“We have five minutes left,” Kamuran says. Her eyes are fixed on the ceiling. She isn’t looking at my face. As she turns her head to the side, a single tear slips from her eye. It doesn’t look like she’s crying; it’s more like a stone dropped into a glass filled to the brim, causing it to spill over the edges.
A warm, crimson glow rests upon the bed. Glistening beads of sweat cling to our oily bodies, trapped between the mirrors.
A knock at the door, followed by the voice of a young woman calling out, “Room service!”
“Come in,” I call out. Meanwhile, Kamuran is idling with her left nipple.
“Excuse me!” the girl says, her astonishment at our nudity tempered with awkward respect. She hesitates, unsure of where to place the silver-domed serving tray in her hands. She has all the naivety, freckled beauty, and bashfulness of a twenty-year-old… She nervously avoids our gaze while trying to adjust her already neatly tied red hair.
“Over there,” I say, pointing to the side table next to the television.
She quickly sets the tray down, straightens her skirt and blouse, and asks if we need anything else; I shake my head no and send her away.
Before leaving the room, she turns around as if remembering something. Browsing the symbols on our bodies with sudden courage, her gaze shifts from the keyhole tattoo between Kamuran’s breasts to the double-headed eagle on the back of my hand. Her pale blue eyes widen with fear. “You don’t have to do this, please leave!” she says.
“Step outside, child,” I say with a faint smile.
Stepping backward, she pulls the door shut behind her.
“Do you love me, Chao?”
“Yes.”
“That’s not what I want to hear,” she says.
“That’s not what I want to feel, Kamuran.”
“What are you feeling?”
I feel as though I am melting like a jellyfish left on a pier under the blazing sun, but I won’t say it. I stay silent because silence is required.
“What about you? What do you feel?” I turn the question back to her.
“That I am alone.”
“You are. And you know I don’t approve of the lengths you go to remedy it.”
“You’re not alone; you socialize so easily,” she says.
Her sentence lands like a direct accusation. In truth, there’s a grain of truth to it. I don’t feel lonely; I feel singular. An experienced singularity. Qualified, flawless… I am that solitary one. I am as singular as a shoe whose pair has been stolen, a lace glove stitched for a single hand, the penis of a Capuchin friar, or a severed arm.
“I paid off my solitude, baby.”
“How?”
“Everything I experienced after the day I left you was the price for the solitude I shared with you. I owe my singularity to you.”
“And are you paying that price right now?”
The room phone rings.
“Sir,” the young woman at the reception says, “your time is up.”
“I understand,” I reply, and hang up the phone.
I walk back to the bed with the serving tray from beside the television. Lifting the dome, I retrieve the Smith & Wesson 686 along with two silver bullets, and slide them into the cylinder.
“Time’s up, Kamuran. Would you like to go first, or shall I do it?”
“Take care of us both. I’m afraid I’ll mess it up.”
“I love you, my miracle.”
“I love you too, Chao.”
I press the barrel against the space between her eyebrows and pull the trigger. The pillow rapidly turns crimson. Her eyes remain open, her lips parted.
“My turn…”
ANARCHISTALES 