'Untitled'
an excerpt

Looking around his living room Gary noted for the umpteenth time that he could really do with getting some photos up. The mantelpiece looked like a giant dust covered desert expanse with only a small clock in the centre that ticked, quietly but still audibly. Gary loved to read but couldn’t in this room, luckily he had a quiet room upstairs that he used for his meditation and relaxation.

The meditation room was sparse; the floor was fake laminate wood flooring with a single tatami mat in the centre of it. The tatami stained with purple splotches and the walls adorned with shiny sharp edge knives in different designs. Knives that seemed ornamental but extremely lethal; however, there was nothing on their shiny blades to betray their guilt and blood lust.
Gary lit some incense and placed the stick inside the bamboo tube decorated with a dragon and a yin-yang symbol. He took the centre blade from the wall by its ivory handle and carried it deliberately to the tatami mat where he kneeled and closed his eyes.

The incense gently drifted until it hit his nose, he breathed in nasally savoring the smell before then breathing in deeply through his mouth. He continued to breathe in the vapor for another five breaths, listening intensely to his own breathing. He cleared his mind slowly and bought himself into the moment. He lifted the knife and hitched up his long shorts to reveal his muscular thigh into which he cut a four-inch line. He then placed the knife in front of him and waited, eyes still closed. He hadn’t even flinched as he sliced, the line seemed to grow and thicken as the blood tentatively made its break for freedom and ran down the side of his legs at random angles.

As the crimson torrent swallowed his leg it ran over hairs like molten lava tearing through a village till eventually it reached the tatami mat and beyond to the wipe clean floor. Then the darkness took him and held him for hours. When he finally awoke, it was dark outside and a cold breeze blew in through the window. He got to his feet unsteadily; the bits of dry blood fell from his legs but most remained. He staggered drunkenly to the bathroom, shedding clothes like a snake would shed its skin. Leaving them scattered behind him, he climbed into the bath and stood at the shower end gripping the handles he had installed specially to help keep him upright after his meditation sessions.

A turn of the dial and piping hot water hit his face and shoulders causing his expression to change suddenly, his eyes widened and he slowly began to regain his wits. He turned and wiped away the blood traces with a sponge, once it was mostly gone he let go of the handle and sunk slowly to sit under the jet that cascaded over him, breathing new life into him, all he had to do was sit an wait.