Inseparable
Connected Through All Space & Time
The Eternal Quiet
This silence feels like a warm blanket. I’m comforted and unafraid because it feels deceptively friendly. The quiet surrounding me dances mischievously, noting my apparent helplessness. I am in a daze. My eyes and ears are bereft of all sensory input. Only the incessant banging of my thoughts inside my head reminds me that I am yet in the land of the living.
Am I?
As I lie in the blank space, everything feels right except… I can’t move my legs. I can’t move anything. At all. My arms and hands are useless—just so much abandoned tissue and dead weight.
Now, the first few threads of panic start to invade my peace.
I slow my breathing.
It’s not helping.
Finally, I can feel something; at first, it’s faint and imperceptible, but the straps are now loud and obnoxious, making their presence around my wrists abundantly clear. My legs are also tightly restrained. The metal of the operating table is searing in its icy embrace.
Am I in a morgue?
Shouldn’t I be clothed right now?
The darkness is impenetrable, but at last, I can hear their voices. Their shrill sounds begin to pierce the comfort of my mind’s hideaway. I can sense them all around me, hovering, touching me, putting things into my body I didn’t ask for.
Anxiety moans in my ear. She is not being helpful right now.
“Listen, we will begin with a vertical incision along the sternum to open the chest cavity and provide access to his heart. On my signal, make sure the patient is ready to be connected to the heart-lung machine. We must carefully isolate the heart by cutting the major blood vessels that enter and exit it. This is vitally important. We will have to be careful in isolating the aorta, pulmonary artery, superior and inferior vena cava, and the pulmonary veins. We will only get one chance at this,” the chief cardiothoracic surgeon said.
“Doctor, when we have the heart isolated, how will we know we’ve found her?” asked the assistant surgeon.
“I don’t know for sure, but I believe we will see evidence of her presence all around his heart. Look for distinct patterns carved along the heart’s outer chambers, something akin to claw marks or bruising that took place the last time they tried and failed to remove her. Or, we may even see evidence of ventricular collapse that may have occurred when they thought she was only a distant, fading artifact from his previous reincarnation. Enough talk. Let us begin. Nurse, initiate the heart-lung machine, please.”
“Wait,” said the anesthesiologist. “I thought I saw something on the bispectral index monitor. He may not be fully asleep. Give me a moment to confirm.”
“Quickly, doctor, we only have two more movement regressions before she shifts out of this plane,” the chief surgeon replied.
Three Syllables
What are they doing to me? The darkness is still all-consuming, but my tongue is free. They are hunting her. Again. Why won’t they leave her in peace? She is mine. They can’t take her from me. What right do they have to dig her up, to torment her so? My anger flares, but the darkness is stronger.
My voice is still mine. I dig deep, recalling those nights, those beautiful nights I danced within her. She is the memory of passion unfurled, lighting up the very moon above us as we lay naked and alone in the fields of the Black Hills so many nights distant. Pressing me down into the soft grass, my back plastered in green and brown, and the stars of heaven showering my face with their tears, she was giving me her miracle, coating me, arming me, and insulating me against the messengers of hate. I remember this well, for she pushed through me with wild abandon and did not give a damn about my disability!
Though the claws of darkness have rendered me blind, I see her clear as day. Her breasts overwhelm me, feed me, and bury me in layers of ecstatic joy unrivaled. She is a living song, written into my body, performed in the old way, giving rise to new moons and feasts of love. She is a revelation—transforming my understanding of mortality under the tutelage of hips unrestrained yet steeped in the art of mayhem.
I call to her. I need to get her attention before they cut into my body. I send my voice across the void surrounding me. I cry out her name, a name knit together by three delicate syllables, each living, breathing, and teasing me to climax whenever my lips form their sound.
She does not respond. Silence is an aggressive bed partner, ruthlessly tearing away at my virginity without compassion or empathy.
“I have the heart now. Hands!” instructs the chief surgeon.
Critical connections are severed, and the heart-lung machine is put in place.
“Doctor, the heart is clean. It’s healthy! There is no evidence of failure or congenital malformations. I still don’t understand what we’re supposed to be looking for,” exclaimed the assistant surgeon.
“She’s in there somewhere. I know she is!” replied the chief.
The perfusionist interjects briefly. “When I reviewed his medical records, I saw that he has been unable to function at work, his sleep is restless, his appetite is gone, and he has been found wandering the hollows of his home, uttering her name while sleepwalking. I agree; her power over him cannot be denied. We have a responsibility to do whatever it takes.”
“We’ll just have to dig a little deeper until we find her,” said the chief, his brow beaded with sweat and determination.
Her Name in Me
The darkness will not relent. I can feel them rooting around inside of me, searching for her, using every arcane instrument to remove her memory from me. They have even summoned the gods of science for this quest. They are close. I can see her right there. It won't be long before they ensnare her in their net.
She’s shivering.
I think… I think she is afraid.
I whisper her name softly, gently. I need her now more than ever. She hears me this time, and I gently coax her into moving deeper in me. I need her to find the place I hide from even my soul. My secret vestibule. It is the one place I know she will be safe from these demons. I urge her to quickly flee, to find this hiding place before they uproot her permanently.
While I cannot see its edges, I feel the darkness begin to collapse upon me like an anaconda in heat. I am running out of time, and she must get to my private place quickly because Lilith’s promise is soon to expire, and her boon will be a forgotten dream.
“I must admit. I am confounded. We have scoured every nook and cranny, every crevice and fold, and she remains just beyond our reach. She’s good, I will give her that, but we have one more move here,” the chief surgeon explains. “Bring me a new scalpel, bone saw, and bone hooks, and make sure both the rongeur and electrocautery are at the ready.”
After the dissection, the medical team, led by the transplant coordinator, places all of the body parts in separate containers, and the interstellar transport technicians arrive shortly thereafter to load all 18 individual body components into conveyor pods. After a few minor adjustments, all 18 pods are launched into space on their way to disparate parts of the galaxy, final destination unknown and uncharted.
“Team, I believe we can consider this a huge success.” There is no way she could have survived this treatment. Well done. Now let’s get ready for the next patient. I’m told they too are suffering from this malady,” the chief surgeon says as both the surgical and sterilization teams begin making preparations for the next round of procedures.
Exodus
I felt every cut, every slice, every inch of my disassembly, but as they deconstructed my body and packaged it into 18 discrete parts, the darkness gave way. Gradually, the emptiness started to diminish. The void fought for every inch, but she vanquished it and humbled it with prejudice. Her light and love flooded all of me. Her love began to rebuild me, knitting me back together, first in tiny ripples of light and then in gushing fountains of radiance that burned through my soul, replacing the loneliness and ache with something more.
I floated across the universe. I was full. Her memory could not be removed from me. She could not be cut out of me. Nothing they could do would ever erase her from my thoughts and dreams. Wherever and whenever I exist, she will always be there.
We are one destiny, and not even the heavens can separate us.