REDRUM

I'm a murderess - well perhaps I'm not but I feel like a paid assassin as I methodically erase every bit of a person, carefully ensuring that he no longer exists. It's pleasurable yet painful as I move forward to the completion of my self appointed task. Pleasurable as each step solidifies my existence and legitimizes my place within society. Painful as each irreversible step is one step closer to having never existed in the first place, painful due to recollection of memories and the realization that there will never be another trip, visit, party or birthday, painful as I can't bear to look at the photographs or think of how there is at best a silent void where a person once stood, laughed and danced.

There is no monument save for the legacy of pain. There will not be an eulogy, a wake or a fond memory - no, none of those things despite the last days where so many regrets were barely suppressed as the doomed was given one last chance to be remembered as a good person, a loving person and not a selfish monster.

I kept his wallet and a few pieces of his identification - everything else is gone including time in the military, his birth, his professional qualifications. A few trappings of his painful life sit in a box hidden away, insignificant items except for the memories of life that he had. A compass that once led is amongst the meagre assortment as is a shell that she gave him, a stick figure that was made for him, a poem that he was never meant to see and a ring that was meant to last a lifetime.

I think I need a kleenex.