Page 29 of Burn (Two Wheeled Psychos #2)

I’m like a little boy again, before the death of my mother, before the fire licked me, and before the man in my head took over as I watch the whore burn. Everything is quiet except the popping and sizzling of her flesh as her corpse cooks on the tunnel floor.

He's silent, most likely enjoying himself, probably because I am. It’s always quiet when I am at peace, and standing over the trash as it incinerates makes me happy, even if it is just temporary. I can’t imagine myself ever being truly and permanently happy again, and it’s not like it was something I ever thought of before. But with Phoenix gone, now it’ll never happen. I’ll just take these brief moments and be okay with that.

The visions of a wife, family, house, and picket fence that came to me before the explosion seem so far away now. They were fleeting, but still meant so much to me, showing me that maybe deep down inside of me there was something normal, and she had brought that to light. But maybe it was because she was as fucked up as me and I could see us being together forever, our own little version of happily ever after, even if it would have been something unconventional for others.

It’s a shock when a tear builds in the corner of my eye, breaking the tranquility of my “work”.

Don’t be a pussy. Killers don’t cry.

“And you’re back.”

I say, yanking my helmet off my head and wiping at my eye with my gloved finger, staring at the moisture on the leather.

I never left. I’ll never leave you. I’m with you forever.

“What is happening to me?”

I weep, my legs going weak, my knees shaking.

This is temporary. Suck it up.

I’m used to anger, rage, hate, and all the other negative feelings that drive me to do what I do, but this is something else. It’s still negative, but it’s different. It’s sadness and regret. It’s all encompassing, overwhelming, and as my legs give out and I collapse to the dirty ground next to the trash, I cry.

The sobs are violent, shredding my soul as I cry out all the pain and sorrow from the past month. I wail to the ceiling while pulling my hair about how much I fell in love and now how much I miss her. I scream out my misery at finding something so right and losing it so wrongly.

I can’t breathe. It’s not from the fire or the smoke that wraps around me like a blackened hug, it’s from the utter anguish squeezing the organ in my chest, the same chest that still bears the scar from her. The brand she left me with hurts, both physically and emotionally, and I can’t stand the feeling of my clothes brushing against it. It’s like razor blades digging into my soul.

My hands can’t move fast enough to rip open the zipper of my leather jacket. I claw at it, yanking it off, and tossing it into the dirt. My t-shirt is next, the cotton shredding as I grab it by the neck hole and pull it, tearing it down the front, exposing the puckered and reddened scar to the cloud of smoke around me. I bare myself to the fire, to the heat surrounding me, just like I’m bearing my soul as I howl out everything inside of me.

“Phoenix!”

I bellow out her name to the roof above me, like a dying animal.

“Phoenix come back to me!”

She’s gone. Blown up. Dead. It’s just me and you again.

“Phoenix!”

My breath is gone on the final yell, and I can’t keep myself up any longer, falling to my side, I curl up in the fetal position hugging my knees to my chest, and I grieve. For the first time in my life I’m actually grieving my losses, and even though it starts with her and the loss of her love, it morphs into everything I’ve lost in my life.

Enough!

“No.”

This will do you no good.

“I need it.”

No you need to keep working. Get up.

“No.”

Get up.

“No.”

Get the fuck up, you pathetic loser!

“No! No! No!”

I scream so loud that my one word repeats through the tunnel over and over again, echoing off the painted walls, bouncing off the dirt floor, then disappearing into the fire in front of me.

The blaze that should be making me hard and happy, is now only making me worse.

No one ever loved you. Your mother hated you. Your father never stayed around. Phoenix left you too. When are you going to see you don’t deserve love? Me. You deserve me! Now get the fuck up!

“Shut up. I never should have listened to you.”

Never.

“Shut up!”

This is it. If I thought I was crazy before then I’ve gone off the deep end now. He’s incessant in my head, yelling at me, tearing me down even more. The one who I created to keep me company, to be the scapegoat for my feelings and desires has turned on me. He is no longer me. He's now an entity of my own making that’s become real. A real pain in the ass.

“I hate you.”

I wail out to the cavern around me.

“Leave me alone.”

Never.

“Please.”

I whine, holding my hands over my ears trying to block him out, but it no use. You can’t deafen yourself to something that’s inside your head.

It’s hours that I lay on the ground crying, arguing with him, wailing and moaning my misery until I’m exhausted and depleted of everything in me. I’m risking being caught the longer I roll on the ground next to the fire that has long burned out, leaving a pile of stripped, blackened bones and dust.

The part of me that always cared about removing all evidence no longer worries about it. Instead of getting up and crushing the bones to dust with my foot, I leave them where they are, still smoldering a little, and I crawl like a baby, on my hands and knees, dragging my jacket and helmet with me towards my bike. She’ll help me, she has to.

My knees hurt and my palms bleed inside my gloves from the sharp ground by the time I pull myself up on her black frame. The red streaks of paint on her fairings looks like how my heart feels, jagged and bleeding, and I know that if anything in this word can help me vanquish this pain that’s shredding me to pieces it’s her.

“Scream for me. Please.”

I beg my ride as I climb onto her with the last power of will left in me.

“Take it all away.”

I re-dress weakly and turn the key, slapping my visor closed.

“Please baby. Scream for me so I don’t have to.”