Azure Dreams: Vincent’s Descent -AtoZ Blog Challenge

“Speak now.”

Vincent stared at the back of the caerulean blue cell phone on the tripod. He did not blink. The video picked up the slight tic from the corner of his green right eye. There was a crust of dried blood on his bottom lip. His lips were tightly closed now, giving a droop to the otherwise vacant expression most were accustomed to. The single drop of sweat that meandered from the forehead down the nose, a bead forming at the tip, until it dropped into the three-day growth of his ginger beard.

The lawyer sighed. The veins of her left hand were bulging from the fist she hid under the table.

“Look, I don’t have all day. Speak. Now.”

Vincent heard the exclamation point. It came into focus in front of him, a dark royal red. He felt its disdain. It shimmered over his lawyer’s head, fuzzing with golden tufts that faded away in a glowing haze. A breeze entered the sealed windowed room, a soft hum that buzzed into a howl. Vincent felt a chill from his sopped chin, moving inch by inch along his jawline.

He heard blackbirds calling from behind her, off in the distance. They took off as one, flying just past her shoulder. The three landed on a dead tree, perching on the same branch. They cawed intermittently, a basso screeching that pounded inside Vincent’s head.

“Spppeeee,” cawed one.

“eeekkkk,” another.

“Nooooooooowwwwwwwwwww,” came the third.

Vincent looked up and out of the ceiling; the sky was swirling. His eyes were blistered by the refracted light of the dying sun as night came to claim everything.

Vincent did not move. He felt his hands merge into the arms of the chair, his back becoming an extension of the wood and fabric he sat on. He was able to move his eyes but wished he hadn’t.

The biggest of the blackbirds, beak extended, leaned in. Its breath was hot, smelling of the dead flesh it fed upon. Black eyes. Vincent felt the eyes eating him.

“I give up,” the lawyer said, turning to guard. “I’m going for a smoke.”

She looked up at the camera in the corner. “He’s not to be spoken to until I return.”

Turning off the camera, she got up from the table, pushing the chair back under. It screeched like the birds to Vincent. The chair was another carrion.

The door buzzed to let her out. She stopped part of her wanting to return to Vincent, put her hand on his shoulder, shake him, pat him, slap him. The urge to punch him propelled her to the locked door.

A buzz. The lawyer was able to open the door. She turned, her instinct to go back, get him to talk. Her feet chose a different path. The door slammed behind her.

She left him staring up at the ceiling of the room.