it's already too far gone

Gasping like you can't get enough air

Your cheeks aflame, you wish you were somewhere, not here

But you can't disappear

You never go anywhere

It's straight out of your worst nightmare

Though you try your best

Your heart feels like it might beat out of your chest

And you mumble a prayer as you stand up ungracefully from your chair

The whole class will be in for a treat

As you walk to the board

Your boodstained pants surely can't be ignored

Your teacher waits patiently, hand ready

You hand in the test and return to your seat

With your stomach churning unsteadily.

It tastes like cigarette smoke and sticky mornings waking up next to five other warm bodies. Your throat burning from the night before. It climbs into your limbs as you try to block out the morning sun. It's heatwaves rising off the tarmac as you hurtle down the highway, a mirage vanishing from under the wheels. It's many things. It feels like nothing, intangible, infinite. You could dip your fingers in it and feel lost, full, backward. It sounds like a reverbing echo, bouncing between your eardrums, tied in with dove song, and your favourite lullaby. You can go to sleep feeling it in the depth of your gut, sinking in it. Its everything and its emptiness all at once.

@bricksandstones #bricksandstones #5senseschallence #nostalgia #loneliness #prose #poem

#lost #arushattemptbeforemylaptopdies