Devastation | Teen Ink

Devastation

August 14, 2010
By thelizzielynn BRONZE, Trinity, Texas
thelizzielynn BRONZE, Trinity, Texas
2 articles 0 photos 4 comments

Favorite Quote:
Books are sometimes more real to your heart than reality itself.


My eyes squinted, adjusting to the bright morning sun, as I exited the lab where I worked. I instinctively look both ways as I cross the parking lot towards my small gas-efficient car. The white paint-job causes a sharp glare as the morning sun continues to rise higher as the rest of the world’s day began and mine ended. I never really was a day person. I preferred to work all night and sleep all day, but here lately my job had me up all hours of the day and night. I was lucky enough to go home at all.

I’m not trying to complain; I’m really not. I love my job. I am a scientist on the brink of a major medical discovery. If my theories and testings are correct, I could create a antivirus that could cure all forms of diseases and viruses in one shot. I loved my job for that, but it kept me away from him. The one who’d taken my heart from the moment we’d met over three years ago. I used to consider quitting just for him. I dreamt of having kids and becoming a stay at home mom, but that changed when I discovered the formula that could save man kind for the rest of eternity. Still, I knew he was lonely; I was barely ever home and I missed him. I know he missed me.

Today was our anniversary and it would be perfect. Tonight we would talk and I‘d fix our marriage. I would tell him my plan to leave my findings in the hands of my team and take the summer off. I’d been working non-stop for seven months while my colleagues took vacations. It’s time I took mine. We aren’t any closer to the antivirus than we were three month’s ago. A month’s vacation wouldn’t change anything, except the relationship between my husband and I.

I stop at a red light a few blocks from our apartment and spot his favorite coffee shop across the intersection. A smile creeps across my face. The light turned green. I crossed the intersection and turned straight into a parking spot. I’d start his day off with his favorite coffee and donuts waiting for him when he wakes. Today would start out nice and end great. I would make sure of it. I wouldn’t let the smile waver from my face for anything.
***

With the coffee in one hand and the bag of donuts clenched between my teeth, I used my other hand to unlock our apartment door. After what seemed like forever, still smiling, I wrenched open the door and walked inside. I set the keys down on the table by the door and grabbed the bag of donuts from my mouth. Saliva coated a small portion of the paper bag, but that didn’t matter.

I made my way towards the kitchen where I set the donuts down along with my own coffee cup. Turning in step towards the hallway, his coffee still in hand, I heard something. I listened harder and heard it again. It was a quiet, and girlish giggle coming from the bedroom. Our room. A mistress? I ask myself. Could he be cheating on me, after three years of marriage? I brushed away the thought immediately. He couldn’t; he wouldn’t. It was his sister. Maybe he’d told me she’d be coming down today, and I hadn’t heard him. Yes, that was it. It was the only explanation. Clenching my empty fist, and holding tightly to his coffee in the other hand, I opened the door. Praying I would find his short and stout sister, Louisa, giggling over their childhood together, I greeted him, "Jonathon, I got you coffee and donuts, after I left the lab."

Devastation. The only word that could describe the moments that followed. I looked towards the bed, knowing I would find his, supermodel gorgeous, secretary in a deep and passionate kiss with my husband. The man I devoted my life to, maybe just not enough. Maybe I wasn’t enough. I closed my eyes and breathed in deeply. I couldn’t even hear his pleads. His lips moved, but no sound reached my ears. My thoughts were spinning out of control. My life was over. I couldn’t survive this blow. It was too much to handle. Through the silence, I heard a voice. It told me what to do. I dragged my self to the closet, he kept a hand gun in the closet incase of emergencies. This seemed like an emergency.

I take a deep breath and took one last look at them. They are terrified; I can see the looks on their faces, yet I still could hear nothing. I could read the begging on his lips. "Rachelle, please!" he repeated. I lifted the gun towards my own temple. My finger glided over the trigger and began to squeeze, and in the last second I turned it straight for his heart. He’d ripped my heart to shreds, and I’d shot his to pieces. I dropped the gun. I’d kept my promise: the smile had not wavered from my own lips. I could taste the blood that had splattered onto my face. I watched as his lover screamed in horror and scrambled over his lifeless body.

I calmly left the room as she began to dial 911 in a panicked voice shaking with horror. When I reached the kitchen I picked up my coffee and threw it into the trash before sitting own and opening the bag of his donuts. I dipped my hand into the bag and pulled out a glazed donut. After taking a bite out of the donut, I lifted the lid of his coffee, still in my hand. I dunked the remaining bits of donut into his coffee and ate them before drinking the rest of it in one gulp. I should have felt pain from it, yet I didn’t.

I could see the horror in their eyes, as the cops burst through the door to find me sitting there calmly with a blood-splattered smile. The fear radiated off of them as my calamity continued. I let them handcuff me and read me my rights through their horrified tones. I was not crazy, as they suspected. Only devastated traumatically into the happiness I ever so longed for.


The author's comments:
A tiny bit gruesome I will warn you, but to write a story like this you can't help but get your pen a little dirty. I enjoyed writing this, which probably says some things about me haha. My friend gave me a prompt one day on a middle-aged overworked woman who came home to her cheating husband. Many would probably have given her a tear-jerking ending, I gave her a mentally-unstable ending, and I don't regret it.

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This article has 5 comments.


on Dec. 11 2010 at 6:09 pm
whatshername GOLD, Carlsbad, California
14 articles 1 photo 112 comments
this is very good

on Sep. 1 2010 at 2:50 pm
thelizzielynn BRONZE, Trinity, Texas
2 articles 0 photos 4 comments

Favorite Quote:
Books are sometimes more real to your heart than reality itself.

that is alright. XD Sometimes the simplest of words can mean SO much.

kohakus SILVER said...
on Aug. 31 2010 at 12:40 am
kohakus SILVER, Ajax, Other
9 articles 0 photos 6 comments

Favorite Quote:
"Like stones, words are laborious and unforgiving, and the fitting of them together, like the fitting of stones, demands great patience and strength of purpose and particular skill."
-Edmund Morrison

I loved this.

I don't know what else to say.


on Aug. 28 2010 at 1:08 am
thelizzielynn BRONZE, Trinity, Texas
2 articles 0 photos 4 comments

Favorite Quote:
Books are sometimes more real to your heart than reality itself.

thank you very very much. I'm glad I kept it suspenseful. I feel the more real we make our characters and the more surprising things we make happen is what makes a story interesting, and I would love to read yours.

on Aug. 26 2010 at 9:43 am
NeverCaredForKool-Aid GOLD, Elkridge, Maryland
13 articles 0 photos 531 comments

Favorite Quote:
I don't believe in hell but I believe in my parent's couch-- Watsky

I'm so glad I read this.  I was looking for something good to read, and I found it.  This was amazing, esspecially the end.  I read your "thoughts on the story" before i read the acctual story, so I was expecting an interesting end to the story.  And yet- it caught me off guard.  This story was really good.  I loved your description blah blah blah... o whatever all the normal things that writers write in this were very good.  But there was something extra in this that made it special.  You characters were so real.  I loved how the emotion you write felt so authentic.

This was great.

Can you check out my story,"Encounter"?