Purgatory | Teen Ink

Purgatory

October 20, 2013
By aubergine SILVER, Missouri City, Texas
aubergine SILVER, Missouri City, Texas
5 articles 0 photos 0 comments

Favorite Quote:
"You don't have to love me, you already did." -- R. Ross


Frigid. Black water sloshing over eroded boulders. An endless ocean stretching out to touch the horizon in the distance. Small feet (dainty, like a child's) shrouded by a long, gauzy black veil made of the finest organza. She gazes out at the ocean, letting the icy air burn her lungs and cut into her exposed skin.

Modesty dies along with its human counterpart. Her fragile, skeletal body is bare, spare the sheer cloth.

She likes the way her body looks, and she touches it all the time, running her hands over her skin and through her hair. She's soft and sweet smelling, unlike all the other bodies she'd come across. She wrinkles her nose in remembrance. They had been falling apart, their decomposing skin emitting a sickly odor. Nasty excuses for humans.
The waves continue to crash against the foot of the cliff, a hundred feet below her, effectively distracting her from the unpleasant thoughts that invade her pretty head.

She begins to sing a song, a simple number she remembers from her childhood. Her voice intermingles with the sound of the storm brewing in the ocean below. Her feet hang off the edge of the cliff, swinging back and forth, toes pointed. She flexes the muscles in her calves.

She wonders how it would feel to jump from the cliff. To fall, to fly? Would she fly? She ponders that for a moment, cocking her head and staring at the sun with squinted eyes. No, she figures she wouldn't. She would fall to the jagged rocks below, and the waves would beat her body until she was unrecognizable. She shudders at the thought.

A gust of wind catches hold of her from behind, causing her shroud to dance around her. She panics, gripping it tightly in one hand. Her knuckles turn white. Her fair hair whips around to conceal her face. She screws her eyes shut.
A clock inside of her is counting down. Every heartbeat is another tick, bringing her closer and closer to The End. Her time here is drawing to a close.

She carefully draws her legs to her body and stands, her back erect and her knees locked. She firmly tucks the black cloth around her body, as if she has a shred of decency left to protect. Something inside of her snaps. The clock has stopped its metronomical ticking. She stares up at the sun and lets out a roar.


Her shrill, primal scream of anger is every feeling she's had since she's died personified into one broken yell. If anyone could hear it (which no one could. The girl was alone in this place), their blood would turn to ice. It was blood curdling, raw. In that moment, she was an animal.
The horrible sound doesn't die until the girl takes a final step and plummets from the cliff towards the dark water below, her stomach leaping up into her throat, her eyes slipping closed.
Just as she predicted, her body bashes against the stone. She breaks. Her hair quickly becomes matted with her lifeblood, her ichor. Her sweet song echoes out over the ocean, and remnants of a verse is audible to the nonexistent audience one final time.

The girl's limp form was swept out to sea. No one would ever know her story, her aspirations.

Like clockwork, another person (a young man) hobbles to the top of the peak and sits, letting his feet hang over the edge and waits for his fate to be decided.


The author's comments:
Dedicated to T.D.

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This article has 2 comments.


amyrory said...
on Oct. 25 2013 at 7:37 pm
amyrory, Central Point, Oregon
0 articles 0 photos 7 comments

Favorite Quote:
EVERY AUDREY HEPBURN QUOTE EVER.

Beautiful.

on Oct. 25 2013 at 3:52 pm
weedzy_baby BRONZE, Littleton, Colorado
1 article 0 photos 1 comment
Wow. I wish I could write like that!