m.a.d.
by papirini
Why did it have to end up like this?
I can feel my essence drain from me,
the longer I remain in this body. There's pain, but it lessens with
each moment that I draw closer to the end. I know I don't have long
left; I can see the blood on my hands, around my torso, and scattered
about on the floor.
It's hard to remove that stain from the
ground, let alone the one that has tarnished my soul.
It's hard to accept that I am to blame
for this crime, but I realize that must accept it. It is because of
me that you, and all my friends, had to follow me down this road. I
regret the actions that I've done.....
What have I done? Fallen in love? How
is that a crime?
That in another time, another place,
even another world....when we were different in most ways, perhaps
there was a problem then. We were forbidden to see one another
because of those differences. The prejudices of our races kept us
apart; even before you were born I knew I was never allowed to love a
man of your kind without repercussions.
Yet I fell in love with you.
For centuries I was all alone. None of
the men on my world mattered to me in that way. They were all
required to scrape and bow to me, to simply follow my commands. Even
the suitors brought to me for marriage saw me as a statue, a delicate
relic, the girl one had to worship and to please. I could never
invite one of them to be my companion, to share a bed with me, to
even hold me; they were too shallow, too empty of life.
Not like you. You were a mortal,
only human. You were a creature among those masses that I was
destined to outlive and outshine. You would have likely died before I
had even begun to ascend to my mother's throne. You were nothing in
my people's eyes, even though you were royal yourself. If I mingled
with you, I would bring disaster to everyone.
That was why I somehow fell in love
with you. It started out as a fleeting infatuation, I admit; it
didn't start out with the passion that it ended with. I had wanted
danger in my life. I was young and wanted to take a chance, have a
fling with whomever I wanted. So many years had passed, so many years
of being sheltered. I became such a rebel, nothing could deter me
from having you. You were young and handsome, and I wanted you.
I had told myself, the day your picture
was shown to me, that I would be with you, even for a small amount of
time, to see what you were. I promised, even as my mother dismissed
you as a suitable candidate for me, that I should play the game with
you, as all other women had before me.
It took me many days, many weeks, to
plan what I would do with you. I decided to come to you in all my
glory. I picked the best dress I had for seduction – a loose
white gown with a red and gold trim, long spiral sleeves, and bare
shoulders. I picked red roses from my mother's garden and pinned them
throughout the strands of my hair, allowing the loose petals to fall
on the floor in my wake like a nymph. I covered my eyelids with the
lightest pink, and tinged my lips with the most luscious red
lipstick.
And as slumber came to my people and
yours, I descended down, gently, like an angel, and came to you in
your forests. You were alone, hunting for nocturnal meat; you had
strayed from your party to find better prey, and you smelled of your
sweat. So I made my move, then and there; the roles reversed, and it
was I descended on you with claws unsheathed, waiting for the
primitive man to respond to me in kind.
But something happened when I did so.
Instead of worshiping me, instead of a counterattack in kind, you
simply smiled and took my hand, kissing it. Such a gentleman, you
introduced yourself by your true name, a name I never forgot.
Endymion.
From that moment on, I realized you
were different; you weren't scared of me, you didn't ravish me like I
thought a mortal like you would. You saw beyond the mere moon girl,
beyond the moon princess, beyond the immortal witch and everything
else you had been taught of me by your peers.....and saw the woman
that I wanted to become.
It was the first time I had ever felt
loved in that way. It aroused so much within me that I could barely
even speak properly by the end of our first meeting. It was never
intended to be more than a simple encounter. How it changed so
quickly after that.
How I changed.
We were doomed from that day on, but I
didn't care. I loved you. I loved everything about you. You were so
warm, and kind, and beautiful. You made me want to be better,
and not just for you, but for everyone. Everything you did to me, for
me....the way you talked, the way you smiled, the way you held me in
your arms, and how we lay together on those long, cold nights....
I was the only woman in the universe in
your eyes. And that was why we were destroyed. I was silly to think
there weren't rivals. Like vipers waiting in the shadows waiting to
hiss unkind words into eager ears, they surrounded us, knowing our
crime, knowing what was to become of us. But I didn't want to believe
that our love was a crime. It couldn't be such a terrible thing to
feel like someone cared for you, and I couldn't bear the thought that
there could be anyone else for you but me.
But it was. We had to meet in secret to
save our people from harm, and even that was sacrilegious. All that
was right for me and you was wrong for everyone else. So for our
actions - for my transgression which began the affair - I was forced
to watch you die for me.
Then I died, alone, by my own hand. I
couldn't bear life anymore.
All that we did to save ourselves from
fate meant nothing in the end. It means nothing, for it is
ending again, just as it had last time in the old world. It is almost
laughable how much these two deaths are alike.
Now, as I feel myself slip away from
your arms again, I know it is my curiosity that has killed you once
more. It could have been different this time. We were both humans
this time, with nothing I could have been my plain old self, the self
I had before all the evil queens, and the crazy men, and possessed
statues and scary monsters and sailor soldiers and......and.....when
they came along.....
...I couldn't have beard thinking of a
life without you, and you without me. That is why it must happen just
as it did in our old lives. That is why we always pay for our sins,
no matter whether they occurred in this life or not.
That is why I had to destroy you. So
that no one else may take me from your arms. So you will know nothing
of regret, so that it may all hang on my heart.
Because in destroying you, I destroy
myself.
I loved you. I still love you, and I
always will love you. That will never, ever change.
And for that, I welcome you once more,
my beloved, to our mutually assured destruction.
FIN
