His name was Simon Clems and she was to be his Mrs. Clems –very, very soon. Wedding preparations had already been prepared, phone calls had already been phoned, and contacts had already been contacted. Everything was going as planned. They had invited a total of seventy people, decided on an outdoors wedding, and chocolate cake –they even agreed on the band. Things were going smoothly and for once in Miranda’s life, everything seemed to have been perfect. Her parents adored him, her friends admired him, and he astonished her. He was the one, that was what everyone had said, and it was about time too.
She was a special case –Miranda. She had countless bad relationships in the past and terror stories that would shiver anyone’s spine. Her experience with men were always gruesome –she was already six times a widow, before she had met him.
Sometimes, she had nightmares…always about him. Always about him leaving her, she didn’t want to go through that pain with him—and for the sixth time since, she awoke in the middle of the night screaming, dreading what she knew was to come. Not anymore…Miranda thought determinedly, she will break her luck…she would do anything to keep that from happening ever again. Anything.
The following morning the beloved couple awoke unusually early to settle pre-marriage affairs. He picked her up, in his old red truck –which most resembled a wheezing tractor than any vehicle of the current century. Vintage, she had called it and he had laughed. It was the most peculiar of mornings that day, the clouds hung over low in the sky, and the day appeared not much different from an autumn night.
As they drove on through the country roads, passing by small farms and villages, a couple of stray cows here and there, Miranda noticed the forlorn countryside—the grass practically gray, the trees almost dead, the wilderness pretty much lifeless. It seemed time stood still inside the slowly moving truck, and the silence engulfed the area, until it almost drove her crazy. He never said a word, though, he just kept smiling and driving, just the way she liked it. He was perfect for her. She continued to gaze out her cracked window, coated with a layer of filthy dust, and she felt her heart pounding all of a sudden, as she noticed the approaching hillside. Just a couple more bends, and they would arrive…to the house that she was yearning to buy, to the ranch that would suit the two of them most fine.
She imagined herself, growing old in that house, with their six kids running loose in the fields, and her Simon tending to her every needs—as he always had. She loved him, yet she despised him…she hated him for torturing her. How would a guy like him, ever love someone like her? And the question resonated in her mind, in her heart, in her soul…and in the deepest of her conscience she knew of the end that would come and she knew he would leave her. She counted every second of everyday waiting for it to finally happen, waiting for the torture to end.
Suddenly, she felt her body lunge forward as the vehicle stopped, in the middle of a desolate area…where her dream house stood waiting, and the countryside bare of any witnesses for miles and miles. She snapped back to the present and stepped out of the car, where her Simon had already opened the door for her. Her Simon had already reached for her hand and the two were already running up the lawn and onto the old creaking porch of their desired ranch.
The ranch was immense, it had rooms for each of their future children and even a basement –Miranda loved basements. It even had a parlor and was designed by a very old-fashioned architect, whom Miranda knew personally. It was the perfect home, and each night she would tell him about this ranch, and each day she had yearned for the day she would come to buy it.
The house was a faded red-violet color, and was in terrible need of a new paint-job. There were few windows and the door stood twice her height…the doorknob was a metallic silver heart and the entire house was covered in intricate vines, hugging the house tightly against the bitter mid-autumn breeze.
Her Simon bent over to retrieve a silver key from the mat below the door, he smiled at her and eagerly stuck the key in it’s place, simultaneously turning the knob and pushing the door wide open. He held out his hand and motioned her in first, but not before dismantling the silky spider web made fresh across the entrance, as if forbidding them entrance.
She stepped inside and looked up at the golden chandelier swaying in their presence. Looking around she saw nowhere to go, but a ridiculously long dimly lit hallway that branched out into a marvelous sitting room.
“This place used to be an inn.” Her Simon said, referring to all the many doors along the hall, but it wasn’t the unusually tall doors that caught her attention, but instead the numerous and wondrous portraits that hung along the wall-space—so lifelike and so beautiful. The inside of the house itself, was unlike what she could ever expect, it was warm somehow and the air was stuffy and the scent of the place smelled of calming oil, yet her nerves felt alarmed and down her back trickled down a bead of cold sweat, not at all attributed to the climate.
She startled, as she heard the door close tight behind her and she felt her husband’s arm around her shoulders, she noticed strangely, that he smelled of oil as well and she knew in the deepest of her heart, that this was the day. This was her dream…
“Lovely, these paintings…” He said innocently, and he dragged her along further from the door and stopped at the first frame, where a gruesome picture of a beheaded lady was depicted. She didn’t take a second glance, yet her Simon seemed to be surveying the picture intently. She on the other hand, was more interested at the plaque below the painting, and she realized that below each portrait appeared a caption explaining the details of the paintings—all of which were rather morbid pictures of death.
Wendy Louis: Murdered by her husband
Miranda swallowed, a dryness residing in her throat, and her heart pounded ever louder. Yet, she couldn’t take her eyes of them…she almost heard the desperate cries, almost felt the pain, almost smelt the blood. She moved on to the next portrait of a man who had stabbed himself with a dagger, and the one after that was of a child drowning. Each and everyone of these pictures were so lifelike, that she was almost afraid to touch it, afraid perhaps that she would feel the cold sharp blade…but she reached out to one anyway, needing assurance that this was not real, and her fingers trembled as she reached out to a painting of a man being swallowed by a wolf. She expected to feel the soft, ragged fur…and felt relief when her fingers touched the rough canvas.
She looked back towards her Simon, who was smiling delightfully at her for some apparent reason and she felt her stomach drop. Time was approaching...if only she could reverse it.
“Let’s go…” She stuttered, heading toward the door, but her fiancé blocked the way, pushing her onwards, further and further into the mysterious house.
“Not yet, love…let’s keep looking. I want to see more.” He laughed and it was enough to tingle her spine. She felt her heart pounding and she felt her mind about to lose it. Any moment now and it would be time. She dreaded it, but she expected it—she knew it was time.
Her Simon never ceased to be interested in the paintings, and with each passing picture after the next, he gave a small chuckle, as if enjoying himself –a man hung by the neck, a woman spewing out poison, a set of twins in a horrid car accident…
She patiently waited; the seconds counting down in her mind, today would be the day. She knew it…and she suddenly heard strange voices in her head, telling her to run for it, telling her to leave him…but she didn’t want that. She didn’t want to upset him—she knew she was trapped. Her Simon was quicker and stronger and fiercer. Her Simon had her right where he wanted…
And then, they finally ambled down to the sitting room, where at the wall above a large and ornate fireplace hung a piece much larger than the others, and she was relieved when she saw the contents of the painting covered by a wine-velvet curtain. She noticed that her fiancé appeared to have a slight frown on his face.
“I wonder what is behind this painting…” But she knew before he reached over to tear the curtains away. She knew, because she could read the bolded print delicately carved in the golden plaque and she feared this painting most of all, because it surprised her—because she hadn’t expected it, yet it confirmed her thoughts all along.
Simon Clems: Betrayed by his only love.
And when the time ticked on closer, and the seconds flew by, and the curtains came off, she saw it. She dreaded looking, but she saw it clearly. Her Simon…lying dead, blood covering his body…and a withering figure next to him, mourning or laughing, she couldn’t tell, but she recognized the figure. She knew the figure very well and it was as if she was looking through a mirror. There were the same almond-shaped eyes and the same pointed nose. There were the same freckles on her cheeks and the same dark brown hair. There was the same pale, deathly skin…
Her Simon stared at the painting, glaring at it almost as if making out the scene…and poor Miranda stood shocked, her body involuntarily trembling and her mind forever lost—and her heart forever broken—because she knew, more than knew, that now was the time.
“What is this?” Her fiancé’s soft whispering tones called out and he turned back to face her, a changed man indeed—for his eyes were now murderous and his handsome face vicious.
“You betrayed me?” He accused, pointing at the wretched painting. The completely inaccurate painting…
Miranda took a step back, her hand over her mouth and tears streamed from her eyes as she frantically shook her head, unable to voice her thoughts, but her Simon, her dearly beloved Simon never saw her, his eyes shut in disbelief. His face soon started to transform, now, a deep tinge of red. She took a couple more steps back and slowly he started to follow, but she knew it now more than ever and she knew that her time was up.
“No, don’t say that—” She tried to console him, her voice breaking yet soothing all the same. “I never betrayed you. You know that.” She skidded now, inching ever closer to the door, but he always caught up…he always stood right in front of her, and if she were to turn around and make a run for it, he would catch her—like one would pluck a delicate feather.
“I love you—I always had…” He whispered, tears now streaming from his own eyes. He reached for her, but she was expecting it, she twirled around, narrowly escaping his grasp.
“I-I know…” She said, and as she talked she took several more steps and never did her eyes break his gaze.
“And…you love me?” He said, his voice too, breaking and he took a couple more steps towards her, and she took a couple more steps back and for all the while, it appeared as if the couple was moving in a passionate dance.
She felt the cold hard wooden door pressed against her back and she felt his warm soft chest pressed against her front –and she knew she was trapped, sandwiched between a rock and a hard place. Tears now violently fell down her cheeks and she felt him tremble against her and she simply wanted to speed time up again…she wanted to die and have it over with, but then she remembered, like a light in the shadows, the dream of the night before. The sixth night…when she was determined to never let this happen again. Her Simon stepped back and reached a hand in his pocket, his face now solemn and grave.
“I’m sorry Miranda—but if you can’t love me…nobody will.” Her Simon said, and he pulled out a slender sharp object…his bitter, gleaming, knife where the glint reflected off his gorgeous black eyes. And she frowned and she cried, and she kicked him in the shins and out the door she ran.
She gasped for her life, she didn’t attempt to run down the porch steps and instead she jumped over them, only to have tripped and landed on her weaken ankles, where her hand fell on something deathly sharp, and her blood drenched along her arm, and she saw to her horror that she had almost landed face-first on an ax. She didn't question why it was there, for she knew.
Then she heard her Simon cry, and violently lunge toward her—but she was determined to fight for her life, and she held the ax in her wounded hand and she swung with the little strength she had…
And she closed her eyes and dropped the ax, and she cried and cried into her knees, she didn’t need to hear her Simon’s shriek of pain, or the thudding of his body. She didn’t need to smell the blood or feel the impact of ax and body. She didn’t need to see his body, now lying motionless across the ground—she knew the scene, quite well to memory. The portrait…the picture…the dream, her mind was never found again. All she could think of was her Simon, her dear Simon…she had done it again.
Then, the sudden sound of a phone vibrating...she looked up and saw the sharp object her Simon had carried transform itself into a phone, and she ignored it, her weeping figure giggling. She looked up at the sky, the sun now started to rise…he was her seventh. Her time ticked on.
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