Eyes on Final Fantasy Forums > General > Writer's Corner > [S] Fragments

[Ouch!]

I figure it's been far too long since I've posted anything here. Some time ago I posted a series of five scenes, and I never followed it up with what I guess is the finished product. It's been a long time since I've last worked on this, but I figured I'd throw it up here for some good feedback.

I guess it might be good to note that the events are not presented in chronological order. It should be clear as to why I structered it this way after reading it. The majority of it isn't really happy either, but very little of what I write is. It's also 6,500+ words long. I could post it gradually, but I'd rather not.

FRAGMENTS

Nobody has the power to go back and change things. We can only remember them. I remember the road that brought me to where I am today. I don’t know where I’ll move on to from here, but I know the road I’ve traveled will point me in the right direction. I just have to remember. So, while I pretended to read the newspaper, I remembered.

~.oOo.~

After a brief goodbye to the old man who had brought me this far, I turned from his truck and wandered into the cemetery. The place I sought was in the far back. It had been a long time since I’d last been here, but I still remembered my way. When I had been young, I dreaded coming to this place, but it was different now. There was certainly an unreal sensation accompanying my return. Although I couldn’t quite pinpoint the exact feeling, there was something strange about being here again. There was a sense of belonging, something that I’d craved the past three years, but had never attained. This place made me remember. Traces of the emotions that had caused me to leave in the first place still lingered, but I was able to ignore them—at least long enough to do what I’d come for.

“You’re the last person I expected to see here,” a voice called from behind me. The suddenness of the words didn’t surprise me. I knew that I hadn’t been alone for quite some time now. I’d heard the footsteps following behind me as I made my way through the cemetery. I’d ignored the presence to the best of my ability. I’d been tempted to sneak a glance when I heard her voice—I’d recognized it at once—but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I couldn’t turn and look her in the eye. Despite the fact that I didn’t acknowledge her, she continued, undeterred by my discourtesy. “I didn’t think that you’d ever come back.”

“I didn’t intend to,” I replied. I checked the emotion in my voice, careful to keep my tone as apathetic as possible, though I wasn’t quite sure why I needed to do such a thing. It was just a reaction that I’d acquired over the past few years—a habit that wasn’t so easily broken. I knelt down in front of the middle grave, not even stopping to consider how wet my jeans would be from kneeling in the snow. My fingers brushed across the name carved into the granite gravestone. My gaze went from one name to the next, reading what was engraved in the blocks of granite. It wasn’t much; I hadn’t been able to afford anything extravagant. What they’d left behind had been significant, most all of it went to pay for my college education, and there was little left over afterwards for the funeral. Even less remained to get me started on my travels.

I stood up slowly and turned around, sneaking a brief glance at her. I didn’t look at her long enough to get a full appraisal of her appearance, but from what I had seen, it was surprising to find that she hadn’t changed. Three years later, she still looked as she had when I’d left. I closed my eyes as I walked by her, bringing a hand to press against my forehead in an effort to focus my attention elsewhere. Her hand fell on my shoulder, gripping it and holding me back. I hesitated, waiting as a cold wind rushed over the hill, shaking the bare branches of the tall oak. If it were spring or summer, the great tree’s canopy would cast a shadow over the three graves. The scarce sunlight that passed through the clouds shone on us undaunted, though. Summer had long since passed. After a deep breath, I finally faced her, opening my eyes to get a good look at her.

Green eyes, black hair, pale skin—exactly how I remembered her. At least, that’s what I had thought at first glance. Looking at her now, I realized that she had changed. She’d grown up, at least physically. I wasn’t so sure about her maturity; she always had been one of the most childish people I had ever known. At the same time, she was also one of the most mature people I had known. “Part of being mature is knowing when it’s okay to be immature.” That’s what she used to say.

“Then why are you here?” she asked. I diverted my attention from her eyes. They stripped me bare and laid me naked before her. I had always hated that. Usually I prided myself on being unreadable, but she had always been able to tell exactly how I was feeling just by looking at me. It was as if I was completely transparent to her—only her.

“I could say something like ‘Well, I was in the area and decided to stop by!’ or ‘I wanted to visit the people that care about me!’ or ‘I really missed everyone here!’ but none of that is necessarily true.” The words flew out of my mouth. It was a reflex I’d developed, to respond with defensive sarcasm. I felt horrible for saying such rude things to her. I’d hurt her enough already, and I just couldn’t stop. Who was I punishing now? Was this my revenge on her, or was I merely just hurting myself more by hurting her?

“You don’t miss us then?” she challenged. Her question brought my attention back to her face; I looked so that I could see how she really felt, so that I could see what emotions her countenance betrayed. I had always thought that it was fair that if she could read me, then I could read her. I understood her better than anyone else ever would. It was an even tradeoff as far as I was concerned. It was because of this that I saw past her tough tone to the hurt she felt. She tried to sound annoyed at my apparent lack of concern, but she failed miserably. She couldn’t trick me.

“I didn’t mean that,” I said.

“But you didn’t come back to see us,” she said. From anyone else, it might have been a question, but she already knew the answer. That’s how it always was; we always knew, but that never was enough. We needed to hear it. I’d learned that the hard way. Even now, I couldn’t give her my answer.

I said nothing. She nodded, finally allowing her grip on my shoulder to loosen. After a moment, her hand fell at her side, leaving me free to walk away. It was my opportunity to turn my back on her, to walk out of her life like I had before. Only this time, I wouldn’t be able to come back. There would be nothing to stop me from returning, but I knew that if I walked away, I’d never allow myself to return. That wasn’t what I wanted. I’d been away for three years. It had taken me three years to realize how much leaving hurt.

That damn old man had put so many questions into my head. Why couldn’t I just leave? It hadn’t taken much effort when I’d left three years ago. Why had I left in the first place? What was it that I had sought? I certainly hadn’t found anything. What was it that I had been running from? Whatever it was, I hadn’t escaped it. Rather, it had followed me, never once leaving my mind. Others, people I had met, suggested that whatever it was I was running from wouldn’t leave me because I wouldn’t let it go. They suggested that I caused this pain to myself. I had dismissed the notion as ridiculous. I had never pinned myself for a masochist. They called it survivor’s guilt; I called it bull :skull::skull::skull::skull:.

‘Then why do you want to run away?’ I asked myself. That was why I had come back, wasn’t it? It was because being away from home hurt. Being away hurt more than staying ever did. Despite the horrible memories that this town held for me, I had wanted to come back. I could tell her what she needed to hear. I was in the area. I did decide to stop by. I wanted to visit the people that cared about me. I missed everyone here, especially…

“I missed you,” I said.

~.oOo.~

“You’re leaving?” I’d been caught. Slipping away in the middle of the night, leaving a letter to be found the following morning when they realized that my room was empty—such things always seemed to work in the movies. Life isn’t like the movies, though. Making a clean getaway isn’t really that easy, especially when the one I’m trying to get away from is her. She’d seemed paranoid for a while. I knew she suspected that I would leave. She watched me all the time. Sometimes, I would wake up in the night to the sound of my door opening and footsteps approaching my bed. I never let her know that I was aware that she came to check if I was still in my bed. My timing had been bad tonight. I had hoped to be gone before she came in to check on me; apparently that plan wasn’t very successful.

I turned around to face her, not bothering to close the door. I leaned one shoulder against the wooden doorframe. I couldn’t see inside the house—it was too dark. Disjointed rays of light slipped through the blinds of the windows inside, but it was not enough for me to make out any of the furniture or even the stairwell. If I hadn’t known the house as well as I did, it would have been impossible for me to have found my way out here without knocking over and breaking something.

The only light was that of the moon, but it barely touched the front doorstep. It was enough that I could see her standing with one hand on the doorknob. She wore only her white, silk nightgown, and her dark hair was disorderly from resting against her pillow. Her eyes were fixed on mine with a stare so intense that it almost frightened me into silence.

“Yeah,” I replied after I found my voice again. She shuffled her feet and looked away from me. There had been the lingering hope in me that she would understand and let me go. At the same time, there had been the hope that she would be selfish and demand that I stay. ‘Please be selfish,’ I begged silently. ‘Please tell me to stay here. Don’t let me walk away.’ I wanted to leave, but I knew that I would stay if she asked me to. She was the only thing that bound me to this place. If she did let me leave, I might never be able to convince myself to come back. There was a chance that I’d never see her again. ‘Oh God, please be selfish, because I…’

After her brief hesitation, she nodded and turned away from me, leaving me standing alone in the front door, my trunk in hand and my coat half on. My eyes follow her as she disappeared into the darkness of the house. The sound of her ascending the stairs followed and then there was the soft click of a door shutting and locking. ‘Why couldn’t you be selfish for once?’

~.oOo.~

She was gone when I woke up. I’d rolled over in hopes of seeing her face, but I was met by nothing. Her side of the bed was cold; she must have woken up some time ago. Last night I had truly believed that I would wake up to her lying next to me. Before I’d succumbed to my much needed sleep, I had held onto the lingering hope that I’d wake up with an arm around her waist, holding her against me protectively.

I was still groggy as I sat up in bed, but I began a survey of the room anyway. There was a door on the opposite wall. I hadn’t spent much time in her apartment, but I knew that it was the bathroom. It would probably be best that I took a shower; I hoped she wouldn’t mind.

A welcomed surprise greeted me when I entered the bathroom. There was an extra toothbrush set next to the sink and a towel was set down on lowered lid of the toilet seat. Even a set of clothes had been laid out ready for me—she must have gotten them from my trunk. I realized I had to ask her where we had left it. She hadn’t spent much time giving me a tour of her home when we’d gotten back from the cemetery. On top of the folded clothes (she must have folded them; I had merely stuffed them into my trunk in a disorderly fashion) rested the thing I had left behind. It had stayed when I left, set down next to the letter I’d written. I thought that maybe if I left it, it wouldn’t be so hard to forget everything. I thought it would be easier to leave. I had been such a fool.

I took my time in the shower. It had been a long time since I’d been able to have a proper one. The places I had stayed usually didn’t have the best facilities. I hadn’t been able to afford anything that was even close to habitable. Warm water in a shower was something I hadn’t felt for a long while. When I was finished, I stepped out and dried myself before pulling on the clothes she had left out for me. I held the necklace in my hand for a moment before undoing the clasp on the silver chain and putting it on. I stuffed the chain under my shirt. It was how I always had worn it in the past.

There was a quiet conversation coming from down the hall when I exited the bedroom. The apartment wasn’t small. I wondered briefly how she could afford a place like this. It reminded me of so many other questions I needed to ask her. Three years was a long time. Things change in three years. I knew things had changed in my life. Certainly her life had changed too.

When I entered the kitchenette, she was sitting down at the small round table in the adjoined room. The phone was against her ear, and she was speaking rather animatedly with someone. She raised one finger, as if she’d sensed my arrival. She hadn’t turned to look at me when I’d entered the room; in fact, I was surprised that she’d noticed me at all.

“Did you have a nice shower?” she asked after finishing the phone call. The newspaper was unfolded before her and I noticed she was now reading the Sunday comics. She hadn’t looked up from the paper when she spoke to me.

“Er… yeah,” I replied. “Thanks for having everything out for me.” She set the paper down on the table and smiled at me. Her eyes fell on the chain around my neck. I brushed my fingertips against the silver and smiled at her. She nodded her head at the other chair at the table. I took her invitation, and approached the chair, pulling it out from the table, and sitting down in it.

“Why did you leave it behind?”

“I didn’t want any reminders,” I said. “I wanted to forget. Maybe if I forgot, I reasoned, I wouldn’t have any reason to come back. I left everything that I thought would remind me of home. I couldn’t forget, though. Wherever I went, there were reminders of home. Maybe it was a little kid holding his mother’s hand. Maybe it was two brothers playing hide-and-seek. Maybe it was a couple embracing each other. They all reminded me of home and everything I had left behind. I could never forget. It took me a while to realize that I never wanted to forget.” I paused, looking up at her. She was staring intently at me, no apparent reaction to my words on her face. I could see the sadness, though, in the minute details. The way the very edges of her lips tipped downwards, the way the invisible tears spilled from her eyes were enough for me to see what she felt.

“Maybe I never wanted to leave in the first place,” I continued. “The longer I was away, the more I realized that I had meant for you to find me the night that I left. You know, when you stood there, I kept thinking ‘Oh God, please be selfish.’ I wanted you to tell me to stop. I wanted you to say that you wouldn’t let me leave. I wanted you to do anything that would give me a reason to say—anything that would show that you cared. There was something I wanted to tell you, but I couldn’t say the words, much less put them together in my mind.”

I stopped there, noticing that she was looking away from me. Could I say the words to her now? She knew how I felt—I didn’t need to tell her. Just as I never needed her to tell me how she felt. She wanted me to say the words. She didn’t ask for them, but she wanted to hear them. She wanted confirmation. Maybe that’s what I was looking for the night I left. I knew what her feelings were, but I was desperate to hear her say those words. Was she feeling that way now? Did she need the confirmation?

“From now on, I’m going to be selfish,” I announced. She looked up at me, a smile straining to find its way to her lips. “I want you to be selfish too.”

~.oOo.~

I had been asleep when the truck hit a bump in the road and sent my head crashing against the car door window. I groaned a bit, bringing a hand to my forehead in an effort to ease the throbbing. There was a soft chuckle from beside me. I looked to see the elderly man with a dumb smile plastered across his face. If he wasn’t being so accommodating for me, I would have been angry with him. Given the current circumstances, I owed him much more than the sarcastic retort that I would usually respond with.

“‘Bout time you woke up,” he said to me, his eyes focused intently on the road. I grumbled under my breath, not really saying anything, but at least letting him know that I was listening to him. “We’re almost there. Where do you want me to drop you off?” I thought for a moment. I wasn’t exactly sure where I could go. Before I left, I’d tracked a friend down, but I couldn’t bring myself to just show up at her apartment with a backpack slung over one shoulder and a trunk in hand asking to stay the night. I knew, though, that she would let me stay as long as I wanted if I only just asked.

“There’s a cemetery,” I began, looking out the window at the buildings we began to pass. I could tell that we were nearing the city. We were in the surrounding suburbs now. The small town I’d grown up in wasn’t too far away. “I’ll give you directions once we get close.”

The man nodded to acknowledge my request. He was being nicer than he had to. After all, the only thing I’d done for him was fix his truck. When he thanked me and told me he was headed towards the city, I’d asked him if I could hitch a ride. That was enough thanks for such a menial task that I had completed for him. He didn’t have to make a pit stop before he got to the city just to drop me off. I almost felt like I was taking advantage of his kindness.

“Are you okay, kid?” the man asked after a long pause. “You’re looking a little pale. You aren’t going to a cemetery to attend a funeral or something, are you, ‘cause you’re sure actin’ like it.”

“Maybe I’m just a little scared…” I admitted. “It’s been three years since I’ve been here. I had left with no intention to return, but here I am on my way back. I think I’m a little afraid of seeing my family again. It’s a little ridiculous, really, but I’m actually terrified of standing in front of a couple grave stones. They’re not even really there. It’s just a hunk of granite. Nothing to be afraid of, right?”

I chuckled humorlessly and then fell into a lapse of silence. The man didn’t say anything. I couldn’t have expected him to. I knew he wasn’t just ignoring me. By the look on his face I could tell that he was searching for something appropriate to say. I knew, though, that there was no real appropriate answer. “I’m sorry for you loss,” doesn’t exactly seem to be a suitable response, and that was perhaps the best one there was. I was really glad that he didn’t say it, actually. I’d grown tired of hearing those words years ago.

“I’m more afraid of her, though,” I admitted. I wondered for a brief moment about why I was telling this guy (whose name I still did not know despite the fact that I’d been in the same truck as him for at least five hours) about my feelings. I’m sure he didn’t give a damn. I suppose the only thing that mattered was that he was listening, and it felt good to get it all off my chest. “It’s so much harder to face the living than it is to face the dead.”

“Girl trouble?” the man said with a bit of a laugh. I was glad that he was making light of the situation. It was easier to deal with if I could just laugh along with him. I managed to smile weakly, but it was enough for me.

“Not exactly,” I replied a little sheepishly. “I… don’t really know what we are anymore. When we were growing up, we were best friends. We met in the first grade. We’d remained friends throughout the years—just friends, nothing more. Things started to change when I started to live with her and her mother.”

“Changes, huh?” the man said. It was all he said, and I wondered if he was taking me seriously at all. His nonchalant attitude was starting to become frustrating. I couldn’t blame him, though. He didn’t understand the circumstances. I hadn’t told him why I’d left, nor did I intend to. For all the help he’d been, he was still a relative stranger. I didn’t need some old wise man to guide me through life and help me solve my problems. That’s what I thought anyway. Ironic… that’s exactly what he did without evening meaning to. By just barely showing interest, he spurred me onward.

“I don’t think about it a lot,” I answered honestly. “She tried to convince me not to leave—she did everything she could to stop me from going. We fought about it a lot. After college I’d come back to live with her for a while. It was a temporary thing; I’d made that clear from the beginning. At first she just assumed that I would stay until I got a job and found a place of my own. She didn’t think that I was really going anywhere. She never noticed that I wasn’t even looking for an apartment, though she never hesitated to point out apartments that were up for rent downtown.

“It was only there a month before the arguments started. When I finally told her that I was going to leave, she vehemently insisted that I should stay. She didn’t want me to leave. She said that she… well, that’s unimportant, I suppose. We argued constantly about it. The night I tried to leave she caught me. She just let me go. After all the arguments, at the one moment that really mattered, the one moment when I needed her to tell me to stay, she let me go without resistance. I haven’t talked to her since I left.”

“Oh?” the man asked—another simple response, another frustration, another prompt for me to keep talking. I kept talking.

“The cemetery, she used to go there every Saturday. Sometimes, I’d go with her,” I said. The old man had no response for that. He didn’t even bother to point out that today was Saturday.

~.oOo.~

“I’m going to leave,” I said firmly. She quieted immediately, her mouth closing. She had been ready to say something, to continue our shouting match. She wouldn’t let me leave, that’s what she told me. Each time I told her that she couldn’t stop me, her resolve seemed to weaken just a little more. The point would come that she wouldn’t try to stop me. That scared me; it scared me more than I had ever imagined it would.

I was standing, rigid and red with anger. I had stood suddenly, knocking the chair to the ground with a loud clatter. Her eyes lowered to the wooden table in front of us. I knew what that meant—she was trying to hide her tears from me. At this realization my anger was quickly replaced by regret and self contempt. I hated to make her cry. She didn’t often cry. She only cried when she was truly hurt. It was a horrible feeling to know that I caused her tears.

Unable to say anything to sooth her, I turned and began to walk from the kitchen towards the stairs. It was getting late anyway; going to bed seemed like a good idea. These arguments always ended like this. We’d both be flushed from our anger and frustration, and we wouldn’t talk to each other until the next morning. We’d pretend like the argument never happened—at least until we argued about it again. I had just reached the open door when her voice called out to me, halting me in my tracks.

“They wouldn’t have wanted you to run away,” she said. Her tone was even, as if she’d just made some offhanded statement, but the words were harsh. I didn’t say anything, but did not move to continue on my way to my bedroom. When she sensed that I would not speak, she continued. “They would have wanted you to keep going.” Listening to her telling me what they “would have wanted” was getting to me, reviving my anger. I spun around to face her.

“Don’t pull any of that :skull::skull::skull::skull: on me, damn it!” I growled, pointing an accusatory finger at her. “I don’t want to hear any of this ‘what they would have wanted’ bull. Don’t you dare tell me to move on! It’s been five years since they died. I understand that. I’ve accepted it. I’m never going to see my mom, or my dad, or my little brother ever again. They’re dead. The dead don’t come back. That’s not why I’m going to leave!”

She stared directly at me this time. Her eyes were red and moist with fresh tears, but they held a deep anger and an equally deep hurt. There was only one little word that she said to me. It was the one word I could never respond to, because there was no answer. The word was the one thing that made me doubt my decision. It was a simple word that made me remember all the reasons that I shouldn’t leave, but I wouldn’t let it stop me. There was only one thing that could stop me. If only she said something different then maybe I’d stay, but instead she said that one damned word.

“Why?”

That was the last time we argued. I left that night.

~.oOo.~

“You’ve been awarded guardianship, as his parents intended,” the attorney said as he stepped into the room. I looked up at him momentarily before dropping my head between my knees again. After a short pause, the man continued. “If you’d come into the next room with me, we can discuss the new arrangements further...”

I listened quietly as I listened to my new guardian walk away with the man. She was my best friend’s mother, and had always been a second mother to me. Her husband had passed away when my friend had been very young; I’d never met the man. I knew I wouldn’t have a problem with the new living arrangement. They were, after all, the closest people to me now.

The room was silent after the door closed, but I knew that my best friend was still in the room. It wasn’t long until I felt the cushion of the sofa I sat on shift as she sat down next to me. I didn’t acknowledge her presence until her arms wrapped around me in a tight hug. When I opened my eyes, I was staring into a tangle of black hair. Her body was pressed tightly against mine in a crushing hug. I hadn’t let anyone get this close to me since it happened. She was shaking. I realized that she was crying and I briefly wondered why she was crying. ‘I should be the one crying,’ I thought, but ever since it had happened, I hadn’t been able to cry.

Hesitantly I slung one arm around her. She seemed to take it as an invitation to pull closer to me, holding me even tighter than she already had been. It was uncomfortable, to say the least, but for some reason I allowed it. She pressed her face against the junction of my neck and shoulder. I could feel her tears wetting my shirt. The roles should have been reversed. I should be crying on her shoulder. Once again, I felt horrible for not being able to let even one tear fall.

With one last short sob, she disentangled herself from me. It was then that I noticed that somehow she had ended up draped across my lap. She slid back onto the cushion next to me. She looked at me, her eyes red and irritated from the tears. She said nothing, but reached around to the back of her neck and undid the silver chain she wore. I remained still as she set the clasp around my neck. She didn’t say anything.

I was stunned. Never had I seen her take the chain off. She even slept wearing the thing. I couldn’t understand why she would be giving it to me now. She didn’t offer any explanation, but I knew that this was important to her. It was important to her that I have it, even if I didn’t understand why. That she entrusted me with something so dear to her… it was comforting. Maybe that was why she gave it to me.

“Everything will be okay if you believe it will,” she whispered. I hadn’t expected her to say anything. I was stunned into silence. I didn’t know how to respond. I wasn’t even sure if I could believe those words anymore. I used to say them to her when something went wrong. I knew what the words meant, but right then, they didn’t seem to be enough.

“He turns eighteen in eleven months,” my new guardian told the attorney as they reentered the room. “June 22. He’ll be out of school then.” She turned to me. “Your parents left you a substantial amount of money—most all of it was moved to your college fund. You have more than enough to get you through all four years.”

“Yeah,” I said, not really sure how to respond to that. I was already figuring out the plan in my head. One more year of high school left, then four years of college. After that, I would leave, probably without the intention to ever return. I wondered briefly if I could leave everyone behind. I looked over at my best friend. She was the only person that really mattered to me. I didn’t have very many other friends besides her. There wasn’t really anyone I cared about more. The question changed in my mind; would I ever be able to leave her behind? I already knew the answer: only if she didn’t stop me.

~.oOo.~

I knew exactly where I was when I woke up. The sterility of the white room was enough of a hint for me. The soft hum of the machinery and the steady beeping that followed my heart rate was superfluous. This was the only logical place for me to wake up. After what had happened, it would have been strange to wake up anywhere else.

“Oh, you’re awake,” an unfamiliar voice said to me. I struggled to rise into a sitting position, but the pain in my chest prevented me from doing so.

“Hey, hey, take it easy, kid. We just stitched you up. Don’t put too much stress on your body. The surgeons would be pissed at me if I were to let you hurt yourself through overexertion,” the voice (definitely male) said. Finally a young man appeared at my bedside. He looked at me with a goofy smile. His whole demeanor just screamed optimism. It was sickening.

“Do you remember what happened?” he asked, suddenly sobering. I only nodded as best I could. I didn’t want to speak, couldn’t speak. The man seemed relieved. No doubt he was glad that I didn’t want to discuss it. I didn’t need anyone to tell me what had happened. I’d seen it with my own eyes. I’d heard my little brother’s dying words. It was an image that would forever remain in my mind.

“You’re lucky to be alive, kid,” he said. “When you got here, we weren’t sure if you were going to make it. You were pretty beat up. You’re really tough, kid.”

‘Lucky to be alive,’ I wondered. That’s what anybody would say… it was a miracle. I should be dead. My chances of survival had to be incredibly small, but I survived because of luck. There’s no other way to describe it. I was lucky to be alive. I considered all this, but I could only think one thing: ‘Why don’t I feel lucky?’

~.oOo.~

I never promised her I would stay. We had never discussed the matter. I had no intentions to leave, but I’d never told her that either. She worried; I knew that much. Although she tried to hide it, I still knew. She had the same look on her face that she did right before I left for the first time. For some reason that I couldn’t name, I was unable to say the words that would comfort her. I could not promise her that I would stay, and that frightened me.

We had discussed what I would do in the mean time, though. I had expressed a desire to find a job of my own, and had made it a morning ritual to search through the paper’s listings in the Classifieds section. I had found a couple places at which I had applied, but that was the extent of my job search. As it was, she made enough money to support us both, though I adamantly refused to continue to freeload off of her. She’d always dreamed of being a professional photographer when she was little. I hadn’t been surprised when, while I was gone, I’d noticed her name in some magazine with a picture of some famous model or another. I quickly learned that she had become quite a popular photographer in the modeling industry.

We’d talked about all that the night before—my plans. She never directly asked me if I would stay, but I knew she was disappointed that I’d never brought it up. We’d gone to sleep shortly after the conversation had died off. When I’d woken up, I was alone in bed. It was always like that. Instead of checking on me during the night to make sure I was still there, she made a point of waking up before me. She was still afraid. I couldn’t blame her.

It had become part of the routine. I would wake up alone in bed, go to the bathroom to shower and brush my teeth, and then meet her in the kitchen where she was always reading the newspaper. She would hand me the Classifieds, and we’d both read together in mutual silence. It was a comfortable routine, and I was glad to have something so simple in my life again.

I stripped down once I had closed the bathroom door behind me. I turned on the water and waited for it to heat up. I stopped in front of the mirror to brush my teeth, but paused momentarily when I saw my reflection. It wasn’t often that I looked at my scars. I’d grown used to them over the years. There were many of them, most were hardly noticeable, but there were a few that stood out as dark marks against my body. There was one that ran from my right shoulder to my stomach, and another was a thick line over my left bicep where a piece of metal had torn my skin open.

After a brief moment, I drew my attention away from my body, reached for the toothbrush and focused my mind elsewhere as I continued with my daily routine. I was able to ignore the thoughts for then, but I knew they’d come back, they always did. Scars like that don’t go away. Some scars are for life; mine certainly were. They’d always remind me of the day I wanted to forget. I knew, though, that I didn’t need scars to remind me of what happened. It was something I’d never be able to forget, no matter how hard I tried.

‘It’s funny how you can never forget the things you want to; you can only forget the things you’d rather remember,’ I thought. ‘It’s always the horrible things that you remember most clearly. Internal scars run too deep. Those are the type of scars that never completely heal.’

~.oOo.~

We need to hear the words. They’re unspoken, but understood, and yet we both need them to be said. It’s because we doubt. We know the answer, but we have no proof. We need to hear the words. She needs to hear my words—my promise. I set down the paper I’d been pretending to read. I know what the words she needs to hear are. I won’t give her any reason to doubt any longer. I’ll say the words she wants to hear. I’ll say the words that I have always wanted to say.


I wrote ten parts for this, but I cut it down to eight in the end. One of them was a more definitive ending. It, however, seemed forced. Was in Vonnegut that said something about stories ending with "etc." instead of "the end?" Whoever it was, I think that definitely applies to this piece.

Anyway, let me know what you think.