Me

It began with a smile. Me sitting on a high bar stool at Flemings Grill, she standing at the door, looking directly at me. One smile, that was all it took, and when she walked over and casually asked, “Are you here on business or pleasure,” I was tongue-tied. I never objected when she loosened my ponytail and released my hair around my shoulders, neither did I say a word when she signaled then whispered something to the bartender who walked over and added some booze inside my half-finished glass of wine. I was lost. I couldn’t tear my gaze away from her face. The pink lips were full and slightly upturned on both sides. But it was the eyes that held me spellbound; that deep sea between blue and green. I was smitten. That was the word I would use when I woke the next morning with her lying next to me, her right arm draped over my breasts, her breath coming in short whispers on my shoulder; smitten. We were happy. I went to work everyday, walked into the house when I returned and there she was, in bed where I left her, that smile on her lips. I looked into the mirror every morning, with her standing closely behind me, watching me intensely. But something happened. I didn’t know what it was. The smile went away first, followed by the fire in her eyes. Then one morning, I woke with broken lips and dark bruises around my eyes, same with the day after. I never asked questions, rather, I began to refrigerate spoons. The look in the mirror became an inspection. One hand over my eyes, my mouth open, I studied the face that used to be mine. She never left my side, even after the doctors said I had a problem and gave it a name. Dissociative Identity Disorder, that was what they called it. They said there was no one else but only me, before they threw me inside a room with nothing but a mattress, to keep me from hurting myself, to save me from myself. I didn’t remember any of it. This was my life now.

My entry for Foxtales' One Paragraph Flash Fiction Contest

Image is from the original post.