I was recently rummaging
through some old things I've written, some of them being nearly 5 years old. It
was interesting reading these things, remembering the circumstances of my life
around 5 years ago. Most of it is very sad, because I think inside that was my dominant
disposition. I found several short writings about a girl named Lucy and an
unknown male character, and as I read through these short blips (all written
independently of each other) I realized they all actually connect fairly well.
My subconscious was up to something, I guess. So here they are, right in a row.
The brain of me, 5 years ago.
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This isn’t real. It
can’t be true. What kind of sick, twisted moment IS this?! She tried her best
to carry on the conversation without letting her assumptions get the best of
her. With the cash register between them, the two girls had been carrying on about
the latest cheesy teen romance novel (something lame about vampires or
something) for about twenty minutes when it struck her-- and Lucy found her stomach in a place she
had never experienced: The soles of her shoes. Her heart raced as the girl
behind the counter gabbed on about who-knows-what and who-the-hell-cares at
this point, while Lucy’s heart tried its best to leap from her chest. Her hands
began to tingle as it seemed that all her nerves decided to give up on her and
devout all attention to her struggling heart. She was sure death was upon her.
She felt the color flee from her face as her eyes widened and all noise around
her ceased. It wasn’t until Jericka had stopped talking that Lucy realized her
mouth was gaping. “…Are you alright? You don’t look so good…” Jericka seemed
sincerely worried at this point as her new found book friend appeared to be
going into cardiac arrest. Lucy’s jaw bounced up and down in a stupid attempt
to say something as she realized with whom she was talking. Say something, you
idiot. She hooked up with your lousy boyfriend, she didn’t run over your dog.
She doesn’t know who you are, she didn’t do anything wrong. “Ihavetogo” was all
the quick, slurred response Lucy could manage to spit out as she awkwardly
knocked over a book display on her way out the door. She knelt down and began
to fumble like an idiot with the fallen books, but quickly gave up as she
realized the feeling in her hands hadn’t quite returned (She would later
massage her hands, relieved that her nerves kicked back in, for in this moment
of impending doom, she was sure they never would.). As Lucy barreled out of the
bookstore she sucked in oxygen as deep as her lungs would allow and removed it
quickly, making her light headed and adding to the nausea that already sat in
her bowels. With splots of colors inhibiting her vision, Lucy wheeled around in
a stupor, looking for anywhere to relieve her insides of the apple bran muffin
and orange juice from that morning, which, in light of recent events, had
declared mutiny, and her stomach no longer had the capacity to tolerate it. She
was struggling to breathe, and before she knew it, the surrounding patrons of
the mall were holding their noses and deterring the eyes of their children.
Then, somewhere in a distant restroom of the shopping mall, a janitor listened
intently to his walkie, heaved a big sigh and began to head his way over to
Wallace Bookshop.
She took the left hand
turn so quickly her blinker only had a chance to put itself to use for one and
a half flashes. Her grip on the steering wheel tightened as the headlights of
the oncoming cars blurred past her. On auto-pilot, Lucy knew where she was
headed but was still debating whether or not she should continue. Though the
battle went back and forth in her head, she knew it didn’t matter. Her course
was set and that was that. The wind blew with fierceness and intention, it
seemed, pushing the little car against its inevitable destination. She swerved
up the mountain road, vaguely concerned about deer that had a tendency to leap
into the road at the most inconvenient times. Lucy smirked at her own thought:
As if now was a convenient time for anything. The sinking of the sun and the
chill it created; her reckless, brash maneuvering of the vehicle, her rising
pulse and the developing knot in her throat. Foreboding October nights such as
this are hardly, if ever, conducive for convenience or good fortune. Lucy knew
this. The red flags were being waved in her face like a matador to a bull. But
like the bull, tonight Lucy would let her emotions get the best of her. She
threw her car into park and marched up the driveway, keys left dangling in the
ignition. The only items Lucy put in her coat pockets were her balled up fists,
one of which that would, in a matter of seconds, leave its place in her warm
pocket to be irrationally and violently
rapped against a thick, cold oak door.
The minutes dropped like
hours as the realization of her furious departure sunk like an anchor in his
bones. His hurtful angry words reverberated in his chest and their sting
lingered. The hour hand of the clock pointed accusingly between the 8 and the
7, at the shards of porcelain of his girlfriend's once favorite lamp on the
floor. The minute hand jutted through the six, pointing down at the desk where
the lamp, just minutes before, had sat. 7:30. His eyes were wide and lost. Lips
parted, he felt like there was something to say. He thought of an old tree
falling in the forest and wondered if he muttered anything if the sound would
even be real. He closed his lips, slowly moving his neck towards the front
door-- closed the tightest it’s ever been. Time passed. he clenched and
loosened his jaw as he stared, fixated on the golden doorknob. And time passed.
He found himself on his knees, slowly placing the tiny blue remains of his lamp
in a pile. He heaved a deep sigh and time passed. His eyes wandered on the
ground to the bottom of the front door. Discolored, dirty and worn, he'd been
meaning to repaint it. He saw now in his mind’s eye a thick red line just in
the doorway. There it is, he lamented. There's the line I never should have
crossed. His incoherent sorrow then evolved into deep unfathomable rage as he
hurled the remnants he meant to be cleaning up at the base of the door and at
the line that took her away. Hot, unfamiliar tears fled down his face. She was
gone, and mercilessly, time passed.
He found himself face to
face with the clock on the mantel that so nonchalantly carried on with its work
while the whole world seemed to be crumbling. 9:30. Two hours had passed
without a second thought and he found himself bewildered by the device's
endurance. Eyes frantic and heart racing, he touched the side of his finger to
the delicate plastic minute hand. He closed his eyes tighter than he ever had
before, sucked in a deep hopeful gulp of oxygen and held it there. He slowly
pushed the minute hand opposite of its regular course. The night whirled around
him. The lamp put itself back together as it came back into his forceful hand.
Angry words were pulled out of each other's ears, sliding down their tongues
and back into the deep corners of their hearts. Blood temperatures lowered,
heart rates descended. His cell phone back safe in his pocket, no new messages
to be discovered. Her arms were warm and tight around his waist. His finger led
the minute hand until it read 7:00. He could almost smell her. He peeked one
eye at the clock, removed his finger and released the stale air from his lungs.
His eyes were still frantic on the clock as he prayed for a miracle. He slowly
pivoted to face the room. He was alone. More now than he was before his
desperate, foolish 90 second attempt to change things. The corners of his mouth
turned down and the now familiar hot tears hesitated on the edge of his lids
before barreling down his cheeks.
She was gone, and time
passed.
Lucy lie, crumpled on
the floor. The blue walls of her room silently listened to her muted sobs. She
could feel the physical weight of pain sinking in her chest, where, at one point, Lucy was sure a heart was supposed to reside.
Tonight, this space was vacant. She was sure of a finite
amount of things at this point. She was sure he was gone. She was sure sleep
would evade her on this pale spring night. She was sure that he would not call
her, and she was sure that this night would end and the sun would rise in the
morning. As tears pooled in her ears, she began to question the suns
intentions.
