Note:

OS inspired by one of my favourite movies, "In Bruges"

The main character, Raymond (Colin Farrell), a hitman who's suicidal because he accidentally killed a young boy during a mission and the guilt is eating him up, really touches me, and so does the theme of suicide as my husband killed himself a couple years ago.

Through that fanfic (which takes place just before Ken stops Ray from shooting himself in the head), I tried to be faithful to Ray's character, hence the incredible amount of swear words and of rubbish and off the wall arguments, but above all to emphasise his aversion to Bruges (which is a full 'character' in the movie) which only reflects how disgusted he is with himself.

ATTENTION PLEASE! I have absolutely nothing against my Belgian neighbours (I live in the North of France, about an hour away from Bruges), against Bruges (which is an amazingly beautiful town), against Americans, gay people, vertically challenged people or anyone! I'm just trying to stick to Ray's character and to all his prejudices!

Please also keep in mind that I am French hence the English mistakes! ;-)

FUCKING BRUGES.

Dammit!

Fucking rain.

Fucking cobblestones.

Cobblestones. They're fucking slippery when it rains. Can't those Belgian cunts use tarmac, as everybody else does?! (1)

There's mud on me trousers now. Those are black trousers. Black doesn't show stains that much. But still. I'm sure people are laughing, because people find it funny when someone falls down. They don't care that you may have cracked your coccyx. You may even end up in a fucking wheelchair, for all they know. But you fell flat on your face and it makes 'em laugh, full stop. I swear, if I catch anyone laughing their arse off, I'll make them eat a cobblestone.

But no one is laughing. I fell down, I fucked me bum up and nobody gives a fuck.

Ding Ding.

Fucking belfry. Ding Ding, that's the sound it makes when it rings the hour. It makes it laugh that I fell flat on my face. See, it's making Ding again! It's taking the piss out of me.

The whole town is taking the piss out of me. The canals. The bridges. The swans. And that fucking belfry.

Fucking Bruges.

I don't even know why I went out of my way to come back here before going to the park. Well, actually, I do know why. That's Ken's fault. He says I didn't give Bruges any chance. That I hated it before I even got to know it. Then maybe… Maybe I went out of my way to see that fucking belfry again. To try to find it beautiful. Because it certainly doesn't look like it, but it's a UNESCO World Heritage site. Ken told me. He read this in his fucking guide book. I don't give a shit about UNESCO. I don't even know what it is, to be honest, but Ken seemed to think it was awesome. Anyway, all I know is that that fucking tower is ugly. And some people are dumb enough to pay to climb 366 stairs – this, is written in Ken's guide book too – and see what can already be seen down here.

Canals. Bridges. And swans.

Except that from up there, the swans must look like tiny white dots. You'd see them much more clearly if you stayed downstairs. You'd have to be really dumb. Some more dickheads just got ripped off at the entrance. Yankees, probably. Yankees are fucking dumb. They bumped John Lennon off.

"Would I mind taking a picture of you? Of course I would! Why d'ya want me to take a picture of you on a bridge? It's just a fucking bridge! Never seen a bridge in your life?! Jeez, where are you from? Fucking Sahara?! And I'm not being funny, but if you like that bridge that much then just take a picture of it and get the fuck off! I mean… Look at your face! That bridge's already ugly as it is, no need to make it worse!"

Fucking tourists.

"Shit! It hurts, you fucking cunt!"

Dammit, that fugly broke me fucking nose. I'm bleeding. I'm sure I'm bleeding. That twat's not gonna get off lightly…

"Hey, Quasimodo! Take that!"

He had it coming. All that for a fucking picture of a fucking bridge. You'd really have to be dumb.

It's raining harder and harder. Raindrops are making holes onto the smooth surface of the canal. Just like a bullet into… Well… Just like a bullet. Fucking rain. It washes all the filth of the city away. The dust from the street lamps. The bird shit from the roof tiles. The crap between the cobblestones.

What about my dirt? Who's gonna wash it away? The blood I have on my hands is quite like the mud stains on my black trousers. It doesn't show, but I know it's there. It trickles through my hands. It ain't my blood. It's his. And that fucking rain is definitely not gonna make it go away.

I could have sat on any bench, but I chose the one just in front of the playground. I think it's only to hurt myself a little more. That's all I deserve.

There's a small hut, and a slide. A fucking slide on which that poor kid will never get to play. Because of me.

Bah. What kid would want to play on slides in that shithole anyway? Maybe a Vietnamese kid. But not that kid. That kid preferred spending his Sunday mornings praying at a fucking church rather than playing on slides like all the other kids. Why didn't he like slides, for fuck's sake?! Every kid likes playing on slides! What was his fucking problem?!

There he was, praying. Asking God to forgive him because he was bad at maths! Dammit! No one gave a fuck he didn't know his times tables! He was only six, jesus! He was praying. He hadn't asked for anything. And I fucking shot him in the head! I killed him, dammit! I killed a little boy!

Shit. Fucking tears. People are gonna think I'm a fucking poofta. I don't give a shit. There's no one here, anyway. And tears don't show in the rain.

It has to stop. It's eating me up. I can't go on like this. I fucking can't.

That's why I came here for. So that it stops. I didn't want to do it in the hotel room. It would have splashed everywhere and Ken would have had to pay for the cleaning because Harry would have said it wasn't his fucking problem. When you see how much they charge for the room, I'd rather not think about it. But it doesn't matter here. Pigeons will peck at my brain. Belgian pigeons, they'd eat anything.

Some people say it's a selfish thing to do. That you have to think of those you leave behind. Well, those I'm gonna leave behind can go fuck themselves. They're not going to miss me. No one's going to miss me.

My grandma is the only family I have left and she's got that fucking disease. What do they call it again? Ah, yeah. Alzheimer. Last time I visited her at the old-people's home, she mistook me for that guy from Magnum. I don't even have a fucking moustache!

Chloë? Nah, Chloë ain't gonna miss me. She's got her not-quite-ex-boyfriend. The fucking one-eyed bum-boy. And she'll keep selling coke to that fucking midget until he blows his head off like Hervé Villechaize. (2)

And Ken? Well… Ken will keep visiting all there is to visit in that fucking town. Even the Chip Museum. And before he leaves, he'll buy a magnet to put on his fridge. It will have 'Bruges' written in gold on it and a picture of that fucking belfry. Or a picture of a bridge and a boat. And of fucking swans. He'll buy a box of chocolates for his mum too. But once in the train, he'll tell himself that it's a shame to have taken in the sights amongst the Belgians and not to have tried their chocolates. I mean, chocolates are the only good thing in Belgium, aren't they? So, he'll try one. And maybe another one. And then maybe he'll eat the whole box and there won't be a single chocolate left for his mum. It wouldn't be such a big deal anyway, because his mum doesn't even know where Bruges fucking is. Nobody knows.

It's in Belgium.

One.

Two.

Two and a half.

Thr-

"RAY, DON'T!"

Thanks for reading! :-)

(1) That's purely bad faith because there cobbled streets in Dublin too! ;-)

(2) Hervé Villechaize was an actor who suffered from dwarfism and ended up shooting himself in the head. Ray mentions him to Chloë when he tells her about how midgets often tend to kill themselves.