Catching Up by TAG

I lay in a puddle of blood.
He stood over my body with a knife in his right hand. Blood was dripping from it on the floor. With each drop I felt weaker. Drop, drop, drop...
Earlier
After two months of convalescence and a month of rehabilitation, I finally was checked out of hospital. David picked me up and drove me to his abode. We lived together as two bereft, dejected, despondent brothers brooding over the same calamity. For a while I had thought I had been the one suffering most as I had got to see her in his eyes. But that had been till I discerned how he ruefully threw glances at his reflection wherever he happened to see it. He just pored over it as if trying to make something out of it. But every time he wearily sighed, rubbed his eyes and went on with whatever it was he was doing before the glitch.
It’s always heartbreaking to find out that the world doesn’t really care about your losses. It wasn’t like that for me. No, I enjoyed the indifference. I liked that look on people’s faces as if they had been oblivious of her demise. It made me sneer. It made me want to cut loose...
I had to earn some money, but not much – just enough to pay the half of the rent and buy food. I found a place in the book store. Did not even fluctuate: I jumped at anything connected with books, everybody knew that. There wasn’t much to do, obviously. I stayed home on weekends. David had to work on Saturday’s , though. So I had the whole apartment to myself on Saturdays. It became the most dreary day of the week. You don’t want to be alone with your thoughts. Not in my state anyway. I usually sat on a sofa with my head tilted back leaning against a wall. A cold wall, it was. Just the thing to numb my brain.
On one Saturday I dozed off on the sofa and in the position mentioned above. I wasn’t able to indulge the luxury of having a nap, though, as I was woken up by loud banging against my door and a voice shouting: Open up you, rascal, I know you are inside!
It was a familiar voice. A voice that sent chills to my bones. I never expected to hear this voice again... never expected because I thought its owner had been dead.
Open up you, bloody bastard! Open up! Open up!
He kept on banging the door. I just obeyed in a stupor. I opened the door and saw private Maudlin's disfigured face. Right side of his face looked as if it had been torn off, munched and then splashed back on his skull willy nilly. The right eye was closed, but I could swear there was no eye in the eye socket. That was where he had been shot – a bit lower the temple. I thought that shot had ended him.
As soon as I turned the key he bashed the door open  grabbed my collar, shook me, then pushed me away and punched so hard on my face that I felt dizzy, staggered and fell.
-How could you leave me out there! – he yelled. – I woke in that bloody hut, dying. And you had been gone!
He kicked me in my spleen. The pain spread through my body in a blissful flaw. He kept kicking me, in frenzy.
-I had to make my way out of that hell! Alone! With two shot wounds! – he was panting from his labour, hence his voice wasn’t that loud now. – I had to struggle for every breath while you were  here, lolling or carousing or whatnot! And, I bet, shagging that bitch of yours you had been moping about...
Well, naturally I pulled him down, stood on top of him and beat him till I heard something crack. Then I got off him and lay near unconscious private Maudlin once again.
In what seemed to be a minute I heard the door open, and then Dave’s voice said teasingly:
-Well, you two make a lovely picture.
-Oh, shut it. – I groaned.- And help me get this nutjob out of here.
We took him out and left him near the elevator. Before we went away, Dave gave him a hard slap and then spat on his face.
-Why did you do that? – I inquired guessing the answer.
- He clearly called her names. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have reacted the way you did.
On this we went back into our flat and set to preparing supper. During the meal I noticed Dave’s furtively throwing glances at me. By and by he wiped his mouth and said:
-Listen...
-Yes? – I replied listlessly.
- I want to tell you something...about her.
-Oh, please, don’t start... – I moaned.
- No, you hear me out! I’ve been meaning to tell you this for a long time. But...couldn’t pluck the courage.
- Alright. – I took a long breath and than hove a sigh of uneasiness. – I’m all ears.
- When it happened...the accident...at the time of her getting run over....
- I got it!
- Sorry, sorry. So, at the time...she...she wasn’t pregnant...
- Are you out of your mind? What the hell are going on about? The child couldn’t have been born. Not for another month.
- No, it couldn’t...
-Well? – I roared. – What is it?
Dave couldn’t bring himself to look at me. And suddenly I understood.
-God, no...please, don’t! Please!!! Don’t tell me...oh, Lord!!..
- I’m sorry...- Dave started but I didn’t let him finish:
-Oh much use your being sorry is!! How could you keep this from me for so long?
Dave darted an angry look at me. He said:
-Well, you weren’t in the right state of mind, were you?
- Don’t you go down that road!
We set in silence a couple of minutes. My pulse was throbbing and my eyes couldn’t settle on one thing. After a lapse of few minutes I said, choking with tears:
-I just assumed I lost both my child and my wife in that accident. But I was wrong, it turns out. I had lost my unborn baby before I lost her. She lost it...Dave?
- Yes? – he sounded like he was summoned from somewhere far away; he didn’t sound happy either.
-Dave, you think my going away had anything to do with the miscarriage? Could the idea that I might die have been what got her tizzy and fretful and consequently lose the child?
-I thought so, anyway. – Dave agreed gravely.
I shudder went through my body. I felt giddy and nauseous. Another thought occurred:
-Could my leaving combined with the miscarriage have made her careless and led her to cross the road unwarily and get...
Dave agreed, clenching his fists and frowning.
-Dave?
-Oh, for God’s sake will you shut up! – he growled and burst out of the apartment.
I was doing the dishes in kitchen, trying to process everything I heard. David had never looked so...so...formidable. I actually felt as if he had held a grudge against me. To be fair, I held the same grudge against myself. But still, I hadn’t thought that Dave had blamed me. But apparently he did. He looked furious, too... I was literally rubbing into a plate when I felt a sting. Looking down I saw I broke the plate. Of course that’s when I actually felt the pain. I stepped back, but slipped on water  spilled from my washing in agitated mind. I reached for something to hold on to, caught a handle of a knife and, falling, pierced my stomach through with it.
I rolled over so that I would be lying on my back. I’ve never felt so torpid. I couldn’t move a muscle. No, rather I didn’t want to. Then I thought of Dave and how I got to him with that interrogation of mine.
I must have passed out for awhile. I heard someone calling me as if from a distance. The sound grew more distinct and I heard Dave calling me by name. Then I felt him slapping my face to bring me round.
-I...am awake...awake.
-What happened? – Dave asked anxiously
- I slipped. – I murmured and smiled.
-You idiot! He slipped! Ok, we will get you alright in no time! And don’t take out the knife.
-Wow, thanks for advice, genius.
- Oh, you are sarcastic, aren’t you? That’s funny.
A doorbell rang. Dave said walking out of the kitchen:
-I will see who’s there. Don’t go anywhere. – and he uttered a weak laugh.
I heard the door open. Then a loud BANG. Something like...like a gunshot! Then someone slowly walked into the kitchen.
-Well, well, well. Looks like someone has taken care of you for me. – the voice said, and then it’s owner squatted beside me.
- You pathetic demented little man!! – I whispered through my teeth. Then shouted: What have you done with Dave?
Maudlin broke into a short giggle and replied:
-The man spat on my face, so I shot him in his face.
-You...
-There, there, dear...-he said in an ostensibly soothing voice. – Don’t exert yourself.
He pressed the knife in my stomach, stirred it around a bit and then took it out. The pang I felt couldn’t be described with words. It was so excruciating that expressing it through human speech would be putting it lightly.
-I will leave you here to bleed out just like you left me. – he gloated.
I lay in a puddle of blood. He stood over my body with a knife in his right hand. Blood was dripping from it on the floor. With each drop I felt weaker. Drop, drop, drop... Everything grew blurry before my eyes. I felt as if I had been drifting away...yes, to her! Judge me!!
I heard a barely intelligible: Farewell, sucker. Then everything went black.