Woman

By: zhakeena (Spare Change)

Woman

I love you

But I must hurt you

To love you more

Yours truly…

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I love her… I really do… but…

Damn… I can’t go through this.

(The man takes the cigarette from his lips. Smoke comes out of his nostrils.)

What would you have done? I have loved this woman for so long… so damn long… it almost hurt to think of her when she’s not with me. Yes… maybe. I loved her so much that I hated the world… the world that could hurt her.

You see… I met this woman during the worst days of my life… I remember… my face was practically kissing the concrete of the parking lot… I had almost lost my job. I was at the verge of insanity at that time.

The sun was beating down violently at my back mercilessly. I didn’t care… I wanted to spontaneously combust and get it over with… but something stopped me.

(Focus on the man sitting in the dim room. Shadows play across him and the room as cars outside pass him by.)

Her shadows stop me. Her hand lain so softly on my shoulder…

She smiled at me. And said my name.

She knew my name since my colleagues had spoken to her previously. She was new and wanted a friend… a friend?

Who would have wanted me as a friend? I am a maggot… crawling… hiding beneath the green blades of grass, wanting to be stepped on by my violent oppressors… man…

She would not have wanted me. She is an angel… my angel.

(Ashes fall on the floor. The man sighs)

My woman.

I cherished her… I cherished her so much…

She never knew, of course. My angel is blissfully unaware of the one she is watching over… but she never fails to save me whenever sadness overcomes me, tired soulless maggot that I am.

A mere touch, a mere word from her lips… it would give me another 4 days to live.

I was dead without her… I felt dead outside her world. I could have lived so much more, if she had only acknowledged my existence. 

I could have lived with that little… a touch, a word, an occasional smile. But…

She never… she never…

(A tear rolls on his cheek. The man doesn’t flinch)

She never returned all that I was prepared to give. She didn’t want to…

How could she have done this to me? She should have known…

In a world full of sorrows, she has connected with another who can share her pains…

Another man…

She should have known how much I had loved her… how much I still love her… how much more I will love her.

She is so sensitive… this world had wounded her so much…

But, I knew that in some sense, she did love me. Maybe it was the world… this cursed world that had the ability to hurt her… that could have deluded her vision. The man she was with—I can see it from his eyes—was nothing. Nothing at all…

Nothing. He doesn’t deserve an angel… my angel…

So…

(Focus on a knife on the floor)

I took the liberty.

(Focus on the blood that surrounds the knife)

I…

(The man smokes again)

I saved my angel… I freed her from this world… this world that hates her.

(Focus on a body behind the man. She is lifeless, her eyes staring into oblivion. Her hands are bound. The man stands up and goes over to her, sits next to her corpse and lovingly strokes her hair.)

So beautiful… my woman is so beautiful.

I know what you’re thinking. I am a criminal… but who was it that invented the term, criminal? Men like you… men who retain the evil in this world.

I didn’t do a crime. I saved somebody…

(His hands grip the knife)

And now… it’s time for my salvation…

(He stabs himself. Moments later, he dies next to his woman.)

-end-