Fade Into you

It was time for dinner. The girl with the doll face and the mousy unkept hair was getting ready. She felt timid and her heart was very light. She was very happy. But somewhere in the midst of being happy was the unknowable; the uncertainty. Inside another room Kristoffer was making a phone call. The girl who looked like a doll did not have much of anything to get by and tonight, Kristoffer’s father, Dr. Craven Schroeder would never let her forget how nothingness came. How little she was and how poor she had been. I think it was a Fall semester of how nothingness came to be when Mary remembered how life came to her and nothing good happened it was like the opposite of magic realism, where giving never occurred to her. Nobody gave her anything and Kristoffer rescued her from that life. Tonight, it was time to give. She had no money and she was n a green skirt with a white blouse. Kristoffer kissed her forehead and said he loved her in her new clothes and soon, it was a night only she would remember.

“Don’t worry, he does this every time.” He patted her head reassuringly and before she took on the clothes he had given her, she’d be the one to ask.

“Is this the last time I’ll clean for you? Will I ever see you again after tonight?

Kristoffer did not sit down beside her this time. He did not lean over to kiss her forehead and sing to her in Latin.

“No sweetie.” He said by the door. “Hurry and get dressed.”

Kristoffer sat right next to his father. Dr. Craven Schroeder leaned over to look at her as Mary looked down on her feet. Tonight, they ordered steak and kidney beans.

Snow started falling outside of the restaurant and Dr. Schroeder asked in Latin in his finest suit, “Well, son. Aren’t you going to address her?”

He smiled delightfully at Mary. Mary shakily got the fork and started unwrapping it from the napkin that was folded neatly on the table and put the napkin in her shirt halfway onto her breast. Dr. Schroeder then glanced at her and started speaking in Italian and when she understood a little bit of it, Kristoffer chided her to speak.

“What does your cousin call you?” he asked in Latin.

“She calls me the ugliest one of the bunch.” she replied back.

He looked around as if anyone was looking.

“Where does your father work?” He asked in an American accent.

She smiled.

“My father is a kind of like a cop and I’m very proud of him. He might get promoted too.”

She grinned. She was very happy and suddenly her bowl of soup drenched all over the blouse that Kristoffer gave her.

He had poured it on her. Poor Mary was unable to compete. Kristoffer looked on but she could not speak. Her mouth was dry before she could even touch her soup. Another woman had come to the table in dark blue rompers. She looked highly sophisticated and her hair was down with curls. She had a very nice but warningly calm face as though she were about ready to snap at anybody. She had the look of an American.

“You.” He sighed. “Where is your money?” He demanded.

Mary gaped and he quickly closed her mouth with his own hands.

He grinned. Kristoffer then started flirting with the girl next to Mary.

They had a one-hour conversation before Mary could even leave.

Dr. Craven Schroeder then let Mary out and left her outside to call her father who had almost beat her to death.

It wasn’t then until they had reached the gas station that Mary’s mouth was covered in blood and soup because of her father who kept punching her. Nobody at the gas station would help except for another man who was half-drunk who I suppose was celebrating their son’s liberation into the army.

And so Mary left her father’s homestead and joined the army to become a skilled killer and never looked back.

“Come on Mary! Get your things!” her father said as he kept pushing her to the side in his grey pickup truck.

Kristoffer was at the front door were she knocked and suddenly he said, “Don’t ever come back. I don’t ever wanna see you coming here again. Only to tend the garden if you’re in love with me so much.”

She never really did. Years passed and the garden she tended to. She grew up there exploring the poisons he grew from his hand.

They never talked.

Again.

She grew stronger and saved his family throughout the years. But that mental trauma, the beatings, the angst. still there. While Mary’s mind wandered and she never wanted the feeling again. Only the times where Kristoffer was holding her. Only the times when she felt limp in his arms like a doll. Only the times when her heart leapt up when she was able to see him. Only the times when she ever felt too heavy in his arms. Only the times when he cuddled her. Only the times when he apologized to her and taught her to love the water.

He had been murdered b his maid and it was all Mary could think about.

Only the time when she truly felt wanted.

When all she wanted to do was drown in him.

Forever.

Mary would never forget.

Because she knew that Kristoffer wanted to fade away with her too.