It Ends with Hatchets (A Reflection of Dark Romance)

I don't like writing about romance. Nor do I like reading it. Kyra loved romance. All of it. Dark and grimy like charred honey. Our house was a smattering of her collections, side tables and chairs replaced with piles of characters I could never live up to.

Oh, but I tried.

I read them, too. Not all of them—definitely not the sports romances. I don't like sticks—not men's and not hockey. Sticks were for poking and prodding. I do not like being poked. But she poked me—pushed at my last frayed nerve when she suggested I throw her down the stairs in the name of foreplay. She asked for it, really. Her requests had grown wilder and wilder, the last book coming to a mythical truth.

The blood-tattered spine now lies on the floor beside her crumpled body, her legs splayed in a not-so-romantic way. For the first time in our relationship, I look away. I highly doubt the police will believe this story. Nothing to do now but dispose of the evidence. Again.

The house is an old wood-frame, shag-carpeted monstrosity. It should have burnt to the ground ages ago, not rented out to two women from Ohio with nothing but a U-Haul of Colleen Hoover and Ana Huang.

I grab the pack of matches from our first overnight stay at the Super 8, shove them in the bust of my lingerie and grab Kyra by the ankle. Inch by inch, I tug her to the middle of the room. When she's positioned, I trudge back up the stairs and change into more public-friendly clothes. I pack a small backpack, just enough for a few days, and then head downstairs, before covering her in the books that were ultimately her undoing and dropping several well-placed matches onto them.

I walk out the front door without looking back.

Outside, it smells like fresh starts. I walk down the street with a slight drag in my step. Perhaps my next target will be someone who enjoys horror. No one has asked to role-play those.

Then, doubting myself, I wonder if Walmart still sells hatchets.