I did my best. I really did. I answered all his questions the best I could, but now I can feel the sweat dripping down my back and catching in the curve of the belt of my pants. The air is thick and its smell is suffocating me successfully. If I am going to be sitting here for any longer I think I might pass out. I politely ask the detective if we"re done with the questions, give him my number for any further contact, then without waiting for his goodbye, run out of the room. I don't even take my time to say goodbye to the people in the waiting room or the receptionist, I just put on a coat and run into the rain outside.
The air feels so fresh and cold and delicious. If I owned an umbrella I would have probably just walked home listening to the sound of rain – but I don't. I live in Arizona. It never rains here. I wonder the last time I remember that the weather was just plain rainy. Not that a storm occurred or a hurricane. Just plain old depressing rain. I stand on the corner of the police station and feel the water slowly getting through my coat. I wonder if I should call my mom and tell her how the rain feels like my emotions do currently, so pessimistic and without changes. But she might not understand the occurrence of my philosophical thoughts, how much they mean to me and how they help me to cope with the world. I get awakened from my daydreaming by the feeling of the raindrops dripping from my hair, and it somehow feels healing.
What I really need right now is a cigarette. I know I almost suffocated 5 mins ago, but as cliche as it sounds, it scared the hell out of me and I need a smoke. I pull a pack of cigarettes out of my jacket pocket and find the lighter in the very bottom of my bag. As if being a part of the interrogation process for the murder of my ex and my lungs almost giving up on me isn’t enough for the day to make it bad, now I can't light my cigarette. The lighter lights up on my fifth try and the cigarettes are on the edge of being too soggy from the rain falling on my coat. For some reason I get overstimulated, my fucking cigarette won’t burn, I can hear people across the street coming towards me. The baby's cries are getting louder and I can smell the perfume, the special scent grandmas wear as they are coming closer to their eighties.
The rain on my skin doesn’t feel refreshing anymore but just cold. My fingers feel frozen and when I finally light a cigarette I can't even hold it to my mouth properly because my knuckles hurt. I focus on the smoke coming from my mouth, how elegantly it bounces up in a gray cloud and then gets torn down by the rain.
Oh, how I hate the smell of cigarettes. Especially the one at late-night New Year’s parties, because apparently, people have nothing better to do than continuously smoke for hours. And then your coat forever smells like a mixture of sad faces waiting for the clock to strike midnight, and realizing they again have no one to kiss. I’m glad I gave up smoking a few years ago. I don’t really remember why I started in the first place. I think a pack of smokes one day somehow ended up in my pocket and it seemed like a cool thing to do. But now the horrible smell lingers in the air all around me. It lingers in the air in front of the police station. Ah yes, police. The word doesn’t sound so scary once you realize that they’re currently having a hearing with all the possible suspects on this new Travis Alexander case, and you weren’t put on the list. It’s almost sad how you didn’t even cross their minds, when in fact you’re the one they’re after.
As I unlock my apartment door I put on some music and think to myself that baking banana bread for the funeral is a very thoughtful gesture. I am not the best cook but I chose the easiest recipe I could find on the internet, I bought all of the ingredients and have a strong faith in myself. The weird concoction of eggs with mashed bananas and chunks of baking soda is baking in my oven, so I focus on putting the flowers I have bought in a cute bouquet. I won't be putting them on the grave but rather to Travis’s mother, who was nice to me all the years I had been dating her son. I have never really understood the overwhelming attention given to the dead instead of their grieving family members, so if I can change that even a little bit, I will. I am not sure how much of the stem you are supposed to cut off at the bottom of the flower to make them stay fresh longer, so I just eyeball it a little bit.
While arranging flowers I am not a part of human conversations, phone calls, meetings at my job or traffic, and whenever this certain type of quietness comes into my life I start thinking. I can't run away from my thoughts, but rather I have to face them. I think that the constant busyness makes me feel numb to all emotions, positive and negative. Since the death of a person that meant a lot to me I haven't really laughed genuinely, but neither did I cry for longer than three hours altogether. I am not sure if there’s something wrong with me or the people around me, but we had mutual friends and despite never being in a romantic relationship with him they seem to be grieving more intensely than I am. The flow of my thoughts is becoming darker and darker, I start thinking about my loneliness and pushing people away, if I ever even properly loved him and if I was ever even loved by him. Then I break down.
The pictures are in my hand, which is under my coat, as I slowly make my way towards the casket. I have been longing to do this since the night Travis was lying on the ground, covered in nothing but blood. I need my revenge. I feel my pulse speeding up with every step I take. Just moments before I reach the casket, I feel my palms getting sweaty. I grip onto the photos. I grip the knife harder. I now see his lifeless body for the last time. He looks almost peaceful. Almost as if he doesn’t deserve to be here.
"YOU DIDN'T DESERVE TO LIVE THIS LIFE ANYHOW", I say to him as he is trying to get some air, but it never reaches his lungs – they are filled with blood already. And I look at the knife, still inches deep in his stomach. The handle is still drenched in sweat and his forehead is too. I wipe my hands on my jeans not to leave any sweat marks on the photos, any signs to trace them back to me. I lay them gently on his chest and close his hands around them. The funeral should begin in a few hours. I will be back for the scandal.
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