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Life was okay, he guessed.
He never really thought about it until now – in his lunch break at the factory he had overheard someone talk about how this was 'heaven on earth'.
Was it really?
He didn't have to do much other than his six-hour shift at the factory. He starts at 8, finishes at 2, and can do what he wants the rest of the day. He didn't have to cook or clean or do his laundry – they did that for him. He didn't have to think about money or how he'll get from here to there. He didn't have to think about his job or his future or his family.
They did that for him.
It was easy and comfortable.
Life was okay.
The bus came to a screeching halt and the driver cursed loudly. “Fucking –,” whatever the balding man exclaimed was drowned by the deafening sound of sirens.
He craned his neck, tried to catch a sight of what's going on through the front window of the bus.
A few moments passed until the fume ahead cleared again and for a second he could make out a bright yellow motorbike racing down the street in front of them, followed by a dozend security cars before it took a sharp corner and disappeared again. The swarm of white cars followed, and in the blink of an eye the calm silence was back.
Only then the driver started the vehicle back up.
He leaned back in his seat.
The bus started moving again.
Relax , he told himself. It's safe here.
The bus took the wrong turn.
Away from the rebel's route.
The bus dropped him off right in front of his house.
It was a nice house, small and clean, just outside of the part of the city where the factories are. It's quiet out here, the sun is always shining and there is always a nice breeze.
He calmly takes the steps up to his door and enters his home.
“Baby!” he called. “I'm home!”
When he didn't get a reply, he frowned. “Baby?” he asked again, but was still greeted with silence.
He got worried now. Where was she? Had she gone out? No. She would have left a note next to the front door. Wouldn't she?
He cautiously took a few steps further into the house. What if somebody was here? Is that even possible? There hadn't been a single robbing in the last 20 years. Nobody did such things anymore since they first introduced that new drug, live casted all over the city, on every chanel. There surely wouldn't be someone stupid enough to risk it.
His train of thought was interrupted by the sound of running water.
Running water?
It couldn't be later than two-thirty in the afternoon. What was she doing in the shower?
Now, sure of himself since there didn't seem to be any danger, he went over to the door that led to the bathroom and knocked. “Baby? What are you doing?”
There was a crash, and he could faintly hear her cursing. Then there was a sound like water on tiles.
“Baby, are you alright?” he called again.
When she stayed silent, he said, “I'm going to come in now!”
He pushed the door open and stopped dead in his tracks.
She was on her knees in her underwear, bent over the bathtub and covered in blood.
“Baby!” he screamed, eyes wide with shock, and then his feet moved on their own and he raced into the small, brightly lit room.
At his shout, her head shot up and red water splashed and splattered from her drenched, wet hair. It ran down her back and seeped into the fabric of her white bra before continueing its way down to her panties.
“Would you shut up?” she hissed, and he forced himself to look away from the huge stains in her underclothes. Her voice wasn't anguished, her eyebrows weren't furrowed in pain but in anger, and when he worriedly scanned her face for a source of the blood he didn't find anything beside the dawning realization that this, this was not blood at all, but colour, because she had dyed her hair.
The shock felt like a punch in his gut and he fell backwards into a pool of pinkish water, getting the colour all over his working clothes.
He wanted to scream at her, he wanted to run away and back to safety, he wanted this to be a bad dream and it almost worked, he almost believed himself if it weren't for the fact that she would be the monster of his mind that was currently on its knees, crawling closer to him, shushing him, telling him to calm down, because if someone heard, if someone heard him yell, they'd come and see this mess, and they'd both be dead.
“Why,” he choked out once he got his voice back, “why did you do this?”
Her eyes were sad.
The colour ran down her face, neck, chest, between her breasts, over her stomach and pooled between her legs as she leaned forward, closer to him.
“I want to be free, too,” she whispered.