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34


For a long time I didn’t move. The air conditioner hummed like nothing had happened, drying the bloods on my hands and quickening the clotting of the pool on the floor, leaving crusts on my face, and on his. My hands were sticky, trembling. There was a faint ringing in my ears, like after someone slams a door right beside your head. I kept staring at the carpet and at what was on it, my brain refusing to decide what to do with the image.

The reddish pool that'll make me retch on a normal day but it didn't maybe because it was sudden or maybe being exposed to such huge amount wasn't really going to do anything.

I swallowed hard, grimacing at my hurting throat, it was either form the scream or Marcus' attempt to strangle me, either way, it hurt so badly and everytime I swallowed if felt like my spit was jagged metals, razors and nails running down my throat.

Moretti was still standing there, his coat half-off, and his expression carved out of stone. He looked at me for what felt like forever without saying a word, and from his expression I couldn't really tell what he was thinking, I don't even care at this point. He could think whatever he like, it's his brain.
I think I just killed someone, that's my biggest worry.

Marcus is dead. He is dead and I killed him.

Finally Moretti said, very quietly, “Lissa.”

She moved, slow at first, then faster, snapping out of whatever shock had frozen her. She pressed her fingers to her hips again, then lowered them and straightened her shoulders.

“Get her something to clean this mess,” he said.

For a second I didn’t understand what he was saying, until my brain caught on the word ‘her’. He meant me.

I blinked at him, my mouth opening but no sound coming out. Some numb pain in my chest stopped me from speaking so I just fell back, and watched as he reached for his phone.

Lissa hesitated. “Boss—”

“Now,” he said. “And tell maintenance to send a team for baggage pickup.”

He took his phone to his ear and murmured something I couldn’t catch at all. When he hung up, he finally looked back at me.

I thought maybe he’d say something—ask why, accuse me, promise punishment. He didn’t instead he reached out his hand in a gesture.

“Stay here,” he said. Then he walked out.

The click of his shoes on the hallway tile echoed and faded. Lissa looked at me, her knuckles white form fisting her hand for too long, she then sighed and rubbed her temple. “Sit,” she said quietly. “Don’t touch anything else, I'll be right back.”

I stood up slowly, the soaked hem of my clothes hit my knees, sending frozen shiver up my legs. I sank onto the edge of the bed and the mattress dipped and swayed like water. My hands were shaking so hard I tucked them between my knees and waited.

I didn't know how long I sat and waited for her but when I finally looked up, Lissa was back. She’d changed out of her jacket and her sleeves were rolled to her elbows. In her hands she carried a yellow bucket that sloshed with water. The sweet, almost cheerful smell of lemon cleaner filled the doorway. Behind her, a mop handle knocked softly against the frame as she walked in.

She stood there for a second, eyes darting from the bucket to me and back again. “He said you should—” She stopped and exhaled through her nose. “Never mind.”

“I'm not even going to ask what happened?” She muttered to herself and dropped the bucket. The air conditioner clicked louder for a moment, then settled as she crouched to drag Marcus' body away from the pool of blood. She sighed when she realized it was of no use when droplets pooled under him again.

She picked the shards of vase to the smallest pieces, shoving them into the bucket as if putting them into a bin bag was creating more evidence.

Is she going to flush it?

She first pulled out a thick piece of clothing from the bucket, squeezed it and spread it open on the pool, it took a few seconds before the clothing absorb a surprising amount of the clotting liquid and she put it back into the bucket, shook it a few times and pulled it up again, squeezed and repeated the motion, until there was nothing big to absorb and she stood up.

Is she not disgusted?

I expect her to retch, to spit a few times, maybe run to the bathroom to throw up but she didn't. Instead she grabbed the mopping stick, squeezed the brownish red water out and settled it on the floor. And with all her might, began scrubbing, back and forth to where I sat even until there was not a sign of red on the flood.

“Get up.” She stood me up by the shoulder and with one swift dragged the wrinkled and mildly bloody sheets off the bed, and as expected shoved it into the bucket, some part still out.

However she did it I don't know, but few seconds after she left my side to the other end of the room where the wardrobe is she came back with a pair of washed jeans and a sweatshirt. Without a word she turned me around with my back facing her and pulled down my zip, took my dress of without letting the bloody hem touch the floor and handed me the new set of clothes.

I put them on without a word, with goosebumps on all over my skin from both the cold and the thoughts in my head.

I killed him.

I killed someone.

I killed a man.

A man died because of me, I shoved a broken vase into his neck and watched him beg for life.