when you’re the last woman standing in a field of slain bodies (some wearing the faces of your comrades; others the faces of your mortal enemies), you will never have the luxury of forgetting. those who survive wear invisible streaks of blood on their cheeks, bits of torn and rotting flesh under their fingernails. it is like living in perpetual distortion, a bastardized reality. and routine is branded into their souls like ownership on cattle.
but for people like jisoo, routine is nothing more than a process – something mechanical and automatic: dream, die, wake, report, wipe, forget, eat, bathe, dream. die again. and again. and again. there are days when she feels like routine would be her undoing, days when her dreams turn into prophecies, visions of the End of the World.
it’s as if merely witnessing the beginning of Ragnarok by her own hands has scorched her soul from the inside out, carved a niche inside the very crevices of her brain – bits and pieces of the future past entwining and intersecting memories of Before, of Now, of Later.
it makes her greedy. it makes her vengeful.
it is always after those nights (when the murmurs of the dead tell her it is time) that she finds herself wandering, her feet carrying her down the fluorescent halls, corridors winding around and around, dead end upon dead end, until she finds her way out of the building They liked to believe is a sanctuary (the place of Hope and Innovation – the origin of World Peace) with nothing more than her bare feet tucked into a thin pair of nondescript slippers, a blanket wrapped around her naked body. head faced down, she begins to walk, aimless and utterly lost–
but that’s not right. no, she never remembers how she gets Here. never quite remembers if she really had arrived to His Place (Temple, the tiny voice inside her head chastises, as though aghast at such a mundane a word) wrapped in a blanket and all alone (she was never alone, she was sure. never. there were always eyes watching, always voices following. she was never alone. they would never leave her alone–). or if she’d been brought there (by Whom? by What? would she ever know?) by some kind of impulsive urge to seek Him, to confide in Him. to Confess.
ah…her head thunks hard against the wood of His door and she draws her knees up, tucking one foot beneath the other and smiles. yes, that’s right. she thinks she remembers why she’s here, remembers being told that the car would be waiting across the street – remembers that she’s on a time limit (you have three hours. make it count.) remembers that she’s in the middle of her story, of her Confession.
“God,” her voice is small, weak, barely audible above the hum of the ceiling fan whirring above her. she watches it whirl and whirl until it makes her dizzy, her eyes almost crossing in exhaustion. she closes them, sighs, and taps a finger against the door serving as the Barrier between them – the mockery of anonymity makes her want to laugh. she doesn’t, thought. there’s nothing funny about the way she’s been spilling prophecy after prophecy, words uttered in languages that have been obsolete, about people long dead, of people who will be dead (because of her, always because of her.)
she thinks she’s been telling God how afraid she was, how guilt is eating her alive, how the pain of Knowing (and later Forgetting, always Forgetting) is torture, pure madness. of how powerless she feels in the wake of responsibility and dutiful obligation.
she thinks, instead, all she’s been telling God is how powerful she feels, how vicious she will become.
“God,” she calls again (and some child-like part of her is appalled at how blase she is, calling Him so intimately; the other – the more cruel thinks she deserves the right to address him by His Name, all things considering. after all, no prophet can be killed outside jerusalem), fingers tap tap tap-ing against the closed door. “am i a sinner?”
Maki isn’t here tonight to keep him grounded. Dae isn’t here to hold his head above the water. So he hovers, somewhere between drowning 20 leagues under, and floating out of the stratosphere. He hovers, and listens to the voices crying out in the dark, clamoring for his attention ( he ignores them all; they will have to wait their turn ). And he waits.
Someone speaks his name. He doesn’t react immediately; maybe it’s not her. The others are too loud for him to be sure. “Be silent!” he wants to command them, for he has a guest tonight, and he will not tolerate interference. But he says nothing, for fear he may accidentally miss her a second time.
When had this dishonest game of theirs begun? He can no longer remember. She comes to his door with confessions and unclean hands for trade; he offers his forgiveness, and a mouthful of lies. It is not a fair exchange, he knows this—she knows this—yet they continue to pretend that this is alright. Everything will be alright, as long as they can have these brief moments between the hours of the night.
Yes, there is somebody calling for him, from the other side. He sinks down, down to her level, down to where he can hear her better through the clamor of the rabble. She begins—forgive me, Father, for I have sinned—and he relaxes into her tales. Sometimes her words soar over his head, sometimes they bore into his bones and stick.
Her tone changes from time to time ( or perhaps that is part of his own delusions, conjuring rhythms and lilts imagined in his mind ) but there is a hollow truth to every syllable that rolls off her tongue. He cannot tell if she is more afraid of her past, her present, or her future. Perhaps none of them, perhaps all three. Or perhaps, she simply fears herself.
There comes a break in her monologue, suddenly, as though someone has turned on a Mute button. He does not volunteer to fill in the void. This too, is a part of the story; it would be terribly rude of him to interrupt.
God. Again—tap-tap-tap.
His fingers answer for him against the wood. Yes, I am still here. I am listening.
His lips pull back, hard, stretching the skin around his mouth taut with tension. The grin he shows is more bared teeth and silent screams than mirth. Am I a sinner she asks. Ah, my child, if only you knew—if only you could see how your ‘God’ is no better than the most common scum of the earth beneath your feet.
“Yes. Yes, you are—” but so am I, so really, we’re not all that different beneath our ugly skins “ —do you seek forgiveness?”
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