More than a Melody (H.S) ON HOLD

33

thirty three

"No, Harry.. I- I have no part in any of this, you know that better than I do!"

My gums emit the fetid taste of rust and utter repugnance, the bed of my nails curling inwards, scraping the couch cushions. Surreal, absolutely surreal and there was no way this was true. There was no way, that if it was, I couldn't get out of it. What benefit would I be to a cartel? I become anxious by just walking around a grocery store or answering phone calls at work. What part could I play in their organized crime? Absolutely nothing. It was silly to believe otherwise.

"Of course I know, the mere thought disgusts me."

The floor feels as though it's shifting. Every aspect of the room swirling into this line of tunnel vision that makes my mind fall frigid.

"And there's no way around this? Would I truly be much of a loss?"

I calm myself down before becoming hysterical. There was no reason to be, right? This isn't absolute. Harry and Miles can arrange a deal of some sort, convince them, possibly. They've made it this long, haven't they?

"We are talking about the Sauvage drug cartel. The most complex, implacable, and sadistic system of operations that has ever been built. All of Europe, North America, South America, and portions of South Asia are heavily cycled into this cartel. The foundations of their capacity and methods revolve around everyone fulfilling their end. You are a dollar sign in their eyes." 

Sauvage. The name has never once met my lips or psyche. French, I presume, by the way Harry's tongue rolls with an accent so unprecedented to before. The adjectives he uses, so freely yet with restricted contempt, make the finely structured vertebrae of my spine tingle and tighten. I am going to vomit again. I think. I don't know.

"You are a dollar sign to them, but you are a small one, their suspicions haven't been raised in a way that is concerning right now. We've bought you a bit of time."

This is what I get for watching Breaking Bad, isn't it? Some sort of backwards, predestined fate? A "ha-ha, you mentally romanticized being a chemist in a drug ring so now we're here to show you what it's really like- without Jesse and Walter White. Good luck!"

Harry notices the way I knit my eyebrows in sync to my thoughts, and he mirrors this before asking, "what are you thinking?"

I don't know, Harry. A lot, I would assume, after being subjected to a reality I never- in a thousand eons- would expect to live.

Instead I say:

"How come you couldn't tell me this before?"

Why go through the effort, the hassle, if I would ineluctably find out? The concealed identity, the lies, the build up of emotion and trust and relationships and the unadulterated collapse of it all- and the pain it brought forth- could have been avoided. Maybe, maybe I would have shut the door that day, left him outside in the butchering cold- for he deserved every prickle of torment the wind brought about. Every sting and bubbling affliction. Maybe I would be able to look at Harry and not be tied down to a rush of agonizing emerald and cherry. Maybe I could touch his tangerine cheeks and become immersed with the nacreous orbs of his sunset woven soul.

Maybe I could love him.

"Their is an ultimate rule of law the Sauvage follow. Code muet du silence."