The Sympathy Shrine

20250410

Prompt from DailyPrompt.com

I thought it was just clutter the first time I visited her place. I mean, a stack of menus, paper coasters, and rumpled napkins? In most apartments it wouldn’t have stood out. And with it being the only messy space I was hardly going to say anything. I was a guest.
A few weeks later we were hanging out at her place again, and I noticed that the stacks had grown and a few pieces were pinned to the wall above. So I asked about it. Thought it was maybe some art thing. She seemed the type to do DIY modern art.
She told me that oh, no, those were souvenirs from dates. Waxed passionate and lyrical about the guy she was seeing. For ages. How he was successful at work, and such a sweetheart, and utterly enchanted by her. It was a bit much, I regretted asking, but was able to honestly tell her it was sweet.
After sitting through that rant I avoided the topic. But I noticed the stacks becoming a heap and spreading across the wall. A few ‘souvenirs’ stood out to me - a sweat-stained handkerchief, a sandwich bag of hair clippings, a tissue dotted with blood. I started thinking maybe I should try convincing her to switch to scrapbooking.
Then she called me one evening. Her voice soft and sombre. Said she was ‘done’ and ‘burning it all’ and asked me to help.
I assumed they’d broken up. That’s a normal thing to assume, right? The guy had broken up with her and she was clearing these mementos out of her life. A statement. Catharsis. And also decluttering that gross dust trap.
So I said yes. I mean, what else could I say? It’s the kind of things friends do for each other. Right? Let them load up your car with junk and drive them to a bit of waste ground where people often burn things, and…
It was the ‘vessel’ which made the whole thing creepy. She’d stacked a bunch of woven wire shapes next to the bags of souvenirs, I hadn’t looked closely, then she staked the base and started pinning sections on in this careful order, and at some point I realised it was making a human shape.
Not an abstract form, either. It was… it looked like a full-scale statue of someone. So, so specific and detailed. You know? The face especially.
She’d been stuffing it as she went. Filling it with the souvenirs. And once every bit was inside it fitted perfectly. As if planned.
Then the accelerant went on, and I fled to the car before the burning stench hit.
She was humming and bubbly the whole drive back. Very grateful.
Next afternoon I saw the news about that guy setting himself on fire. That photo… his profile…
I snooped a bit. His ‘goodbye’ note claimed he’d ‘committed grave sins’. Rumour was he left the money to someone not family.
Then last week, another stack appeared at her place…

Prompt was “Your friend tells you they always keep a souvenir from every date they’ve been on. You think that’s sweet, until…”