Characters of the World

The front door swings open and the lock on the scratched metal doorknob bites the wall again, deepening the permanent bruise in the drywall and yanking me from a dead sleep. My pulse twitches unevenly against my chest, startled and expectant. I don’t try to close my eyes again, it will be hours before I can do that. Instead, I breathe out a searing breath and wait for the familiar, inevitable racket to shake my limbs and the walls. Your feet shuffle against the fake wood floor and into your bedroom, the door slams shut behind you. I hear her voice, shrill and angry, against yours, deep and jagged, both slurring stupidly. I can’t read the words and it makes me mad, even though I know that knowing what they are would only piss me off more. I only hear ambiguous sounds humming loudly like a broken machine, an annoying sound shoved in between all variations of the word fuck. I can hear that word. Verb, adjective, noun. She gets louder and so do you. It’s the same fight as always, powered by wasted energy. You never solve the problem, you only drown it in beer and god knows what else. Then someone else opens your door with sleepy eyes, tells her she needs to leave now and never come back, tells you that you need to stop yelling. Your going to wake your sisters. I picture you, teeth clenched, fists closed, knuckles white as I hear them carve a new scar in the house. The sound makes me jump even though I’ve heard it a million and one times before. I picture her, salt water on her cheeks, hurling blades at you from her eyes. I hate her for existing, for clenching your teeth and closing your fists. But I hate you for being my big brother in the morning. I hate you for making me laugh in the morning. I hate you because I have to love you again in the morning, and that will never ever go away.

pavorst:

Dear whoever-is-reading,

I have a challenge for you. It’s simple. Make somebody up. Write a story about them, draw them, sing a song about them, make a matchstick sculpture of them. Make them up, and name your creation after the character. 

That’s it, really.

PS I wish you the best.

(via pavorst-deactivated20120105)

The same bird, sits on the same light post almost every time I pass it. So I thought to myself, he’s not a human but, I’m gonna write about him anyway.

This isn’t how it used to be, all grey, hard and loud. A bird I used to know had a nest in a tree that used to be there, I was here when his children took to the air for the first time. They spread their little scrawny wings, as the soft feathers followed the wind and flapped just hard enough to survive the fall. There were none of those animals with the round legs that roll across the flat black rock in flocks. The ground was soft with pine needles, and the air was clear. The “humans”, they’ve been called, traded my tree branches for something else, but I still won’t go away. Part of me gets satisfaction out of my tiny rebellion, I don’t know if they notice, but it sure feels good that they haven’t won completely. I’ll come back here every day for the rest of my life. I’ll stare at what used to be, and remember how much better it all was. Sure, it hurts, but it’s so much better then letting them erase it forever.

Two people that I watched from afar in my sisters second grade class, formulating their life in just a few seconds. This is their story from my eyes

“Cynthia, honey, those shoes don’t match.” Says Ray with a teasing and adoring smile. It’s his daughters first day of second grade and he has taken the morning off. Cynthia is wearing one pink shoe and one green, and looking mighty proud of her style choice.
“But daddy, I like them booooth.” She retorts, one hand on her hip and the other pointing to her feet.
“Why don’t you pick one pair for today, and one pair for tomorrow?”
Cynthia sighs in frustration, daddy will never understand the fashion sense of a seven year old. “Fine.”
Ray laughs as he watches her strut innocently back to her room.
His wife takes her place in the hallway “Good morning, Honey”
“Morning, Jill” He takes a sip of his cofee and doesn’t notice that his wife is wearing lipstick for the first time in months. Her shoulders drop in disappointment, It used to be his favorite shade.
Cynthia is back and in matching shoes. “I’m ready to go now.” She announces to the room, with her nose stuck high in the air and her eyes bright.

The school is a five minute walk from their house, and the journey’s soundtrack is Cynthia’s giddy rambling about who she does and doesn’t want to be stuck sitting next to. They find the classroom easily and when Cynthia let’s go of Ray’s hand to go find her seat, he looks up and his stomach drops to his knees. He shifts his eyes to the floor, hoping that his wife hadn’t seen him look at her. He subtly makes his way to the other side of the room, attempting to keep as much distance between them as possible.
Jill soils the attempt when she recognizes her and her husband. “Oh, Ray! Look! It’s our neighbors!”
Ray’s stomach drops to his feet
Jill raises her hand in a friendly wave. “Hi, how are you?” She starts walking towards her and Ray follows mechanically
“Hello.” He mumbles, offering his hand to hers, and feeling silly for the formality that has never passed between these two hands “My name is Ray.”
“I’m Kaitlyn.” she smiles, that familiar smile, the one that he would love under any other circumstances.
He pulls his hand away and their wedding rings scratch against each other, making him blush awkwardly.
“Oh, you two haven’t met yet?” His wife asks.
“No.” He says, at the same time as she does, both answer too quickly.
And at that moment, Jill’s chest seems to implode upon itself. She has finally found the woman that has been pulling her husband away from her, the woman who has sucked the affection out of his eyes, that used to be there every time he looked at her. The woman that has been sleeping with him.
Ray recognizes her change in posture, and the sudden ice that covers her golden irises. He can’t stand to hold her gaze so he looks away, thinking how stupid he was to think that she wouldn’t figure it out. Internally screaming at himself for letting it happen, and trying to remember when he stopped loving her and started looking other places for the love that was lost.
“Well we better be going.” Jill says, all friendliness frozen.
They both kiss Cynthia goodbye, and as they walk out of the classroom Jill grabs his hand in a facade of affection, her nails start to dig into his knuckles. “I want you out of the house by three o’ clock.”
This time, the five minute walk is silent.

 I count each pill with a memory. The first slides down my throat and it’s the day I met him, leaning against the fiction and literature shelf of the library holding a beat up copy of Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451. I feel the same, the pain still rumbles at the pit of my core. Another pill is our first kiss, same section of the library, he tasted like cofee and cigarettes. I get impatient. I start to take two at a time to smother the pain, to kill the memories, when i’m done they will all be gone and i will be happy again. It’s the only way. I name the next two with the cross country road trip, where he told me we would last forever, as we sat in the crimson red and white booth at some fifties breakfast joint. I ordered french toast and he ordered steak and eggs. Then I take three because he lied to me through his beautiful lips and perfect teeth. It’s hard to see now. everything is slowing down, but my heart is still broken. The pills aren’t working, they aren’t fixing it. I will not survive. I take two more because i’m scared to die. I hear someone talking to me but they are in a bubble and i can’t hear them. I see red and white lights from the window. I am being lifted. I am in a car. “Where am I?”

“You’re on your way to the hospital. you took to many pills.”

“It’s my heart. its broken now i’m going to die.” 

“You took nine pills Ma’am. You’re lucky to be alive now.” 

“It’s my heart. It’s not working now i’m going to die.”

“We’re going to try to make that not happen.” 

“It’s my heart it’s never going to work again. I’m going to die.”

“her heart rate is dropping. I don’t think we’re going to make it to the hospital, Dave.”

I want to tell him that it’s my heart. that it’s broken. That I want to die. but I forgot how to talk and my lips are stuck together.

It’s my heart. it has stopped working and now I am dead.                                                                                                                                

This story is about a Woman that passes my house every single day when she walks her dog. I see her socializing at the park and i also see her when she’s alone. She always seems somber until i say hello, or someone else does. It makes my day to brighten hers. even if it’s only by a little. This is her story, from my eyes. (I apologize for the length, just give it a chance.)

I awake from the same dream every morning.  Torn from the same lips, hands, and memories as yesterday and the day before for the last forty years, or is it fifty now? Oh, who the hell knows? The dream replays the last time that I saw the love of my life. We’re at the end of my parents’ driveway saying goodbye, of course I hadn’t expected his absence to turn eternal, but it was a grave moment none the less. I was memorizing as much of his face as I could with my fingertips, and his eyes were closed, his voice unstable. 

“I don’t want to go Delores.” he whispers, “But I swear, I will come back for you.” He opens his eyes now looking straight at me, burning his sea green irises into mine. “You here me? I will be back. I promise.” 

“I know Anthony.” 

We exchange desperate “I love you”s and he begins to walk away slowly, backwards at first, and I am grateful for the extra seconds to see his face. Then he reluctantly turns around and I watch his back move into the distance. 

Then it’s as if my present mind catches up with me, I remember the phone call that changed my life, that informed me of the end of his. I remember that I had a chance to stop and here it is, in front of me again. I open my mouth to scream something, anything that will make him stay with me, but before any sound can escape, I’m awake.  

It’s Wednesday and I greet the day with a sigh, knowing that it really doesn’t matter what day it is, they’re all the same anyway.

I hear a familiar tapping on the floor. This is the reason that I choose to get out of bed.

“Good morning my Lloyd.” 

He points his graying nose at me sniffing the air as a response. 

“I suppose I should let you outside, yes?” 

He heads toward the bedroom door. 

Lloyd is seventeen years old and his body shows it. He’s got salt and pepper on his nose and the tips of his paws, his back left leg is at a constant shake, and his eyes are covered by a slight film, not enough for complete blindness but enough to suggest old age. 

We have racked up the years together. He was just a puppy when I was fifty six so I guess you could say that I got a head start, but he has been here for all the important parts.

We go throughout the day on our familiar routine. Feed Lloyd. Feed self. Watch whatever soap opera available. Read a chapter or five out of any given Jane Austen. Feed self again. Walk Lloyd. 

It’s usually  around five when I set my shuffling feet and the four legs of my walker to the sidewalk. Lloyd leads the way on a leash that he despises but deals with anyway. I find myself immediately in a better mood when I go outside. As if every day I am realizing for the first time that there is a world out their and it does not revolve around my ticking clock. 

There’s the neighbor’s seven year old daughter with the wild curly hair that comes to pet Lloyd every day. 

“There’s your friend” Says her mother with a friendly smile, every time that I pass. She has warm eyes, traced in worry lines etched by things only she knows. Her teenage daughter has the same friendly disposition. She has curiosity sewn in her expression almost always, and she always listens to me tell her the latest updates on Lloyd‘s health or my thoughts on the weather, and intently not courteously, not because she has to, but because she wants to.

Then I make my rounds to the park, where I meet Janine, who uses her dog walking as a way to let off steam. We talk for twenty minutes sometimes forty five, while Lloyd lays in the shade rubbing snouts with any dog that walks by. No matter what the subject, she always ends by telling me how grateful she is for my ear. 

“Oh, it’s no problem.” I always say. “I’m glad to help” 

I return home and get ready for bed, thinking of my day. Using the good feelings and the things that I learn from all my neighbors as a shield from what I know I will see when I succumb to my subconscious. I remind myself that life is made of the things you will live through, not the things you regret. I close my eyes, and until the morning I look forward to waking up again. I am strong.   

I was in Hawaii for my senior trip, and without a car we spent a lot of our time on a bus. This is about a guy who stood directly in front of us and shook his little booty, torturing us because we had to use all our will power to keep from laughing. Here is his story, from my eyes. 

           It’s Sunday, the day that Pablo takes to the Hawaiian public transportation system holding a black umbrella and his best dance moves. Pablo is a man of confidence, from the wavy black mane that falls to his shoulders, to his shorts that may or may not be too short for public, he radiates the attitude that courses through his limbs when he grooves. This week he skips onto the number thirteen bus and plays a song with a catchy drum beat. He presses the repeat button on his portable CD player and lets the music take him. His goal is simple: to make as many people smile as he can. This is easy for Pablo because his smile, framed by a perfectly manicured mustache, is wildly contagious. He makes a stage out of the small amount of space in front of the back exit. As soon as the bus moves, so does he. First he taps his feet, feeling the energy build up, he lets it spread to his legs. He stands on his toes with one hand on the pole in front of him and one on the handle of the umbrella swinging it in tune with his hips. While he does this he inconspicuously counts the smiles. He laughs to himself as he jerks his head back and forth, because he sees that some people are looking down at their hands or their phones awkwardly, with their lips closed tightly in a straight line. Pablo sees laughter in their eyes, and puts more sass in his steps to coax it out of them. People are always trying not to smile, since the very first day of his bus ride entertainment service the same thing happens. People just don’t seem to want to smile in public. The bus comes to it’s fifth stop, and when the doors open Pablo sends an enthusiastic “Mahalo, Brutha!” to the bus driver and hops off the bus. He walks with silent satisfaction. Today he made nine people smile, and four people almost smile. A success that has injected him with even more ambition for tomorrow, because tomorrow is the day that he sings on the number eight.