This is a rewrite of a short story I wrote a looong time ago (some of you may remember reviewing the early version a while back). I'm currently searching for some competitions to enter it...in the meantime, I'd like some feedback on it! Thanks in advance for any reviews.
*Rated 12+ for some potential disturbing themes
Dearly Beloved
I am sitting right now in some sort of health institution; a medical man will be here soon to give me an examination. He shall not remove my journal or pen from me if I can help it, though. I feel very sick at heart, but I must impart my observance of the night’s evil deeds.
It does not seem so long ago that I was sitting in my high-backed chair by our little fireplace. I remember, as if in a dream, writing in this very journal by the illumination of the lively flames in the garret.
The night was a cold one; not long ago, I was out there, returning from my pallid job of store clerk. I was the last man to lock up the place, and hurried through the cobbled London streets to the little abode that I call home.
My journey was only briefly interrupted by another human: a fellow worker returning to his own dwelling, his red nose protruding from behind the scarf wrapped around his face. His eyes flickered at me momentarily, scrutinized me minutely, and then he nodded politely and passed. The only sentiment I felt for him was pity, for he did not have the joyful expectancy as I did, knowing that she was waiting at home for me.
Ah! My darling—the reason I am here now, the cause of my acute distress. And where is she now—but no, I must not think of it.
Upon my entrance from the windswept street into my haven of a home, I found her waiting for me. I shall never forget that sight, and must record it here, though it interrupts the flow of my narrative. Indeed, it is quite worth it.
My darling is beautiful; her exterior is smooth, white—almost pale, yet still a lovely hue nonetheless—and lustrous. Her dark eyes are large, hypnotizing depths into which I often find myself being drawn, as if by some otherworldly force. Her figure is tall and extremely thin. Though she does not speak anymore, she still uses her mouth to spread joy—namely, by smiling at me, her pearls of teeth glistening in the light, with a warmth and tenderness that makes my heart quicken.
It was with one of these such smiles I was greeted with upon my arrival home tonight. I stepped to her; our fingers intertwined; I brought her hands to my face, reveling in her cool touch.
Your face is cold.
She did not say it aloud, with words, but I knew that is what she conveyed to me with her eyes.
No matter, I said in a similar manner. I will warm myself by the fire.
’Tis a wondrous thing indeed to have this unspoken communication, something that can only come from the years and intimacy of a relationship like ours.
We ate supper in relative silence; it was a comfortable quietude into which we were both plunged. I paid no mind to the cool, watery broth in my mouth that sufficed for our meal; poverty might have stricken us, but what mattered that? I have—nay, had her, and that was all I needed for true happiness—now it is bereft from me.
I remember when I first saw her youthful face smiling at me, ensnaring me with her alluring eyes and the beauty that shone from within. She was the love of my life, I knew.
Two years after our first meeting, at the ages of nineteen and two-and-twenty, we were happily married.
The sight of her face at the window was what kept my spirits alive as I returned from the dreary grayness of the mills. Hers was the cheerfulness that had kept me also joyous in our hardest times of struggle.
And when she succumbed to the raging sickness that swept our town, she was the one who encouraged me not to despair. I stayed by her side constantly, a guardian day and night, warding off the plague that so desperately tried to take her from me.
Those weeks of toil, pain, and depression finally came to an end. During that time I had become almost a hermit; never eating or sleeping, never leaving her side. She was the only reason for me to live.
One morning, as I rose from a deep slumber into which I had fallen beside her bed, I found her eyes fixed upon me, a smile lurking at the corner of her mouth. I felt quite mad with relief; she was all right; she would stay with me yet.
I cared not that I was lacking in a job now, nor that we were soon evicted. She was able still to smile at me, and that was all that mattered. It was an easy matter finding a suitable shelter that we could call home, situated on the corner of Emptiness, away from the bustle of society.
Proudly, I had carried my sweet one, delicate from the illness that had so ruthlessly wracked her small frame, into our new abode. Setting her down onto the single bed, I had met her gaze and promised her, “No matter what, we will always have each other.”
She had smiled in reply. I know.
And now—it grieves me to continue with this account. I would fain leave this journal behind with my simple, pleasant tidings, with just a memory of the happier days, before this accursed night. But the truth must be known. I know not to whom this journal will fall into the hands of, but I shall endeavor to expose the one who is truly at fault—the man who is mad beyond doubt.
My darling and I were sitting peacefully by the fire, in a quiet serenity that was quickly shattered by an invasion of our home. It was none other than the man I had passed in the streets this evening, during my return to my house. I did not recognize him then, but he had evidently remembered my face; he used to be one of my closest compatriots, whom I have not seen for years.
Tonight he barged into our home, followed by the constable and two of his men.
“This man is mad,” he said, pointing at me. “Here he has been living all his days, in this hovel, believing it to be a palace, with that!”
And he pointed at my beloved with a wretched finger!
“He needs medical attention; it’s a miracle he hasn’t frozen to death out here in this barren wasteland during the blizzard.”
The constable stepped forward then with a stern expression upon his normally blank face. “Come with me,” he ordered.
I rose angrily, and it took the constable and his two men to drag me away from my dear’s side. “I will not leave my wife!” I cried, turning to her.
She could only stare at me, her eyes wide.
“You’ve gone raving mad,” my former friend—now, greatest enemy—cried. “That—thing—is not your wife anymore!”
I froze; my faculties seemed numbed, as if in disbelief of what they had just heard.
The traitor could not stop the flow of words pouring from his mouth. “Your wife died a decade ago! The doctor attested to it; your family saw it with their own eyes; even I saw her lifeless body. She is dead and gone, but you would not believe us. You continued to think in your delusional mind that she is alive. Look at her!”
I turned my tormented gaze upon the face of the woman I had been living with for so long.
She was still smiling at me, her eyes as hypnotizing as ever.
“Do you not see?” the man cried. “That thing in the chair is a skeleton! You’ve been living in a hovel for the past ten years with a rotting corpse!”
I could not believe him; I would not. I turned upon him and gave him a blow with my fist that sent him to the ground with a blackened eye. The constable and his men dragged me out of my home, away from her.
I caught but one last glimpse of her face, still smiling encouragingly at me. Something glistened down her cheekbone; perhaps the faintest trace of a tear.
Do not worry, she had called to me, we shall see each other again soon. It will not be long before we are once more united.
And thus is the manner of my evening; I feel weariness overtaking me now. I must leave, escaping into the darkness where she is waiting for me. I do not know what to make of this entire night, other than the fact that I have no reason to live if I am not with her.
I go now in the knowledge that I will see my dearly beloved again.
)
xD This is like the first time I read a work of yours and you impressed me! *standing o* 
But that is not a bad thing. 
