SARAH e. WICZEN is a student at Niagara University in New York. She loves history, the theatre, books, old movies, her family, and rain. Sarah is eighteen years old.

                                                               madness


He pauses in the doorway a moment, hesitating before reaching for the doorknob and touching ginger fingertips to his face, wondering if the bruise is visible. He is not sure, and he wonders if the light will be strong enough for anyone to notice. No matter...if anyone notices, he can come up with excuses. He is good at excuses. His lover will lend him one if he can't come up with one on his own...his lover is very good at excuses, gives them in exchange for the bruises left scattered across his pale skin. Tonight...tonight things would be better. His lover promised it...promised him an evening of beauty, of magic. Promised champagne and roses, promised candles, moonlight and magic and madness. Madness, he thinks, madness, and he reaches down to brush the bruise on his thigh. The madness...what was the madness? It was part of love, and although he does not understand it, he accepts it. He accepts the madness, the bruises just as he accepts the kisses, the soft words in the darkness. He hesitates before reaching for the doorknob again, making sure that he has his composure. He neatens his hair, straightens his tie. The tie...he loves the tie. It is red, bright red, the color of blood, the color of his blood spilled during the madness the night before he received it. His lover was apologetic, fetching ice and bandages, calling a cab to send him to the hospital, whispering a good excuse in his ear and kissing him on the lips. The tie arrived in a silver gift box along with a dozen red roses at his bedside, and all the nurses commented on it, talking about how lucky he was to have such a nice lover, talking about how tragic the accident was. He is very accident-prone...people have commented on it. But they never connect it to his lover, to the madness. And this is just as well, for he is lucky. He was lucky to find his lover, lucky to have his lover, lucky to find anyone willing to love him at all. And what is the madness but another expression of love? He hesitates a third time before reaching for the doorknob, reaching up to neaten his hair, to carefully brush his bangs over the sore spot on his temple. Tonight things would be better, he reassures himself, and reaches up - not for the doorknob, but the doorbell. It rings, a calming patient sound, and his lover opens the door, eyes lighting up at the sight of him. "Come in," his lover whispers, smiling, pulling him into the house, bestowing kisses. He relaxes in his lover's arms. Tonight will be different.

                                                                  # # #

© 2001 Sarah e. Wiczen