Smile

I was trapped. I couldn’t do anything. All I could do was watch as my beautiful wife was torn apart before my eyes.

It might have been more bearable if I actually had been literally trapped. Not the one doing it.

But at the same time, it wasn’t me. I could see, and hear, and feel myself moving, but it wasn’t me.

“John, please. No!” she begged of me. Him.

I wish I could stop it. I tried with all my might to take back control. But it was useless. He had full control. And was loving it. He smiled like he had won the lottery. A smile that promised death. He was in control and knew it.

Later, when it was done, he gave it back. All I could do was sit with my wife in my arms and wait for someone to find me. I cried the whole time, tears mixing with blood.

At the trial, he took myself from me again. Such a strange sentence. I never thought I would ever think of it much less use it in connection with me. But that is what it was. He took me from myself.

He pleaded guilty to the whole thing. I cried out that it was wasn’t me. That I was a different person. But nobody heard. He was so convincing. That creepy smile and that calm voice. I could see the looks of disgust on the faces of the jury. I was going away. I knew that much.

What I didn’t expect was the sentence. I only caught the last part since I was so focused on being heard.

“…death by lethal injection.” What? Had I heard that right? It couldn’t be.

Why would he do this to me? To himself? If I died, he died too. Why? Why? Why?

During my time in prison, it was a constant battle of who had control. Sometimes I had it and just cried in the corner, terrified of my fate. Other times he was in control and walked the cell or the yard with that horrible smile and calm that was so convincing. I hated him. Loathed him.

Sometimes at night we talked. When we were sure that nobody could hear us, he talked. I never started the conversations. I never wanted to. But when I heard him speak I couldn’t help it but talk back. I tried my best to fill every word with venom. I put as much hate as I could into each syllable.

He never cared. The voice that replied was calm and I could feel that smile. Smiling as though it knew without a doubt what it had done and didn’t care.

Finally, the day came. I stood in front of the mirror in my cell looking into it. Not that it was very rewarding. I had smashed the mirror my first day. Had broken everything piece until it looked like a mosaic. But as I stood in front of it for the last time, I swear I saw that smile again. Heard that voice again. Crying out I punched the mirror not caring that my knuckles would be sliced open and bleed.

“Good…” was all the voice said.

My door opened and two guards escorted me to a small, dark room. I had seen something like it before in spy movies. Never thought I would be the one on the table in the middle.

There were some people in the room. One man began speaking and reading off charges placed against me. I kept thinking, “That’s not true,” with every one he read. Not that I could have said that. He had control again, and the monster was nodding along slowly with each charge.

At this point, I might have been ok with my impending doom. Had I not noticed the mirror in front of me. I knew there were more people behind it. But all I cared about was what I saw in it.

I saw a man. Laying strapped down on a table. I tried to call out to him. Tell him that I believed that he was innocent. But he couldn’t hear me. Nobody could.

The man was too busy smiling.