Heaven Not Spared

It had been a fairly simple thing. Two men. One action. 

They had been best friends. In a way, they still were. Their motive was passion. A woman. Somehow, there was always a woman involved. Good, bad, evil. Whatever the action, there was always a woman involved. One had fallen in love, the other had already been.

Let’s set the scene. Beautiful, sunny day at the beach. Seagulls cawing, taking flight, the air was salty and fresh and cold. The sand sparkled in the light. The distinct smell of fish and saltwater. A few crabs scuttled here and there, giant turtles lounged in the sun without worry. The sand was soft, clouds on earth. This was heaven on earth. A few families lounged on blankets they had brought. Enough.

Two men sat side by side. Not looking at one another. A few minutes ago, they had been laughing as best friends oft do in one another’s company. Now they were silent. Not the kind of silence they were accustomed to with one another, no, not the silence where souls speak volumes, where one can sit in comfortable peace with a kindred spirit, this was an awkward silence. A fuming silence, an angry silence. A revelatory silence. This was the moment of truth. Everything spiralled out of control from this point on.

A seagull cawed as it flew over the backs of the last dinosaurs left on earth, those magnificent turtles. A mother circled around her eggs nervously, hidden as they were in the sand, no one knew yet. Yet she protected them nonetheless. A particularly salty breeze swept through the beach. The sun glimmered in the distance, the clouds hung low and light, and white. The blue of the sky sparkled as brightly as the green of the shallows in the ocean.

A scream. A woman pointed, shivering, then fainted. A boy looked over, and vomited. A man, suicidal, rushed over to the scene. Everyone else stood in shock.

A pack of seagulls that had been foraging for food in the sand screeched and took flight. The turtles waded towards the sea. The sun was hid for a brief second by the clouds. The day was still very beautiful.

Blood spilled onto the glimmering sand, sparkling in the light as it pooled into the pores. The knife hissed as the man pulled it out from the chest of his friend. The third that had run towards the scene held the man in his arms, hoping that the murderer would kill him too. The ‘murderer’ however, was a man of principal and did not like unnecessary bloodshed. He dropped the knife where it would be picked up later by men in gloves, and bagged in a plastic bag. A rotting smell began to invade the air, fighting off the salt, a smell that made its presence known and felt with audacious temerity.

As the blood trickled into the sand, even those far away shivered as they felt that the sand underneath their feet were coming alive, fresh with the knowledge of this murder. Even heaven was not spared.