Reflect

He stared up at the night sky intently, his silver eyes reflecting the vast expanse of stars stretching above him. His brother's voice echoed in his head.

“When I die, I'll be up with the moon and the stars, and I'll be beautiful too.”

His response had always been that his brother was beautiful, but it never worked.

"So where are you?" he whispered, searching hungrily across the sparkling canopy for anything that would make him feel connected to his twin once more. But there was nothing. Just the cold, harsh moonlight and billions of stars, apathetic in the face of his pain.

Sighing, he stubbed out his cigarette and climbed back through the window, leaving the hard shingles of the roof behind and once again surrounding himself with the empty silence of the dark apartment.

Collapsing on his bed, the man covered his face with a thin, graying pillow in a half-assed effort to block the muffled thuds and yelling from a suite down the hall. Every night, it seemed. He assumed that if he wasn’t so self-involved, he’d attempt to help the woman. At least that’s what he told himself as he tried not to relive the memories of seventeen years of terror and misery that her screams triggered.

His phone vibrated, startling him out of his reverie. He debated whether or not to answer, but curiosity won out and he brought the phone to his ear.

“Stephan? Where are you?” a woman asked, worry evident in her voice.

“Here,” Stephan replied, without conviction. “What do you want, Malice?”

“Just checking up on you, it’s been a week. Did you go to your session?” she inquired.

“No. I hate her. She treats me like a disease.”

Malice sighed, and he visualized her pinching the bridge of her nose like she did when she was frustrated. The thought was vaguely satisfying, and he wondered exactly how vexed he could make her before she snapped. Then she might go over the edge, and scream terrible things. How he longed for those words.

“You have to go, Stephan. Don’t you know what the word mandated means? If you don’t go, they’re going to force you.”

“I don’t want to go. They can try to force me, but it doesn’t mean it’ll work,” he stated defiantly. There was an ache beginning just above his eyes, and he squeezed them shut. The short silence was punctured by a shriek from down the hall, just loud enough to make his head throb painfully. “I need to go, my head hurts.”

“I bet you haven’t been taking your meds either.” Yes, she was definitely getting upset. The drive to continue angering her had subsided with the advent of his headache though, and he found himself wishing she had never called in the first place.

“They don’t help. You don’t understand,” he snapped before he hung up and dropped his phone into the open arms of the aged teddy bear that sat against the headboard. The faded and scratched glass eyes stared accusingly back at him.

“Don’t look at me like that,” he admonished, although he carefully moved his phone away from the bear and patted it on the head. “You know as well as I do the conversation wasn’t going anywhere. You were listening.” A slight smile graced his pale face for a moment, before it was wiped by the laughing in his head.

“He’s dead. Stop being such a fucking child,” said a high female voice with a Russian accent.

Stephan grit his teeth and attempted to block her out, focusing hard on the floor. The headache was almost blinding, and he knew there was only one way to gain relief. Still he attempted to resist; past experience had always shown that giving in was a bad idea.

“Brother, I’ve failed. Brother, I’m sorry. Brother, love me!” she mocked, mimicking the desperation that he’d felt so many times.


“Shut up!” Stephan’s voice exploded with fury, and for a few single, pain-filled seconds, he considered leaping from the roof in a desperate bid to escape his tormentor. In the next moment, however, his rage-driven bravado gave way to a heavy emptiness that seemed to spread through every vein until he found himself without the will to move.


~ * ~

A huge cherry blossom tree rose from the midst of a loosely piled hill of rocks, its roots twisting under or jutting out of gaps and wrapping themselves around the rocks, acting as a spider web of support to keep the ancient tree from tumbling into the black abyss that lay beneath the tree itself. Its pink flowers contrasted vividly against the rolling black and gray storm clouds that blanketed the sky, allowing only the weakest of sunshine to tentatively stream down in patches. A light wind wrested the occasional petal from its branch and flung it from the tree, where it would float gently downward, dissolving into ash before it touched the ground.

Stephan ran his pale, slender fingers over the ashen bark, mystified as it flaked away under his touch, revealing delicate veins of lava that twisted over the body of the tree, as if they were small rivers with banks of burned wood. It oozed out of the roots and dripped silently into the ominous void below.

Afraid to harm the fragile tree further, he sat down on a rock near the bottom of the pile and gazed out at the land around him. Desolation reached as far as he could see; dead scrub grass punctuated by areas of dry, cracked earth the same gray as the clouds. Far out in the distance, a mountain towered over the wastes; the only other source of color. Volcanic rain disgorged itself from the pinnacle, its brightness fading as it fell toward the earth.

Dissonant piano notes wafted faintly through the air, coming from behind him. Upon turning, he found himself staring at a black grand piano. Standing up, he walked toward it, sending up puffs of ash with every step. A weak ray of watery sun fell over the piano as he came into view of the player.

Seth’s fingers danced over the ivory keys, though his gunmetal eyes were fixed on Stephan. Unable to control himself, Stephan strode over and wrapped his arms around his twin. The piano vanished, and they were left standing among the ash and rocks.

“I missed you so much,” Stephan whispered into his brother’s shoulder.

“You promised you would come with me, Steffy,” Seth responded, his voice devoid of emotion. Stephan nodded, choking back tears.

“I know, I know. I’m so sorry. It was an accident.”

“Why didn’t you try again? I waited for you.”

“I couldn’t, Seth. I just … couldn’t.”

“Are you weak, Steffy?” A hint of accusation entered his voice. Stephan took a step back, wounded by his brother’s anger.

“Are you?” Seth pressed.

~ * ~

Stephan woke with a start to loud knocking on his front door. Grabbing a loose blanket, he wrapped himself in it as he shuffled to the door.

“Who is it?” he called through the crack.

“Malice.”

He slid the chain back and let her in while taking note of her new appearance. Magenta hair that stuck out in every possible direction and black eyeliner that ringed her tired brown eyes, giving a distinctly mad-scientist look.

“Get bored of the blue?” he inquired, though he wasn’t interested.

“Yeah, well, Raven said it didn’t look good on me.”

“Fuck Raven,” he slid the chain back into place and threw the blanket on a nearby chair. He didn’t care if Malice saw him, she already knew how he looked naked. “Why are you here?”

Malice sighed and let herself fall onto his couch, putting up her feet – encased in combat boots – on his coffee table. He grimaced at the dirt that fell off them and settled into the scratches in the wood, then disappeared into the bedroom for a moment.

“Raven and I are fighting again,” she said as he re-entered the main room wearing black sweatpants and a faded grey t-shirt featuring a depiction of the Eiffel Tower. “I got a message from Garrett telling me that she’s been telling all the local bands to stay the fuck away from me because I’m an obsessive stalker bitch. I’m just like, whatever, but I’m really sick of her shit.”

Stephan grabbed a pack of cigarettes and lit one as he leaned against the kitchen sink.

“You need a new girlfriend.”

“I’ve been hitting on this guy on Facebook. He only lives like an hour away, and he’s really fucking hot. He won’t fuck me though, because he says I look like his sister,” she chuckled. “You got a beer?”

“Faggot,” Stephan said, opening his fridge and grabbing a bottle of Alley Kat. He sat down next to her and gave it to her.

“For real.”

“Fucking your sister is what life’s all about.”

A laugh burst from Malice that momentarily shattered the subdued mood in the apartment. She unscrewed the cap on her beer and drank a mouthful before turning to him.

“I love you.”

“Love you too,” he said without much conviction. Internally, he tried to drag up any possible emotion, but found nothing except colossal emptiness. His twin’s words echoed relentlessly in his mind. Am I weak?

“I want to ask you something.” Malice looked nervous, like a kid that was performing in his first talent show.

“What?” He focused on the smoke filling his lungs, remembering his grandmother’s warning. “Every cigarette takes a day off your life!” He took another drag, hoping she was right.

“Um … How do you feel about necrophilia?” Her knuckles were white from how tightly she clutched the bottle in her lap, and she refused to meet his eyes. He shrugged.

“Don’t care.”

Her face lit up and she instantly relaxed.

“I want to have a threesome with you and a corpse.”

“At least we don’t have to ask.” A wry smile graced his sharp features. Malice laughed, clearly relieved.

“Here I was berating myself about how disgusting and abnormal I am.”

“Nah,” He gestured vaguely to the window over the kitchen sink, its thin curtains barely filtering out the sunlight now streaming through. “Everyone’s got their thing.”

“I figured you'd think I was a freak,” she admitted after a moment of silence.

“What?” Stephan chuckled. “Me? After everything I've done? I knew a girl once who could only get off to animal crush.”

Malice made a face. Stephan had to admit that, of all the things he was okay with, cruelty to animals was where he drew the line. A memory swam in his mind’s eye: a white kitten meeting an untimely and unnecessary end at the hands of his father, due solely to the fact that Seth had put up a fight that night. Nausea swelled in him, and he dashed to the bathroom.

Fuck you you fucking fuck. He thought. Get your shit together. He heaved into the toilet. I fucking hate your guts. He retched and heaved again. I want to die.

Finally managing to stand again, his stomach feeling tighter and emptier than ever, he gazed at himself in the mirror. Gray eyes and black hair beautifying a monstrous creature stared back. Revulsion crashed through his veins. His pale fingers traced the outline of his jaw. Seth stared back at him, their symmetry as true in his imagination as it was in life. Tears fell from his eyes, and the pain of separation became realized in the scream of terrible loneliness that tore itself from his throat.

The mirror shattered, its glinting pieces embedding themselves into his fists. Sinking to the floor, he cradled his head in his broken hands and sobbed quietly, even as he thought he felt his brother's soft touch caressing his arm; that whispered voice telling him that everything's going to be all right in the end.

In the end.

Isn't this the end?