His Eyes, Part 2 I never meant to trap her that way. In a split second, it was too late for both of us. If only I'd been thinking, if only she hadn't looked my way, if only... But what good is 'if only' now? I looked up as she drove by, and she looked back, and all was lost.

In that split second, it all happened again, what I promised myself I'd never do. What I always promise myself I'll never do. But the thing inside me won't die so easily. Or perhaps it's fate. Even when I don't mean it, when I don't want it, they come to me. It's always the same - they look at me once, they want me, but they never realize that they're falling in love with death itself.

Now she's in my dreams, every night. I hold her, I love her, to make up for what I know I'm doing to her. She's so much like the others who come to me - passionate, burning, but always with the cold beneath the surface, the soft wish for oblivion. As she drowns in me, I feel her - sister, lover, mother - I see her dreams, I drink her memories, oh, and she fills my soul with warmth and joy, but I know it can't last. I'll exhaust her, like I've exhausted the others, and all that will be left of her is the fleeting dreams in my mind.

I wish I could set her free. I wish I could make her want to live. Maybe they have something to do with each other. Maybe I have to do both somehow, but I haven't the strength for either. As much as I've taken from her, I haven't the strength to set her free.

Tonight is the last night. I know when she goes down tonight, I'll take her into the darkness, into oblivion, into me. I don't want her life, I don't want to drink her soul! But I want her... god, I want her.

Tonight is the last night for me, too. I can't stop myself from taking her, but I can stop it from happening again. I pray to whatever made me, whatever made this thing inside me, that I have the strength to go down with her - and that, as I drown with her, I don't have to look into my own eyes, as black as my soul...

By E. Lynn Schuman, 1996