Prism

He smiles. The kind where your cheeks push your eyes to squint — a joy so palpable under your skin, it’s blinding. And that’s what it was: a blinding, infectious smile.

The corners of my mouth can’t help but perk up, like a reflection of his.

His mouth opens, and he says all the right gentlemanly things.

“Ready for dinner?”

“I missed you.”

“Hi, baby.”

The sound coming out of my mouth is muffled. Why can’t I hear it? I slow my breathing and listen in, like tuning the frequency of a radio. It’s a language I couldn’t understand. But I pick up pieces of a foreign language — a tongue distantly recognizable. Clouds of red pour out of my mouth, my heart beats a steady purple, and my eyes are beady dots of jade green. My lips are a pale red, my chest exudes a beautiful rose quartz, and my clothes are a semi-translucent white.

I look out the window of the car as we take off. I only see him and his blinding reflection. In the glass, the colorful light bends like the inside of a prism; it is a sight so stunning it empties my mind, bringing my clarity. The hues fill me with warmth despite the muffled words from my throat.

“So what were you doing earlier? I saw you talking to that girl. And the other guy was there too.”

A steady flow of color streams out of my mouth. I don’t understand the scene, but the pulchritude of the colors distracts me, enveloping my body in their tenderness.

“Did you see my text?”

Bright, bloody red.

“I wish you’d respond sooner. I don’t like feeling ignored. You know what I mean?”

Melting teal blue.

“Thank you, babe. I love you.”

Swirling, muddy green.

“And I’m sorry for bringing this up right now. It’s been a hard day for me, and you being here made me feel much better.”

Shimmering rosy orange.

“You still love me, right? Do you think I’m a good person? Come on, babe, answer me. Don’t you love me?”

Sickly lilac purple.

“Good. Do you think I look good? I think I look ugly. Can you tell me if I look beautiful?”

Purple. Red. Purple.

“Thank you, baby. Tell me again?”

Red. Purple. Purple. Purple.

“Hey, we’re here! You ready to go eat?”

Chalky pastel yellow.

“Before we go, I have a gift for you.” He leans in and takes a fistful of my colors. Left in its wake is a dreary gray, discoloring my cheek. Then he steals another from my mouth. My gray lips reply with a stream of gray smog, with a faint hint of light pink amidst the cloud.

He swats away the smoke. “You like that, don’t you?” Leaning in again, he kisses the splotches of color, cutting with his razor-sharp tongue, leaving gashes on my skin. The wounds cry and weep, gushing a rushing stream of bloody color. But he leans in again. He licks up the color of my wounds.

“Feel better?”

But he leans in again.

“You like it?”

He leans in again.

And again. And again. Again. Again. Again. Again.

Red. Red. Red.

But he takes that too, when his hands slip under the facets of rose quartz, his body lost in translucence, and his lips devour the jade and green aventurine until my eyes are useless and color blind and unseeing, like a smile too wide that it scrunches your eyes. He is in every place I don’t want to be seen by the light. He leans closer and closer, until I am against the glass, reflectionless in the window.

He is on top of me. I once knew the freedom of colors, and now, the heaviness of the monochrome weighs me down. Every gemstone has a breaking point, and he drains me bite by bite. My beautiful — disgusting — lover — vampire —

My eyes flutter open. I gasp and shake and shudder and heave. The world is dark and gray, the way it should be in the calm of night. The clock blinds me with a flashing 02:18. With a hand over my heart, I listen as it steadily falls.

“It was just a dream,” I say with a raspy voice. Correction: “Just a nightmare.” I am in the darkness of my room, and I welcome it, knowing I am safe in my bed. Here, I am alone and free to use words and speak my mind. The details of the nightmare slip away from me with each passing second, until I can only recall the spike of fear and being awake. My heartbeat stabilizes.

Despite myself, his heart beats elsewhere, aligning tempos with mine on this planet. He walks among us. In any crowd, he could be there. Yet, he is both alive and dead. His ghostly self knows no borders, no walls, no doors. Any turn I take, he is a close follower. Among the strangers walking behind me, I feel shaky knowing he walks briskly by with them. Every late-night walk, he is lurking inside the words the man yells at me from across the street. In each friend I talk to, I feel him creeping in the corners of their comforting words, their light-hearted teasing, their affectionate touch. Within every car I enter, his hands grasp whatever jewels he can greedily steal. His unearthly limbs pass through my solid body, but the presence sends a chill down my spine, and I know he is there.

“It’s okay,” I mumble. “I can’t remember it anyway.”

The dream finds its way into the prism of thoughts in my head. Just another colorless string of thought to be contained and digested later.

I lay back down with the darkness on top of me, as it does every night, again and again. Sleep weighs down my eyes, and I welcome it, knowing I am safe in my bed. Here, I am alone and free to use words and speak my mind.

The darkness of night does not scare me, even without my color, I know it’s here. And among comfort … my mind … slowly … drifts … to sleep.

I crack my eyes open. The light pierces my eyes, and I welcome it, knowing I am safe in — his car — Here, I am — with him — and free to — silence — my mind. The — colors in the prism — do not frighten — me, even without — an escape — The inside of a prison — brings me — clarity.

“Hi, baby.”

“I missed you.”

“Ready for dinner?”