She Would Never Hurt Me

My girlfriend died in the summer, on the 21st of August. It was one of the hottest summers on record, during the day the sun blazed furiously in the blue sky that left very few places where you could escape its relentless heat, at night you could see thousands of tiny diamonds sparkling in the inky blackness of the sky whilst relishing the treasured breeze that only the night time would allow. Annie and me used to sit outside on the car bonnet during those long nights. She would point out constellations and planets and I would make up new ones because I didn't know any. I started coming up with stupid names just to make her laugh.

I met Annie at the birthday party of a friend. It was a surprise party and I had been asked to play my guitar while people sang Happy Birthday. Once the initial shock was over and everybody had recovered from the laughing fits caused by the look on socially awkward James’ face (it was his twenty second birthday and he seemed to be genuinely under the impression that we had all forgotten), the loud music, dancing and alcohol made an appearance. I wasn’t very good at parties so I was just standing awkwardly in the corner, cradling my guitar to protect it from eighty, ever so slightly drunk people when a young woman with wild light brown curls and sparkling blue eyes twirled over and told me that I looked too glum for such a talented man and that I had to dance with her.

And that is how I met Annie. Crazy, wonderful, wild Annie.

She died in her sleep. The doctors said that she hadn’t felt pain but they had no idea why she died. She just “slipped away”.

And left me behind.

Annie’s death hit me hard. We had moved in together barely two months earlier although we had been dating for several years. I remember coming home from the funeral in such a state that I didn’t realise that Annie’s art set and many of her canvases were lying smashed up in the corner of her studio until three days later.

It took three years of moping and lying in a state that was beyond depressed for my friends to decide that this was enough and I had to get out again and get over Annie. Initially I hated them for it. How dare they interrupt my grief? But later I realised how intensely I needed that support and how I never would have got out of that pit of despair without them. I have them to thank for Rachel. I would never have met her without them.

She was about as different to Annie as you could possibly get. Her brown eyes were as dark as Annie's had been light. Her hair was as fiery red as her temper. She could get mad so easily that it was actually quite endearing to witness the rage that could erupt from her tiny form at the slightest little thing… Annie never got mad at anyone or anything other than herself. Her sleep-wake cycle was completely disrupted which was one of those little quirks that I used to adore about her. I would regularly go to sleep listening to her singing quietly while she painted in the next room only to be woken up and hour or so later to the sound of her yelling and smashing the canvas and paint pots because she couldn’t get the image from her mind to come out onto the canvas properly.

I was happy with Rachel and although I never forgot Annie, the pain of her death gradually started to fade.

But as soon as Rachel moved in with me I started to have nightmares that were so vivid, common sense was the only thing stopping me from thinking they were real. I would see Annie around the flat, sometimes curled up in the corner crying or screaming, covered in cuts and bruises that would open and close all over he body, coming from no visible source except for the too-long nails that she would rake down her arms. Other times I would see her painting twisted and cruel paintings, usually of herself, completely different to the light, cheerful, gorgeous paintings she painted while she was alive.

But there was one painting that scared me more than any other. It depicted Annie, curled up in a dark room, screaming, which wasn't unusual by this point. Except this Annie had red hair.

A month or so after the red-haired Annie painting, she began to follow me into the waking world. I would see her at work, in the park, while we were out shopping, in the car. All the time staring at me with almost accusing blue eyes.

I didn’t tell Rachel.

I didn’t tell anyone.

How can you tell people that you think your dead girlfriend is haunting you?

I don’t know how long I had been seeing Annie before she disappeared. Just like that. One day she was there, sitting on the empty desk that was opposite mine, her blue eyes staring straight into my grey ones and making focusing on my work pretty much impossible, and the next day she was gone.

She didn’t reappear. Instead she was replaced with something…else. I would feel it around me, lurking in the corner of my vision but whenever I turned to look for it, there was nothing there. I began to ignore it, it wasn't harming me and I was scared that if I worried about it too much my mental health would begin to suffer and I couldn’t do that to Rachel. Life seemed to go back to normal for which I was extremely grateful.

But a couple of weeks ago I finally saw it. I was lying in bed, with Rachel curled up in my arms, fast asleep and it was nearly midnight. It took me a moment to figure out why I had woken up. It was there, standing in the doorway, just a human silhouette with no distinct features…except for the blue eyes. It didn’t exactly scare me although it was slightly unsettling. It reminded me of Annie and I knew that Annie would never hurt me.

Rachel stirred in my arms and grumbled at me to go back to sleep, pulling me back to reality and making me realise just how exhausted I was. I grinned and kissed her tousled red hair and after glancing at the figure once more I fell back asleep.

The figure has been in my room every night for the past four weeks. Each night getting closer, but it feels more watchful than threatening, as though it is protecting us while we sleep. Annie would never hurt me.

But last night it was closer than ever. Standing at the end of the bed, staring at us. And for the first time…I felt scared. Because those blue eyes contained nothing but fury. Absolute, raging, violent fury.

But Annie would never, ever hurt me. I know this, there is no chance this thing will hurt me if it’s linked to her. It just can't.

I woke up this morning well before dawn. Rachel was still asleep next to me and the bed was extremely comfy so I couldn’t bring myself to move and eventually dozed off again. I woke up what must have been several hours later as I could see the Sun rising through the bedroom window. Rachel was also awake, her lips were moving although I couldn’t hear what she was saying. She was sat up and staring at me, one hand on my arm and the other pressed against my neck... and she looked scared, genuinely scared. This wasn’t right. Nothing scares Rachel. This combined with the fact that I couldn’t move or even ask what was wrong made me figure that this was just a dream, so I let myself fall back into the comforting darkness of sleep, dimly registering that dream-Rachel and run out of the room.

When I woke up again there were lots of people in our bedroom. I was confused, why were there people in my bedroom while I wasn’t even dressed or showered or anything?

There were flashing lights outside and I could just about hear the sound of sirens, but they were muffled like someone had stuffed cotton wool into my ears. I saw Rachel standing in the doorway, crying. I wanted to call out to her, tell her I was okay. But I couldn’t. For the first time since the figure at the end of my bed I felt scared. Really, really scared. This…this wasn’t a dream. I was struggling to keep myself awake and after a minute or so I gave up trying, I really didn’t want to see Rachel cry anymore. It just made everything even worse.

As I gradually fell back asleep, I saw a dark figure that no one else seemed to notice. It was standing just behind Rachel, looking over her shoulder at me, blue eyes sparkling with something that looked like triumph. But these eyes were a dark, dark blue… these were not Annie’s eyes.

I woke up in a dark place. There was a door to my left. It looked like the door to Annie’s studio so I walked through it and found myself standing in my hallway.

My guitar was propped on the wall by the door but it wasn’t the guitar Rachel had given me for our first anniversary, the only guitar I played nowadays.

This was the guitar that had been in the attic since that burning, raging summer three years ago, the guitar I played for Annie.

I couldn’t bear to look at it because every time I did I saw Annie’s eyes. The way they sparkled whenever I played for her. The way her lips would twist into a grin and the way her fingers would tap out a beat and the way her warm, soft voice would occasionally bless me by joining in, making up lyrics that always seemed to fit.

So I smashed it.

I smashed it into a million tiny pieces.

I stepped over the remnants of the guitar and walked down the hall, past the masses of cards that were propped on the shelves and table and quietly cracked open the door to the bedroom. Rachel was fast asleep. I could see where the tears had dried on her face. I walked to the edge of the bed quietly, trying not to wake her. Even in her sleep tears found ways to creep down her cheeks and she was hugging my pillow tightly.

She was completely unaware of the dark shadow watching her from the end of the bed.

She was completely unaware of me.