Golden Eyes

My life is typically outlined by its stable consistency. Peaceful, quiet, unassuming. I have a few friends and attend university, but I have no social life outside of that. That was until I met Jane.

She was stunning, perfect in every way, far out of my league in looks, wit, and personality. I had assumed she would just become another minor acquaintance of mine. I'd see her in the hallway and shyly wave before scurrying to my next class. I couldn't have been more wrong.

Jane was vibrant and brought a significant splash of color to my life. From the moment I met her, I was utterly and completely infatuated. She was cute, funny, intelligent, and creative in ways I had never seen before. The way she formulated her words pulled me in like an unyielding rip current. Her voice, soothing and tender, silky and smooth on my skin in a way that made my hair stand. She was incredible.

We quickly became more than acquaintances as our friendship turned to young love. Fast and fiery with youthful passion and an insatiable hunger for each other. Her piercing yellow eyes pulled me deeper and deeper with every glance.

As our love developed into something more than a fling, we began exploring each other's worlds. I loved her more than anything, and in a foolhardy move, I ignored the signs. My rose colored glasses blinded me to Jane's darker side. Her intense fascination with the macabre and her incessant collection of animal bones, though not inherently concerning, were combined with late-night "runs" every night between 3 and 4 AM.

I hadn't noticed until we moved in together, but it filled me with anxiety. I had never loved someone so much before, and I feared she'd break my heart. It was a bitter, cold Saturday evening when I finally confronted her. After dodging the question and her several futile attempts at redirection failed, she finally confessed. She spoke about it vaguely but assured me that it was nothing to be worried about. That she just needed to clear her head now and then, that her creativity needed an outlet without peering eyes. It was bullshit.

I called her out on her blatant manipulation attempt and told her I would leave if she wasn't honest with me. After all we had been through together in our 2 years of dating, she owed me her honesty. What had begun as a gentle but sincere confrontation had exploded. She screamed at me and told me that it "wasn't for me to know," so I left. I packed my things and headed to my parents for the night. Full of pain and feeling like I had just lost my best friend, I retreated to my old room and sobbed. What had I done to deserve this? What did I do to trigger such a furious rage from the woman I loved?

Things were different after that. We rekindled our relationship as best we could, but she was distant. Her late-night excursions became more frequent, and she began returning with damp, metallic-smelling clothes. I was distraught, destroyed emotionally, knowing the love of my life had betrayed me was killing me. I couldn't keep up this facade of fake happiness; my anxiety was eating me from the inside, driving me mad, preventing me from attending work or enjoying things. After 3 more months of pitiful sulking, I mustered the courage to follow her.

I crafted a not-so-original or elaborate scheme to put my plan into action. A weekend work trip! I told her I was being mandated by my lab to attend a conference discussing heightened lab safety and new protocols. She bought it. I left on a warm and humid Sunday in mid-June. I hid, tucked away in my car down a side street, she would have to pass to make it out of our cul-de-sac.

To my surprise, she left the house earlier than expected. Around 11 pm, her car slowly reversed from our driveway, and she made her descent towards the highway. I followed her with at least 5 car lengths separating us, doing my best not to draw her attention. She continued down the highway into the forest and eventually took a right down an old dirt road. I parked my car at the road's entrance and followed the rest of the way on foot. Keeping an eye out for any infrastructure. There was nothing. Just a dark dirt road that was only dimly illuminated by the night sky peeking through the trees.

After a 20-minute walk, I finally found her car. She was parked alongside 6 other cars. I saw a dim light illuminating the trees in the distance, a tall crackling blaze that glowed with an intense green hue. As I slowly crept forward, I found myself awe-struck. There, in the middle of the woods, stood a massive glowing pyre. Ashes descended from the sky, colored green by the pyres' neon complexion. In the middle of the glowing flames sat a purple glowing standard. A strange and unique shape that I was unfamiliar with. Surrounding the blaze, 7 people chanted in a language unfamiliar to me in a rhythmic, almost song-like fashion. Each wearing a dark cowl and black robes, each with a mask that resembled a crow with antlers crafted out of what looked like human remains. In the center of it all, before the glowing green pyre stood Jane. Her flowing brown hair waved in the wind as her tender, naked body dripped with sweat. She chanted alongside the others, beckoning something from the sky. I hid behind the cars, doing my best to stay silent.

I slowly peeked over the cars again, only to be met with piercing yellow eyes. Jane stared at me with a fiery intensity reflecting the flames she had worshiped only moments ago. As our eyes locked, my heart began pounding. Her eyes glowed a fierce yellow, piercing directly into my soul. The longer our eyes remained locked, the deeper the burning sensation across my body. No matter what I did, I couldn't break our mutual stare. No matter how hard I pushed, our eyes remained locked. As the flesh dripped off my bones, I watched her walk towards me, backed up by her worshipers. This wasn't Jane. I stared into her piercing golden eyes, the same eyes I had fallen in love with, as she gently plunged her hand into my chest and crushed my beating heart. My last moments on earth, infatuated with those golden eyes.