CRASH

A violin was telling a sad tale and I lived it. Do you hear the cricket's cry their sad lament? They sing, you find me not, you find me not! My love finds me not! Yet a lonesome cricket still chirps, still hopes somehow. The sun was just rising but I had risen long before it, the sun rises in joy and strength but I... I rise to spread the stain of salt and water down my checks. Play, play on my violin and make the clamor of my soul reality to my ears so that I might understand it. I slowly danced to the tune which beat inside my heart, singing softly, "Relax, take your time... Trust me and you will see... infinity." How long had I been promised that now?

I remembered... My father was laughing at the time, and mother was hiding somewhere. My big sister, her brave soul protected me, she was shrieking. Thwack! Thwack! Crack! CRASH! Stop, my child brain had demanded, stop it! You can't love us, you can't... not like this. And he didn't and doesn't. I'm just glad my sister escaped the hell of that house, I escaped to a different hell altogether. My friends were druggies, my family alcoholics, and my mentors criminals. There was no childlike innocence within me, no spark of hope divine or life care-free. Infinity? I'd forgotten the definition.

My sad dance of memories and sorrow led me to the bathroom. Ah, my strongest enemy, the with the sharpest tongue. My father had not been a kind man, nor my mother an encouraging woman, my friends had placed me at their feet to appear larger in their own eyes, and... all the world threw me to ashes. But no one compared to the sheer belief of a mirror. I stared in scorn and hate and contempt. Dash away violin! Scream out your vile anger in twisted cords and snap your bow upon the shredded strings! What was it I saw in the mirror? An abomination of a girl, hardly deserving the to bear the female sign. Gaunt and gangly, uncouth and ungraceful, and above all else altogether unlovely. The mirror also hated me, for it had not shattered from my visage out of spite. Oh yes, infinity was real but only as a negative reality. Infinite putrescence!

I wiped my mouth from the vomit and dared not to remember how many pills I had taken to get a hold of myself. I couldn't stop moving, couldn't stop for a moment breathing. But I had a semblance of control at the least. The violin was distant, like I was dead and buried already and it played on the other side of the casket for my passing. Hello world, let's pretend life again. I remembered how to smile and say, "Good morning." They actually meant their well wishes. I made an attempt to eat in order to make them feel like I was being a "good girl", I made my cricket cry in my heart and said nothing of my pain. Find me my love, find me my infinity. Come softly, my violin and speak to me of poison and a slow death of the dead already.

I took a walk in the park and thought about my many imperfections. I wanted and deserved death, I lied, I cheated, I drank and smoked and cut. And life punished me for it, I was beaten and betrayed by everyone to the most foul of degrees. Them I forgave already, because I knew I deserved all those and worse. And made my life amount to a slow torturous punishment. The sun was warm and the wind cool and the day perfect around me. I wanted to cry, why cannot you agree with me? I've made my infinity already, I diligently crafted it over time and with care and thought. Why didn't you let me drink the cup of sorrows I so arduously mixed?! Shriek, violin! Wake infinity for me and bid Him answer me!

"Cold hearted orb that rules the night!" I crowed at the sunny sky, "Let me decide what is right!" Silence replied my tantrum. Silence and I could stand no more. Not the silence, please. Where are you my violin? My cricket's cry for love? I wept in frustration, my muse, my music. My heart still had a song to sing, but no instrument to vent the song with. No more self deception, no more illusions. That's what the silence was to me. "Mercy!" I begged, though I wanted justice more than mercy. Every time I had cried for mercy in the past...

The mirror again, in my brain this time. Why the mirror?

*Little facets that there be, little crannies hard to see. Mirrors only see by light and light by life of power and might. Mirrors slice more keenly than swords and rebuke more potent than kingly words. Yet they make more beautiful than otherwise could be and bring a truth to the lies of the unseeing.*

Who spoke? Can it be? "What would you have of me my mirror? What can I offer to satisfy your unswerving gaze?"

*A perfect mirror always demands to reflect that which it is in all that stands. The world itself is not enough to match the silvered sight, but one who lived within below did live to be that light.*

Must I always be so humbled? To accept the beauty of another and not create my own, to let another drink a cup so perfectly mixed with sufferings in my place. To nail all imperfections and curses, all addictions and habits, and every other dark beast which resides within my heart upon him, must I always stay so contrite? Yet I have been in ashes already, I have been in squalor and humiliation... What difference is it to me that I finally become what I am? But a mere girl fashioned for the beauty of another. For years I lived like one who listens to the keening cry of death upon his laughing and pale mount. I could not but weep at the sound of the fires of Hades rising so hastily to my feet! I flew away, sinner that I was, for it was not then death that scared me half so much as life!

*Life again springs to you, do you dare to then renew? Accept this beauty for your own and ascend only to kneel at a throne.*

I, did and accepted fully and cried your pardon for me and requested your beauty on me! It was then that the image in the mirror went through many changes, showing a life and a death and a life eternal. Then, when it hung in the air of my mind like an everlasting symbol, it crashed and shattered.

*No more mirrors of judgment be, merely mirrors for refinement of thee. Laugh and dance and sing and grow for to you this mercy has been known.*

Dt

Friday Morning to Monday Morning

Greetings Gents! There are two primary reasons to my more absent postings of late. First, I've been working on a story and it hasn't been progressing well. Second, I was out of town! I visited a city three hours SSW of where I live currently, to my great delight. Enjoyed Mangolian style food, good fellowship, and new friendships. All in all a worthwhile trip. I also learned that at an illegal cruising speed of 75 MPH my 94 Honda Civic CX gets 61.79 miles to the gallon. MWAHA! This pleased my poor college student pockets to no end, I can almost one shot it to the college from just the numbers. It is only about 650 some miles away, and I did make it 590 before refilling. I digress, I want an opinion from you, my audience. Should I continue to try to make this current (sub-par imho) story work? OR should I abandon it in the hopes that I shall have some other concoction in the mixing? Up to you.

Dt

Under my Skin

I was awake as I lay in my bed, enveloped in the darkness. I glanced around at the room for the hundredth time. I had long given up trying to remember when I had last actually slept. Time was a slippery thing to me and clocks only told me numbers, too many numbers. My eyes ran over the desk in the corner with its useless piles of papers that hadn’t been touched in a month. I saw the large dresser with its menagerie of trinkets and baubles that lay in a random pattern of chaos across the top. My eyes began to scale the walls. I found myself fixed upon the eyes of the miscellaneous people in the pictures that stared ahead with long-dead, leering eyes. Those pictures had meant something to someone who had once lived here. Had that someone been me before? I couldn’t remember. I had left them there simply because they held meaning. It was something real, to someone, somewhere, once upon a time. Then, I saw the large mirror where I was reflected, even in this dim light. My pale frail frame and my fair hair offered stark contrast to the dark camisole I wore but it was my eyes that caught me. Who was this staring back at me? A question that taunted me until I turned away; I couldn’t bear to hold the awful gaze.

I rolled out of bed and went to get a drink. The light in the hallway was such a stark contrast to the dimness of my room that for a moment I couldn’t see. I stood there blinded, feeling much like a deer, caught and frightened by the headlights of a car. Blinded. Trapped. As my eyes slowly adjusted to the light of the room, I began to see the details of the room: the open window allowing a cold breeze to stream in uninvited; the now dusty collage I had painted a year ago, a riot of color in a gloomy world; the golden pothos that sat on the table next to the window, wilting slowly from neglect, its beautiful vines still struggling to snake upwards. I knew how it felt as I tentatively began walking down the stairs. They were cold and smooth as glass against my bare feet. When I reached the bottom I stood there, holding to the banister as if I might fall when I let go. I focused only on breathing until finally I was able to release it. How pathetic I am I thought to myself, how frail. I moved my focus away from me and back to my surroundings.

The kitchen had faded ivy wallpaper that seemed as old as the house itself. The years had left their marks on the walls. A miscellaneous tale of scuffs, scratches and dust that I could not understand, but I liked it nonetheless. It wasn’t pretending to be something it wasn’t; it was honest. I scurried over to the fridge ignoring the fear creeping slowly across my bones as best I could. It had always been like this. A memory assaulted me unasked and unwanted. The hospital that day had been fairly empty. They had taken me to a room and set my wrist while I sat there silent and chilled. It must have been odd for the nurse that I remained so quiet as she cracked the bones back into place. Had she noticed the shadows in the room I think she would have been quiet too. The shadows swarmed and swirled in a slow macabre dance surrounding us, occasionally brushing past me. That day, when I heard the cries of what seemed thousands, I feared I was either dying or losing my mind entirely. I had only later learned that the hospital had been in use as a sanitarium when I was there. So then the nurses had at least heard the voices.

The coldness of the refrigerator brought me back into the present and eased the constant pounding in my head. I stood in the open door letting the chill wash over me for several minutes as more time slipped away; I longed to follow into that black oblivion. Where does time go when it passes us by? My heart clenched suddenly along with my lungs, and my stomach was troubled by a strange sensation of sliding... slipping. I ran to the sink emptying my stomach of the water I had just consumed. I wiped my mouth and shuddered, seeing a red light reflecting off the window over the sink. I turned.

He stood there, smiling, his sharp teeth a stark contrast to this house of darkness. I backed away only to bump into him behind me...no in front of me. Where are you? I tried to run but I was paralyzed, frozen like a stone to my spot. He lifted a pale hand adorned by long black claws and moved my hair away from my face, tucking it behind my ear, a strange act of gentleness. I shivered as I felt the same weakness that I always had as his presence invaded me.
The memory came with the weakness, with the cold. It had been a winter night then, a dark winter night. I had snuck out of the house, I never did know why. He stood in the snow staring at me as I skulked around in the snow like some sort of small criminal. At first I took him to be a criminal. But then his pale blue eyes caught my dark ones, holding me prisoner with a petrifying gaze like the basilisks of old. I knew true fear for the first time in my life and understood that he was no criminal: he was far worse. I came out of the memory suddenly, instinctively shrinking back from his freezing touch and accidentally slamming my head into a hanging light. As the world tipped at an impossible angle he began to whisper something, almost inaudible. A song came to mind, “cause you know babe that I can't get you out from my in...you're under my skin, under my skin...” I screamed then, screamed and screamed until I lost consciousness.

It was the knocking that woke me I think. I didn’t know what it was at first. I was too lost; my mind remained disconnected from life. I tried to focus on the noise, muddled as it was, tried to force myself to listen. There it was again. It was familiar somehow, like a melody on the radio, a song whose name you’ve forgotten. Then, as if I had suddenly awakened, I realized what the noise was. It must have been the neighbors who called them I thought—screams in the middle of the night do tend to alarm people I supposed.

She found me curled into a tiny ball in a corner in my closet. How had I gotten there? I didn’t remember moving from the kitchen. She asked me how I was, I looked at her...through her, don’t really see her do we my pet? his voice whispered to me. “No, she isn’t real enough” I answered. I felt him smile inside me, a slithering, sickening motion that nauseated me. My muscles spasmed, responding on their own to him. I tried to crawl away from him, from the sickness he caused. He grabbed me pulling me towards him. The woman stared at me as he dragged me across the floor, his crushing form enveloping me, or I was I enveloping him? I grabbed my head as the pressure on my lungs increased and screamed dragging my sharp fingernails down my face babbling “Death would be kinder, the mind slipping away into the void, the endless wheel spinning in the darkness. We’re all tied to it, bound by the hands and legs. Oh get it off, get it off, off!” I screamed as I clawed myself, collapsing in a fit but remaining conscious somehow.

The woman spoke and fire seemed to fall from her tongue upon me. I jerked away from her hard, slamming my body into the ironwork of the bed. I turned and clung to it, to the chill of it. Stop I tried to scream, but she had begun again. I was useless to prevent her when I could barely see her. I could only burrow deep into myself. Run, run, run...run, run, run...it played over and over in my head, a demented mantra consuming my thoughts. Suddenly I felt a hand that was like an inferno. I tried to wrench away from her as my mind was slammed back into my body. I opened my eyes and clawed at my face, rising.

“Get away!” I shrieked. She smiled at me, asked me if I wanted to be myself again, without him. I panicked, “YES! I said then yelped “NO!” She simply watched me as I struggled inside myself. I began to pace frantically. “Stop...don't...yes...please...No I....help me!” I cried in broken sentences as I felt him slam me to the ground and hold me there. Still she watched in silence. I was able to stand again after what must have been an eternity and tried to run only to sit back down and curl my body into a tight ball. I sang to her, or me, or even him, that song in my head...“He's under my skin...he’s under my skin...he’ll always be in...oh gods!” I cried becoming more and more frantic. Her eyes continued to watch me, their intelligent kindness suddenly infuriating me. I rose and stepped towards her, suddenly every inch the arrogant powerful villain instead of the writhing cowering victim. She narrowed her eyes at me and spoke with that tongue of flames. I fell again and lay flat staring at the world as if I was an observer and not part of it. He held me down (or was it that he had fallen on me?) his oppressive weight making it impossible to move. My breath came in quick gasps, my lungs fighting to do their job, fighting his interference. “Help...me...oh god...please...I...PLEASE!” I begged, screamed, and cried, not even sure what I was asking as the tears ran down my face, mixing with the blood in my cuts, scrapes and scratches. She came to me and laid her now cool hand on my head. Everything in me screamed, spit, howled, hissed and jumped while I lay as if dead. Her clear eyes were the last thing I saw before I blacked out.

When I awoke, I felt as if I run a marathon. I was sore and tired, my head was heavy and my body was bruised, but I could breathe. I tried to open my eyes but they refused to obey, as if they knew what was best. I gave up, too tired to resist, and let sleep capture me once more. It was the best sleep I had had in years. When I finally rose, I was able to eat without my body rejecting it. I went outside—she said it would be good for me. (She was right as usual.) The sun was shining, the birds singing, a warm breeze blowing softly. I stared at the world as if for the first time. Had the sun always been this bright? Had the flowers always smelled like this?? I suddenly realized as I bent to pick a lily that I felt no foreign presence in my mind, no force on my chest, no pain...anywhere. At first I felt fear at the absence, but as I stood there able to breathe freely I forgot to be afraid. I smiled then laughed for the first time in over a decade. A different song was playing now, I sang merging my music with the rest of the world “it's gonna be a bright...bright...sunshiny day. And everything's gonna be ok, yeah everything's gonna be ok...”

Dt + MS