Facing Reality

Facing Reality

As I slip into the bedroom, I carefully close the door and remove my stiletto heals so I do not wake you. You are a light sleeper, but I am unusually quiet tonight. I slowly glide across the wooden floor to the bathroom.
As I turn on the shower, you softly stir. Carefully, I remove my dress so I do not touch my bleeding face. It is a beautiful white dress, long. It fits my body like a glove. I notice that I have stained it, and I will have to wash it myself. My face is bleeding quite badly. That is what happens when you drive drunk.
I step into the hot steamy shower. As I look down at the water dripping off of my face, it looks like a murder scene. I try not to look because it makes my stomach feel queasy.
Washing my dusty blonde hair, I feel like a princess. My body is tan, it is not very curvy, but it is thin and I am proud of it. I am one-hundred-sixteen pounds, and I am thirty-four years old. I am married, but I do not have any children. That is probably the reason I am still thin.
I turn the squeaky faucet handle and the water slows to a small trickle until I cut it from the water supply completely. With out-stretched hands I grope for my towel. I find it and press it against my face, for a brief moment forgetting the pain. As I come to feel my face drying off, I recall the night and its fateful events.
You and I were at a Christmas party, a couple blocks away from our apartment building. I had arrived before you because I did not have to work today. I had been drinking, not much though. You had stayed for about an hour, and decided to leave early because you have to work in the morning. When you arrived at home you called me to tell me that you had arrived safely, but the roads were a little slick. You also told me not to drink too much. I think I should have listened.
I decided to leave about two or three hours after you had left. It had snowed quite a bit since then and the roads were very slippery. I was drunk. A block away from our apartment complex my car swerved off of the road. I hit a few trees. My car was damaged very badly, but over all I felt alright. I just had a few scratches. My chest and right leg had sharp pain in them for a while, but I thought it was just the shock. I walked home in the cool crisp snow. The night had been frightening.
I decide to sleep on the couch because you are taking up the whole bed when I get out of the bathroom. I fall asleep in the cool black leather. It is now four in the morning. I wake up. You will be getting up at six to go to work.
As my groggy eyes adjust to the dim light of the living room I remember, the newspaper comes every morning at 3:55. I drag my feet around the coffee table, to the front door, and into the hall in front of our apartment. Here I find the paper. Almost like routine, I pick it up and walk back to the couch. Lethargically I unroll the paper and scan it almost as slowly.
Front page, Car Accident, it looks bloody. Second page, nothing exciting, a new church is opening on main road in the center of town. Third page, Kidnapped girl found alive in Alaska. Well, that is one place I would never have thought to look. As I think for a moment, it comes to my mind, the picture on the front page looks very familiar.
Wait, on the front page, that is my car. As I read the details, I lose my breath. This evening a Blue Ford Escort was found wrapped around a tree on Blair Street. The driver of this car is said to be a Caucasian female in her mid-thirties. Her right leg was pinned to the hood of her car. Her right lung is collapsed and she has fourteen shattered ribs. Twenty-seven lacerations to the bone on her face. Time of death, 1:34 a.m.
I should have listened to you when you told me not to drink too much. I should not have driven home, but I did. I am forced to face reality and come to realization. I am dead.