Dark was the night.

It wouldn’t have done anything. The street was empty. He purses his lips and walks, counting the sleeping lampposts as he passes them.

25? Or was it 24?

He tugs the lip of the hood, his furrowed brow covered, hidden. Hidden to no one.

Must have took the wrong turn.

The wind pushes him along, aiding his every step. But the candle was at its mercy, flickering naked and helpless guarded valiantly by a thin bulbous glass wall. He needs it. Oh how he needs it.

He brings it close to his shirt pocket, sparking a little light in his ink-soaked heart. The silence around him, deafening. But he hears it. He hears it all, loud. Clear. The heart speaks enough to fill a thousand tomes. His heart. His ink-soaked heart. The words course through the veins filling his every being, smarting every pore.

A respite with every word and every letter that escapes. But each returns, untouched, tattooing the bare beating heart,  darkening it with every beat, every breath, every step. The palm clutches it. Comfort is but skin-deep.

The dying light reaches only as far as his next step. Covered in the night, he leaves a trail. A trail of ink. He bleeds. And he is letting it. As it flows, the pain goes. Drip by drip.  Bit by excruciating bit.

It marks the way on this quiet road. Deeper he walks, darker the night. Should the sun rise, should memories beckon, all he will see, all there will be, is this ink-stained road of forgotten hopes.