The Stranger

by Patricia Nagy Gyuris

Image credit: Vitaliy Shevchenko on Unsplash

The first time he touched your breasts, in the late November cold on a bench with the rusty leaves falling at your feet, the flames of your blood melted the first frost. His teeth bit your skin, calling your fibers to ignite. And so, they did as if that was their purpose for being. White stars fell from the sky, sizzling on your naked skin. Sweat and melted snow flowed from your body for your baptism. You smelled the sweet scent of myrrh. You heard the sacred call of the incarnated liturgy. Your arched body was flames moving in the wind. You were sculpted by God, he murmured.

You prayed to remain his prey. You begged for his spirit to trap yours as people receive the Holy Ghost. Your Chrism. For what is holier than fire in the flesh?

For weeks on the bench in the park, he bit harder and harder into your skin, feeding on the blood within. He asked you to bite him in return. His blood tasted holy, not like when your dad slapped you and iron filled your mouth. His blood became your bread and wine. Your Eucharist.

He told you his dreams. How he only loved once before, but how he feels you'll be the one to change everything. How he was alone before you. How you're the only one who could understand him, the battle in his skin and spirit. Then he probed for your dreams. He wrote poems about your undying love, your sincere demeanor. There was no ounce of deceit in you, he whispered. He wanted to marry you and be your forever. He wanted to devour your past and spit its bones out. He wanted to heal your father's wound. He would never abandon you like your mother or discard you like your father. You were three when your mom left, and you started rocking back and forth. You were three when your dad chose you as his favorite. At about seven, he traded you for your brother. Your lover promised you a safe haven, everlasting devotion. He became your priest, your God, your everything. You prayed at his altar every minute of the day for his love to never waver.

You felt safe and shared all of you. You didn't realize he suffered from the Madonna-Whore complex. He wasn't your first–a sin he could never forgive. He turned against you as he did against the world. He asked for every single detail so he could hate you more. Shards of ice hit your body as you obeyed. You became an enemy to be humiliated, preyed upon. His fantasies were with other women now. No penance changed his mind. The poems died. Tears were useless. You collapsed on the floor in sobs time after time. He stayed unmoved. What he wanted from you, lowered you even more in his mind. And you went as far as you could. In the end, he wanted to see other women with you. You gagged. You refused. The altar's flame turned to embers, then ash. You left one morning ash in ice.

You were nineteen, young enough to feel the pull of pride. For it is what you really wanted, to revere, to praise, to be immortalized in return. You went to church before. You felt the sacred desire of thousands of people to matter, to belong. But you always thought you'd rather feel it shared by two in skin and spirit. All gone. You left with pride, to survive. His home was not yours anymore, even though you woke up feeling you were in a strange bed every morning.

Alone on the cold bench, you are an ice sculpture, frozen in the past like the leaves under your feet. No Holy Unction of the flesh can melt you. You're on a mission to kill him inside of you.

Your memories of him, one by one, iced and pulverized until your desire was exorcized. You flagellated your flesh until all feeling succumbed to numbness. Men became umbras in your heart and mind. You're now trapped in a perpetual night. He came back for you, but you live in the depths of black. You see no joy in boiling blood. You tore apart at yourself until you forgot who you were. When he found you, he was a stranger. He touched your face, but you looked through him. You heard him wail. You turned your icy back. Who am I? Who are you?

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Patricia Nagy Gyuris

Patricia Nagy Gyuris is a Romanian-born, California-based writer. She developed a passion for poetry and flash fiction at Sierra College. Her writing explores the complexities of immigrant experiences and the indelible impact of trauma. Her work illuminates the hidden corners of desire and motivation.