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Autumn nights haunted him the most. Crisp leaves falling off trees. The smell of spices in the air. The cold felt the same outside as it did in his cell. When the wind blew, those memories left a chill in his spine that was impossible to shake away. Seven years in captivity and he never imagined he’d feel the fresh air on his skin again. It feels wrong, sinful even to defy his death wish. Maybe that’s why his mind would take him back to cold imprisoned memories, to bring him back to where he was supposed to be. When he walked the busy streets of the city, sometimes he could hear the clanking of chains or the rabble of the other prisoners. Though every time he looked, they were never there. There were bikes riding in their lane and noisy conversations of passersby minding their business. And he was just a man on his way to work.
Prosecuting was one of the few passions Simon had left. Still is. Was. Still is. He couldn’t make up his mind. But there are cases too similar to that day.
Those often didn’t land on his desk. When they did, the chief prosecutor made certain it didn’t stay for long. He was always told that those cases didn’t end the way his did, but the thoughts still lingered. So did the feeling it carried. The chill of his inevitable execution still echoed in his skull, but it had nowhere to go. No ground to plant itself on. Not since his trial.
He has enough common sense to know he’s not on death row anymore. He’s not still bound by iron shackles. He knows that he is a free man. But what free man is still haunted by seven year old bloodstains that refuse to be washed away?
The thought kept him awake at night in his bed. He turned his head from the patterns on the ceiling to glance at his alarm clock. The red numbers illuminated the room. 12:10 am. 10/8/28.
The bed frame groaned under his weight as he stumbled to his small bathroom. The red numbers were burned into his retina. Everything looked red. He didn’t bother to turn on the lights. Everything was red. He felt for the sink’s knob to turn the water on. His hands were red.
Who would have thought the woman to have had so much blood in her?
The water was cold. It felt freezing compared to the warmth of his hands. His blood felt warm, and so did hers. But the water was red too. Everything was red and Simon was a young boy again.
He hadn’t enough time to wash the blood from his hands when the police arrested him. Even when the blood had cooled, it felt alive. Even when it was dried on like a second layer of skin, it was warm. When the police had taken a sample of it to document, a piece of him had chipped away too. It left a single clean spot. He couldn’t stop staring at it. Like he’d just realized he had a hand underneath.
He was standing in front of the paltry sink in his cell. He was in his apartment’s crapped bathroom. He’s 21. He’s 29. His hair barely tickles the back of his neck. It reaches halfway down his back. His cheeks are stained with tears.
Once he washed his hands, the evidence of his crime would be gone. He could smell the rotten iron on his hands, a scent that no perfume in the world could cover. The only proof were the scenes he saw whenever his eyes blinked. Forget sleep. Metis would sleep enough for the both of them.
A rational part of his mind quietly knew he couldn’t keep the grisly reminder forever. The other part screamed that he needed to remember exactly what had happened. What he had done. He didn’t kill Metis, but her blood is on his hands all the same. Athena had a mother. Where is she now? Was she still just as bloody as he was? Will she ever wear her favorite sweater again without feeling the burning sensation of her mother’s blood? Will he ever wear his hands again?
Simon couldn’t take it anymore. His thoughts swirled until they made him unbearably sick. He needed relief. He needed to be clean. Of sin, of murder, of the blood on his hands. In a blur, he turned the sink’s knob and led his shaking hands under the water. The blood was wet again and everything that happened in the last 24 hours flashed in front of his eyes. His heart sped up and ached in his chest. He started scrubbing. And once he started, he couldn’t stop.
It wouldn’t come out. Even as diluted blood ran down the side of the sink into the drain, the blood on his hands wouldn’t leave. He scrubbed hard, until his hands started to shake and beg for mercy. There was still one spot left. It needed to come out. Out, out, out.
Suddenly, the red disappeared.
It was dark and cold in Simon’s bathroom. It was only through the moonlight spilling softly through the tiny window that he could make out any shape at all. His face and back felt slick with panicked sweat that made the fervor under his skin cool. When he turned on the light, Simon could see what was really there. A man with bloodshot eyes and red cheeks with the aftermath of fat tears dripping from his chin.
He looked down at his hands. They were still shaking, painful, and red. But there was no blood on his hands. Just painful, angry, self-inflicted scratches.