A mother.
A wife.
And infinitely more.
For he had never stopped her from stretching out and invading his soul.
He never wanted to.
With ease, despite the passing years, she could reach into his mind and heart, hold them in her perfect grasp.
A simple word, a gesture, a communication containing a trigger, and he was back with her.
For the mere sight of her, the penetrative gaze from omnipotent eyes, he would sacrifice everything.
Her divine femininity.
The ability to use it all.
And he only ever wanted more.
Life always moves forwards, and theirs was no different.
They live their respective lives and love their people.
But she would always hold divinity over him.
He was safe in her hands...her knowledge of him...his secret soul bared.
She kept it all.
And by choice, with a click of her fingers he yearned to kiss, she could start a fire in him that rendered all else...meaningless.
*
Daniel’s life was happy, comfortable even.
He had a loving cluster of people around him.
Life was settled and he had little in the way of real complaint.
Across the ocean, Audrey could claim the same.
Yet there remained a tie between the two, Audrey and Daniel, forever connected.
They had been friend’s many years ago, before their life partners arrived, before responsibility finally took over, yet they’d always remained bound.
But there had always been something else infinitely more powerful.
For Daniel found elements to Audrey, secrets buried beneath, that he could not resist exploring.
What he saw was darker, more alluring than others could ever imagine.
Underneath lay a spirit that would tie them in knots and forever bind them.
Daniel loved and feared her.
He found his thoughts infiltrated by her and he managed to let escape this fact to her one day, a confession of his desire to please her.
Audrey enjoyed her new knowledge of her dear friend, Daniel, who she could make something else entirely when need and desire took her.
When her ego needed lifting, Daniel would gladly be there to provide it, in her service. When she needed fire and longing, Daniel would always oblige with craft and desire to fill her.
And in the shadows grew something supernatural alongside them, a spirit derived from their own. It inhabited the space between, no matter the distance.
Once they parted, the spirit remained, binding minds across oceans and cities:
“Hello, Daniel. It’s been too long.”
Daniel was in another world, another life, a different time zone, but still Audrey sounded in his mind.
“Dear, Audrey. Always you come back.”
Audrey sighed, smiled, her husband fast asleep next to her.
“We always come back to each other, Daniel.”
They could talk all night. Audrey switching between divinity and friend with laughter and reminiscences ringing through their minds.
“I have to go now, Daniel. But first...I want...need...desire a sacrifice from you. You want to serve me, don’t you? You know how it rejuvenates me.”
Daniel, almost resenting his own compliance, adding to the flavour of his unique submission to only her...agreed internally. Audrey sensed it, sending a delicate smile along with a mind’s eye view of her own window's to the soul.
Iced blue oceans stared through him and weakened any resistance.
“I’d like that, I…I need to, Audrey.”
“Of course, you do.”
“What can I sacrifice...give...lose to the greater good that is you?”
“We have moved through the years with our spirit and evolved dear Daniel. Material things are nice, a touching token of sacrifice which I gladly take. But we are beyond matter now, Daniel. So, I want...your dignity. I may never use it you understand, it is quite safe, for now. But I want you to offer it to me, it’ll be mine to use whenever I please. It’s the biggest sacrifice Daniel for should I ever use it, the end will come for us both. I just know it. Do you trust me?”
Daniel smiled, “Always have, always will. My dignity is yours to take.”
Daniel knelt and there stood Audrey, her apparition, so powerful, so true, towering over him. Their eyes met as the spirit manifest envelopes them. Audrey leans down, her hands around his face, drawing white strands of light from his being. He quivers, moans, before falling to the floor at her feet.
He is regenerated.
Above him, Audrey replenished, stands majestic.
And Audrey kept his dignity safe, for the time being.
Until the time was right.
*
And so, it continued through the years, to their gain and cost.
For their replenishment was not imagined, the spirit not a metaphor.
All three existed together and the spirit grew around them, inhabiting and yearning rejuvenation.
The years rolled by and age barely touched them.
They became mysteries to their own loved ones who all aged, cracked, withered...then died.
Soon they’d have no one else, just as the spirit had conceived.
It was irreversible.
They tried in vain to escape this destiny, hearts broken and lost in the sands of time.
But when solitude overwhelmed, the spirit would soar and collide their minds again.
Replenishment and the instinct to survive willed out while time withered everything around them.
*
The Earth is dust riddled, shaking off its infections.
It is bare, without light or hope.
No animals wander, no creatures roam.
Just two hooded figures remain, the ruined Earth theirs alone to walk.
They do not make a sound for all language is dead.
Minds melded, shrouded in the spirit borne real, they fornicate in the dust.
Lust, desire, dirt blot their souls.
They embrace it before retreating into the darkness.
Waiting.
For nothing.
For everything.
Until one day or night (-) it was impossible to tell which (-) the spirit forced their union once again.
Only this time, the two eternal lovers had their own plans, independent of the spirit.
As lust took them once more, while the spirit soared above their endless devouring, Daniel cut Audrey’s throat.
She bled into the dirt and the spirit despaired as it realised that Audrey was not repairing.
Audrey had tried to kill Daniel before, indeed it formed a part of their congress after her attempts failed. Another string to their unrestrained post-apocalyptic, savage sexual bow.
But this time Audrey had used the gift given to her many lifetimes ago. The gift of Daniel's dignity.
For what grace was there in Daniel killing his only ancient friend, his lover, and leaving himself alone to die with this spirit?
There was none, Audrey had taken his dignity once and for all and freed them both.
The spirit howled as did Daniel for it could not live without one of them.
It tried over and over to resurrect Audrey with its fading force, but to no avail as she drifted from view.
Daniel lay back in the dirt, smiling, as finally flesh and bone admitted defeat to the ages.
He hoped he could join Audrey in another place.
The spirit gave out a final shudder before the dust took them both...with Daniel’s last thoughts of hope resting on the wind.
And the Earth forgot the last of its inhabitants.
As it waited.
For nothing and everything.
For hope had a way of bringing forth life.
Even life lost and sacrificed to the dust.
The End