Kepler 69-c

Flash Fiction Story

Freedom. I can taste it. It tastes like bile and chocolate.
The scent of late night vagina.
You want it, but it reeks.

I’ve worked hard to get here.
Into this cheap, tiny rocket compartment with 5 snoring dutchmen.
Bunkbeds. 3 cubic meters. A shared metal coffin.
Public rocket Falcon-52.

At least they were polite. They knew who was alpha the moment I came through the hatch.
Every group has a pecking order.
In case of a crash they’ll do what I tell them.
And rightfully so.
I just pray they won’t hear me cry my eyes out tonight.
I love you more than anything Sandy.
Leaving you was the hardest thing I have ever done.
I had to cut you from my flesh and I am bleeding heavily. How I wish I could grow old with you. Those nights in white cotton.
Awake until dawn. Our heads full of dreams, doom looming on our doorstep.
The pressure was supposed to make us stronger. Instead, it killed your soul. Your hair thinned and your eyes grew tired.

I never overcame the loss of our baby.
The world was hard I know.

But you should have trusted me, I am a natural leader. I was born that way.

How did you stay blind to that? No child of mine will ever be hungry. I am never hungry. My power is hardwired.
No matter what the naysayers say.

I guess I showed you too much softness. But isn‘t that what relationships are there for?

We all know I can fight.

You should have known the night your lover died. But then you never knew I did it. He shouldn’t have crossed me. I used a poisoned doorknob. There you have it: microabrasions. Too small for a pathologist to detect, big enough to deliver a lethal dose.
It probably stung him a bit. Like the little prickle you got when our lips touched.
Cause of death bone marrow failure. I killed him because I love you. .

We could have lived unburdened. No silent whispers gnawing at the bearing pillars of our subconsciousness. Nothing dismantling our idilic future. The petting zoo that you want. My studio and shrink office on the beach. Three dogs and an army of snotty-nosed children. We would have always made love. On the bed, the couch the kitchen table. In the garden, the pond, in the bushes. On the roof, a bench on the backseat.

After the last time we did it I looked at you and knew : We wouldn’t fuck anymore. The link was cut. Your eyes were empty. I wish it hadn’t been that way, then I needn’t slit my wrists now.

I moved my stuff from our place today.

My paintings, my laptop, my clothes. No more than 2 bags and a few canvases. That is all I own. Unemployed for 6 months yesterday, homeless from today. All my stuff is in this stinky compartment and soaks up the smell of freedom:Methane and butyric acid.

Last night I had no nightmares. That was the first time in weeks. Only the familiar nocturnal panic attack where my larynx contracts and I jump up gasping for air. After the initial fear of death is gone it doesn’t even concern me anymore. It is a short, intense terror but I grant my body the time to wean. My subconscious is psychotic. I can feel it’s unrest. Even while lying still in this coffin.

I have no more luxury goods, the outgrowths of our souls into the material world. No more objects to outsource my personality into.

The things we look to in case we forget who we are. Strip them away and your ego dies.

It is hard to be an island to yourself. Until today I had you. With you, I would have never needed an object again. You defined me, but I changed.

Now there is nothing solid left. No one projecting her self-percepts on me.

I’m going back to Kepler-69c.

Freedom tasted good up there.

Like stars, new worlds, adventures.

And it smelled like romance. In here, there’s only sweat. But I will bear the stink tonight. I grew my wings enveloped. Such is the act of hatching.

Free fall before you can spread them.

And pray that you won’t hit the ground.