He was the love of her life, there was no way their souls were not bound together in the heavens and on earth. Their passion and love for each other was going to inspire generations. It burned hotter than the fire in hottest and deepest abyss of hell. They often talked about their lives together, the lives they were going to live for eternity. They were going to hold hands and float through the universe and galaxies hand in hand and if there truly is a God, He wouldn’t dare separate them.
Suddenly, she realized the fire of their love was dying out. It started when she became aware of her light which was brighter than the biggest star. Her light radiated brighter than their love. He couldn’t believe there was a light that could shine brighter than their love, the love she had for him, he was hurt that she found her light without him and he couldn’t accept this. He started to withdraw more when he noticed the sudden look of realization on the faces of strangers when they saw her, he realized then that he was not the only one who could see that bright light, everyone else did too and that light was brighter than their love. Soon, no one saw their love just her and her light. He decided to move to another who had no light, he searched far and wide, went through so many others with no light until he found the perfect one, the one who he knew will never shine brighter than him or the love they shared.
When he left her for the other, she was lost, he was the love of her life, the one that she had bound her soul to, the one she was going to conquer the earth and the heavens with but, he wanted no part of her light, it was too bright, he wanted to be seen too and he wanted people to see their love but that was not going to happen with the intense burning of her light. The love of her life left her lost and all alone. She screamed and cried to the heavens, broken, how could this happen to her? How could a part of her soul leave her alone? She was not aware of how intense her light was, she thought he took her light with him when he left and she was all alone in the dark, the darkness he left behind. Her tears made her blind to the light all around her.
One night, she stumbled into a dark seedy nightclub, she had been feeling lost and in despair and decided to go out. She spotted this strikingly handsome man as soon as she walked into the club, with her hair disheveled, dark eyeliner mixed with mascara running down the side of her cheeks and the smell of cigarette on her breath. As soon as she spotted him, he spotted her and was instantly drawn to her. People were always drawn to her, it was her light. As they made their way to each other, they met in the middle of the dance floor in this seedy dark place. They reached out to each other as if they were in a trance and he pulled her to him and gave her a long deep kiss, she felt nothing. He was not him, her heart, the one who left her in the darkness she couldn’t find her way out of. She felt like she was having an out of body experience and she was watching herself kiss somebody else, she did not recognize this person, this broken person.
They decided to leave the club together, they had not spoken a word to each other. She led him to her car and they drove in silence to her apartment. When they got into the elevator of her apartment building they reached for each other and they tore at each other, kissing each other deeply, drawing each other close, clawing at each other like they were trying to tear their human bodies apart so that their spirits could touch each other; that was the type of intimacy she knew, the soul touching kind.
When they got into her apartment, he started to rip her clothes off, with her panties ripping, it woke something up within her, her senses returned, what was she doing? Who is this? Why am I doing this? She immediately became aware of the mistake she was making and she whispered, “stop”. He didn’t hear her properly, she whispered again, he heard her faintly but he didn’t stop, she started screaming at him “Stop! Stop! Please stop!” But he didn’t, she felt a sharp pain rip through her body, he slammed her on the cold marble floor, she knew she was in trouble, she tried to push him off but she was too weak and he was too strong, as she turned her head to her left, ready to accept what ever was coming next she spotted it, her award, a weirdly shaped glass award she received for being an outstanding business woman. She focused on the award and gathered her remaining strength and thoughts. She thought to herself, was this the universe telling her she didn’t have to lay like a dead bitch and accept this horror? She did not know where the strength came from, maybe it was pain, maybe it was hope, she did not know, but she got the strength, picked up the award and struck him on the head.
His lifeless body fell on top of her, she let his body lay on hers for a little while. Blood was dripping from his head onto her lips and she loved the smell, the sticky feel, she licked it and could taste the life leaving his body. After 10 minutes, she pushed him off her and sat up, she felt powerful, she had taken a life, the way her life was taken away from her by the love of her life. Is this how he felt when he left her and broke her heart into a million pieces? She thought to herself. She liked this feeling; it was intoxicating.
While she sat there on the cold floor looking at the stranger’s lifeless body, she wondered what to do with the body and the greatest idea came to her, a laugh involuntarily escaped her bloody lips. The universe had given her a gift, she knew no bad deed went unpunished and the universe just gave her the ultimate reward for all her pain and she had a backstage pass to this production. She stood up and went into her storeroom to pick up the cleaver that had been used to cut up the cow at her New Year Party, got out plastic bags and went back into the sitting room. She started to hack away for hours, cut up his body in pieces and packed them up in bags. She cleaned up her apartment with bleach, took a shower, dressed in a black t-shirt and packed her hair up in a messy up do.
................At noon, she had a few friends over, she had cooked pasta and was entertaining, something she had not done in a long time, even her friends were surprised and happy that she was getting her groove back.. She was drinking a glass of wine, her mood was upbeat, her eyes were the brightest they had been in months since her heart was broken. She was watching the news, expecting a story to come up on the screen, , And then she saw his face on her screen, BREAKING NEWS! LAWYER CAUGHT TRYING TO DISPOSE HACKED BODY AROUND AJAH LAGOS. Every body turned to look at her, her friend Folake asked, “Is that not….?” And she looked at her, feigned shock and replied, “ It appears so! My word! Thank God for saving me from such a murderous monster!” . Everyone hugged her and had words of encouragement, telling her how lucky she was that she escaped him and how he was a monster and she deserved better, “Good riddance” some people exclaimed, she played the part of the consoled broken hearted girl.
Her friends stayed on a while and then left, she was finally alone in her apartment. As she closed the door after the last guest, she stared at herself in the hallway mirror and had a flash back to earlier in the day……….. She was staring at herself in the hall way mirror, wearing her black t-shirt and messy up do, her eyes were dark and she had a menacing smile on her lips, she was done fighting the darkness and she allowed it to finally shroud her being, her core was now wrapped with darkness and she loved the feeling, she could feel something leaving her, she did not know, but that was her light leaving her as darkness and light cannot dwell together. She was different, she spun with glee and she put her plan in motion.
She loaded the luggage carrier with the plastic bags and wheeled them to her elevator, because she lived in the pent house she had private access to the elevator and a private car park, it was easy getting from her apartment to her car, and because of this, no one saw them arrive together and no one was seeing her leave. She knew where she was going, it was like vengeance was her natural GPS, she had not been there in months but she knew her way to his house, the house where he now lived with the one he left her for, the house where both of them had planned to start their lives together.
She saw his car in the drive way, she knew her way around locks, opening his trunk was easy. He didn’t have neighbours and she had the cloak of darkness to complete her mission successfully without attracting any attention. She loaded all the plastic bags and made her way to a corner from his estate. She sat in the darkness, waiting for sunrise, she knew he would leave his house to run errands and she waited patiently.
As soon as she saw him drive out of his estate around noon, she knew what to do, she called the police with a burner phone and tipped them off, that she just witnessed a man load his trunk and he was being shifty. Now, she knew if he were stopped, he would have looked surprised at the discovery made in his trunk and would have been able to convince them he was innocent. So, next step, she called him. As soon as he heard her voice, he knew it was her. Hearing her voice made him realize how much he had missed her and how he was planning to leave the one he was with to go back to her, he couldn’t do without her and he was ready to endure being scorched by her light just to be by her side. She was his soul, his heart and he couldn’t wait to tell her. Before he could say anything, she spoke. She told him how she was going to destroy his life and break his life apart the way he broke hers. She told him she left something for him in his trunk that will make him burn in hell, the eternal hell he had put her in “hope you like fire? We are going to burn in this eternal flame for all eternity” and she hung up.
He parked his car to check what was in his trunk, he had smelt something funny earlier but was not in a hurry to check for the source of the smell. When he opened his trunk, he saw the black plastic bags, the smell coming from them was putrid. He tore one bag open and an eye rolled out, at first he thought it was an animal, but he looked closer at the contents of the bag and saw a hand, a human hand, he shrieked. He started throwing the bags out of his car and that was where the police found him, when he was caught, he was too numb to protest, he knew karma had found him, he knew the universe was punishing him for putting out her light and indeed they were both going to burn for it, he screamed out in pain, he cried, cried for his loss, the life they could have had, the life he destroyed.
Photographer : Funke Afolabi
Styling and Art Direction : Funke Afolabi
Make up : Tochi Kanu-Ivi
Model : Shirley Erijo
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