Warped: Historic & Fictional Relationships Gone Bad!, Page 2

Never Bow Down

  He was a man of great power and expected everyone to bow down before him.

  “I shall never bow down to you!” His wife, Anne screamed at him.

  He grew tired of her temper and failure to produce a male heir.

  “You shall lose your stubborn head.” He promised her.

  (Anne Boleyn was King Henry VII’s second wife who was executed after three years of marriage. The honeysuckle and acorn were adopted as symbols of their relationship.)

  Her Lover’s Name

  He had unrolled the rug, expecting a statue. Instead, he found her. His smile warmed her, and his touch thrilled her.

  How did it come to this?

  She placed the snake to her chest, and its fangs sunk into her skin. Her lover’s name was the last word Cleopatra spoke.

  (Cleopatra was an Egyptian queen who was the lover of the Roman General, Mark Antony)

  Excess

  She cried at the news of her husband’s demise. In the broken mirror, she gazed at her tawdry gown and reminisced about the grand days.

  Surely, the court would pardon her and take her back to the castle.

  The cake remark was just a joke. Commoners were far too sensitive!

  (Marie Antoinette and King Louis XVI were queen and king of France during the French Revolution)

  Alone

  In town, as she walked alone, people threw her disdainful glances and others shouted obscenities. She watched as those who had cruelly mocked her, entered the church. They would wail if they knew the secrets of the man who led their mass. The baby kicked, and she rubbed her belly.

  (The Scarlet Letter: A Romance is an 1850 novel written by Nathaniel Hawthorne.)

  Barren

  Each time, they would try, and she would rest on his chest as he stroked her hair. Perhaps this time, they had made a baby. It never happened, and she remained barren. He sent her away, but his love for her remained.

  At his death bed, he called her name.

  (Joséphine de Beauharnais was the first wife of Napoleon I, and the first Empress of France)

  Second Chance

  He traveled to the Underworld to bring her home.

  You mustn’t look back until you reach the upper world, the gods had warned him.

  Orpheus walked ahead, yet he couldn’t hear her footsteps any longer. Was she following? He looked back, and she screamed his name as she vanished forever.

  (Orpheus and Eurydice are the tragic lovers of Greek mythology)

  Tangled Web

  She was determined to marry a man like the ones she would read about in romance novels. Yet here she was married to her fifth husband, and he, too, was weak. Shaking her head, she poured the poison in his beer. Would she ever find the man of her dreams?

  (When Nannie Doss a.k.a.“The Jolly Black Widow” was arrested, she joked about her dead husbands and the method she used to kill them.)

  In Black

  She had never known a love like his, and at his untimely death, a part of her died with him. For the rest of her days, she was in mourning and dressed in black to show the world her heart had lost its joy. She spent most days in seclusion.

  (Queen Victoria married her first cousin, Prince Albert, in 1840. She never ever fully recovered from his death in 1861)

  Blinded By Love

  Skin is burning and boiling, a scream fills the inside of her chest. The lye scorches her vision, leaving behind a veil of scars.

  “I’ll do whatever it takes to earn your forgiveness and win your love,” he promises.

  After fourteen years incarcerated for the crime, he marries his victim.

  (Linda Riss married Burton Pugach, who in 1959 hired a man to splash lye on her face. Their marriage lasted thirty-nine years)

  Don’t Cry

  He watched his love deteriorate before him. The doctors he had hired couldn’t help her overcome the disease.

  “You’ll be with me always,” he sobbed as she died in his arms.

  He had her body embalmed and placed under glass. He displayed her perfectly preserved corpse in his dining room.

  (Eva ‘Evita’ Peron was the second wife of Argentine President Juan Peron)

  For You, Father

  She woke up to darkness.

  “Who’s there?”

  There was an enormous shadow in her bedroom, and she could hear his breathing. She started screaming, and he silenced her by squeezing her neck. He felt her bones shatter underneath his merciless grip.

  “For you, father.” The monster whispered through gritted teeth.

  (Frankenstein is a novel written in 1818 by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

  Afterword

  After reading these stories of broken, insane and tragic characters, you must know that their stories do not end. Look around your home, your neighborhood and your world…if you pay close attention, there's a wolf lurking in the shadows. Do you see the furious son who blames his father for his misery? What about the monster in the mirror who appears when you're angry? We have all experienced jealousy, selfishness and desperation in some form or another. Fortunately, there are boundaries most of us will respect, however, beware of the ones who crossed over the line…

  …bad things can happen.

  Photographs and cover design by Matt 'FlyTrapMan' Childs