One Last Story

I almost didn't post this. I was so tempted to leave the story as it stood, to leave it with Sam's life, and not end it with his death. I don't like thinking about that morning. It was horrifying and heartbreaking and makes me want to cry and throw up all at once when I think about it.

But this isn't for me. This is for Sam. This is so people know what happened to him.

The morning after that night on the fire escape I showed up at the warehouse bright and early. I was so excited to see him, the man I loved so much. We were finally together and my heart was singing at the thought of being with him again.

And then I arrived and all I saw was blood. My first, illogical thought, was to wonder why Sam had been throwing around paint.  He was nowhere to be found, just the sticky, thick redness that looks fake after so many gorey movies and tv shows. People always say our generation is jaded against blood and gore, and I would have agreed with them before that day.

It was everywhere-the floor, the walls, the ceiling... streaks and sprays in an impossible show that if I'd had training I could've read like a book. All I could see was the pain and death of the man I loved so very much.

There was no sign of him or his body at first, which gave me some small hope. The faintest dream that maybe he'd gotten away, that it wasn't his blood, that he was in the hospital and gloriously alive.

And then I saw the pooling blood under a small pile of plain black trash bags. Completely normal and unassuming things. I stepped over to peer inside and nearly vomited at the gore that greeted me. He'd been... disassembled. Almost liquefied. But I recognized the bloodstained clothing I found floating in the first bag, and in the third was what was left of his face.

I think I screamed then, I'm not sure. I think I probably passed out, because I remember the world going sideways and a strange man in a suit peering in the doorway at me. Then, nothing.

Next thing I knew I was waking up on the floor and there were five cops running around the warehouse peering at bloodstains and glaring at me. They almost arrested me right then and there, it was only my incoherent pleading and gibbering that convinced them of my innocence. I was lucky that they decided they didn't want anything to do me and sent me on my way.