Secrets

Arched eyebrows, folded arms, pursed lips: all seeming to glare at me with the reflection of my own palpable disappointment.

I can feel it resting on my tongue, the bitterness polluting my thoughts with its judgmental weight. I push through the taste, my tongue scraping against the roof of my mouth with a frantic desperation to find an essence of anything to distract from my uncompromisingly absolute failure.

Inflating into the back of my mouth, I begin to choke from just threat of it completely engulfing the entire length of my esophagus. Muscles contract as I fight the impulse to release this poison entrapped between my jaws.

My tongue, once saturated with shame, no feels dry, sandpaper against my teeth coated with their dishonesty.

Pounding down my windpipe, my lungs begin to fill with the perverted contamination this monster brings. With one finale exhale, the reaming oxygen flees from my body to be replaced with a toxin of my own design.

This terrible irony does not escape me with the rest of my air, ever present within the otherwise chaotic whirlwind of thoughts encased within the denseness of my skull.

This cancer claiming every corner of my being is one I carefully crafted. With cautious tenderness, I coaxed it into the light from the depths of my mind, its grasp tightening around me, its claws sinking into my skin.

Yet, I never seemed to notice it was my blood flowing from the wounds it had created.

¨How could you?¨

The accusation, the hurt is too much for me to bare and I shut my eyes tightly against what I have done, what I am going to do.

¨Well?¨

I´m frozen, sweat gathering on the back of my neck and across my upper lip. Tear filled eyes meet mine, better reflecting what I had already been able to picture completely.

¨Do you have anything to say for yourself?¨

The argument of guilt had been presented clearly, offering no opportunity of release from this crime, now that everyone had been made aware of just how horrendous complete betrayal could be.

We all knew there was nothing left to say.

¨Very well.¨

A deep breath from all in the room. Frayed nerves sparked the visible anger and disappointment in the air, exuding from those who were encased in the four walls that would only hold awful memories for all involved.

My fists tightened. This was it, this was the moment. I had always known, deep inside my corrupted, poisoned soul there was no hope left. I had started down this twisted path long ago, and now was the time to reap the consequences.

I turned away after the sentencing was delivered, trying to maintain composure against the sound of handcuffs clasping shut, biting into the smooth wrists I was sure would soon be ruff and jagged from the wear the metal would cause.

I was lead out of the courthouse with hands encased around me forearms, keeping me from the swarming press desperate to grasp any remaining information about the high profile case.

¨Mrs. Raymond! Mrs. Raymond!¨

Shouts from these vultures with pens and notebooks in hand surrounding me with their penetrating questions managing to pierce the agitated thoughts of my mind.

¨Are you certain your husband killed your daughter?¨

¨Are you pleased with the verdict?¨

¨What will you do now that your husband is in prison.¨

I kept my face straight, jaw locked as the secrets once again began pounding. How easy it would be, to free this truth that I was sure would never stop fighting, a constant reminder, a consistent struggle.

Nevertheless, my teeth remained pressed together with the knowledge of what the consequences would be. What would happened to not only us, but the rest of the world.

A necessary sacrifice.

The words echoed through my head. With my husbands sentencing, the rest of us would be free. We could return back to life as it was before Darlene´s death.

The pounding became a banging, shaking through my body at the mere thought of her name. I climbed into the back of the car, door shutting loudly behind me.

Sacrifice

I suddenly felt nauseous, my hands clasping around my mouth. My thoughts were screaming, hands shaking as they pressed against all these secrets, all these horrible truths that persisted in their quest to liberation.

I pushed them down my threat, coughing them down my lungs, spreading them through my veins. I deliberately swallowed the toxin that I knew would kill me.

Better I, than every else.

My body yelled in protest at this deliberate act of self-deprecation. My mind settled as it focused only on self-preservation. My heart beat ferociously, unable to stop circulating the cancer to every corner of myself until it had molded itself permanently within every aspect of my being.

My body, betraying itself, began to shake intensively, unable to handle this feeling.

And it was true. I could imagine no greater sacrifice. These shameful truths would weigh on me until shattered. This awful, desperate feeling would never leave me. I would undergo this consistent battle to protect the greedy, condemn the pure.

I would be wounder, irreparably, carrying these scares within while stumbling through life with the haunted look of a soldier tattooed into my irises.

This desperate war between good and evil, in which I was on the latter, and winning, side would never cease.

The full weight of these secrets settled upon me, my muscles aching against the strain.

And with this pulsing, everlasting pain came only one hope. A hope that this tremendous effort was too much, that I was not strong enough to carry on, that it would not be long before these secrets took my life.

All I had to do was bury it with me.