Denial by Muslimah Davis

Wandering seamlessly in a tunnel I ask myself, “Why am I running?”

Breathing raggedly, I look down at my baggy, dirty, disheveled clothes, stamped in red with madness, uncaring to precaution. Then it all hits me like a disoriented dream from a past life. As I walk, flashbacks appear erratically making me go into a fit of anxiousness.The lights, ‘Oh the lights’ created a rewind button aggressively tugging me back to a recent past.

It was dark, light, then dark again, as though I was getting further away but not close to escaping. Similar to a film trying to capture the images it once kept so sacred in comparison to Pandora's box. “Is this what they call tunnel vision?” I question myself aloud.

In a dazed trance, vividly hearing the repetitive tapping of my distant feet as well as the buzzing flickering of the lights. I catch a glimpse of my hand seizing a knife, striking furiously at an object, A LIVING, BREATHING AND MOVING OBJECT. I sensed the abruptness of my action but there was no turning back. I had plunged into the abyss of revenge. My morality flew out the window, leaving behind my primitively functioning body. Within that very moment, I was erupting with a wrath much stronger, much harsher than that of an angry God himself.

No regret in sight, continuously swinging to my satisfaction, the creature squiggles and squirms so hopelessly, I felt a smile creeping onto my face. Blacking out of the memory neighboring my current state of emotional being, I detect remorse, bewilderment and an ample amount of panic-strickenness. ‘Could I have done this?’ “There’s no way!” I say frantically. Caressing the dried blood in my hands, my vision blurs from an aroma consisting of wet rags and old moldy pipes. I gag.

Too paranoid to keep moving, I stop due to mental exhaustion. My brain is at war with my conscience, yelling, screeching, and throwing arguments on whether or not I did it, such an evil deed. One so horrible as to be unforgiving and unjustifiable to simple society along with my moral integrity.

All of a sudden I felt a shift so powerful from within me, it could knock the world out of rotation. Tears were streaking down my face, while I grinned, it’s like my emotions including my facial expressions were malfunctioning. ‘Hah! Tears?!’, I thought as I touched my face. As I taste the bile rising in the back of my throat , I start screaming, “ No I didn't …. It wasn't me !”

The next second I shook myself trying to swat away the devious thoughts swarming, realizing my mental sancity was crumbling. Trying to convince myself I couldn’t, I wouldn’t and I haven’t done something so cruel. Despite my refutative encouraging comments, there was an overwhelming factor of guilt. I knew I had done it.