I wish I could see her again.

Just once.

To hold her in my arms
And feel the warmth of her breath against my skin.
To hear her heart beating,
Slowly, softly,
Until it fell in sync with mine.

I would give anything for that.

Anything.

I still can’t believe she’s gone.
Some mornings, I wake up expecting her to be beside me.
Some nights, I reach across the bed
Only to find cold sheets beneath my hand.

She’s gone.

And no matter how many times I tell myself that,
My heart refuses to believe it.

God is cruel to me.

How am I supposed to keep living
When the person who made life worth living
Is no longer here?

So I stopped trying.

I stopped going home.
Stopped answering calls.
Stopped sleeping.
Stopped eating.

I started drinking instead.

It was easier.

There’s more liquor than blood inside of me now,
And every night I pour another glass
Hoping it will drown the memories.

It never does.

Her face still finds me in the dark.

Her voice still whispers in my dreams.

And every morning,
I wake up disappointed that I survived another night.

That night, the rain had soaked through my clothes.

I wandered through the city without knowing where I was going.
Streetlights flickered above me.
The sidewalks were empty.
Every window I passed was dark.

I felt like a ghost
Long before I ever died.

Then I saw him.

A beggar sitting beneath a broken streetlight.

At first, I barely noticed him.

His clothes were filthy.
His shoes were worn down to the soles.
His hair hung over his face, dripping with rain.

But something about him made me stop.

Maybe it was the way he sat perfectly still
While the rain poured around him.

Maybe it was the way he wasn’t shivering.

Or maybe…

It was the fact that he was staring directly at me.

I looked behind me.

There was no one else.

I turned back.

He was still watching.

His eyes were strange.

Too dark.

Too focused.

Like he wasn’t looking at my face.

Like he was looking through me.

I tightened my grip around the bottle in my hand
And started walking.

“Please.”

I stopped.

His voice was barely above a whisper.

I slowly turned around.

He held out one trembling hand.

I reached into my pocket.

“How much?”

He didn’t answer.

Instead, his head tilted slightly.

Then he smiled.

There was something wrong with his smile.

Too wide.

Too deliberate.

Like he had been waiting for me.

“I don’t want your money,” he said.

I stared at him.

“Then what do you want?”

His smile disappeared.

He looked at me for a long moment.

Then his eyes dropped to the photograph in my hand.

The one I carried everywhere.

The last picture I had of her.

My stomach tightened.

“How did you—”

“You want her back.”

It wasn’t a question.

I stepped backward.

The beggar slowly rose to his feet.

For the first time, I noticed how tall he was.

Far too tall.

His wet clothes clung to a body that looked unnaturally thin, almost skeletal.

He took one step toward me.

Then another.

“You’ve been asking for a way,” he whispered.

My heart began pounding.

“A way to see her again.”

I couldn’t speak.

He stopped inches away from me.

His breath smelled of something rotten.

Then he leaned toward my ear.

“I can give you what you want.”

I looked into his eyes.

“What would it cost?”

The beggar smiled again.

This time, I saw something behind his teeth.

Something that made my blood run cold.

“Everything has a price.”

He reached into his coat
And pulled out a small, black piece of paper.

He held it between two fingers.

“Make a deal with me…”

The rain suddenly stopped.

And the streetlight above us went dark.

“…and you can have her back.”

I should have run.

I should have thrown the bottle down
And disappeared into the night.

But desperation has a way of making monsters look like miracles.

So I reached for the paper.

And that was the moment
I made the worst mistake of my life.

To be continued…