August Twenty-Eighth

This is a short story I wrote for my Creative Writing class last semester.
(I will warn you, it's kind of sad.)
I would love to know what you think :) 

            It’s a broken heart she found on the ground that day, hidden almost completely in the battered leaves. It could have been mistaken for one of those leaves, lost and abandoned, given a new mark with every shoe that left it behind. The single rip down its center was its most distinguishing characteristic. Such a distinct “Z” shape was not caused by any shoe. It crawled toward the bottom, separating lines originally meant for writing, until it came to a stop, as though two hands had grown too tired to keep going.
           Without much thought, she leaned down and placed it so it just barely filled the space in her palm. No one was around. Not a single soul was there to claim this lonely piece of paper. Perhaps she was supposed to keep it. Perhaps it was no coincidence that she was the only one under that maple tree at 10:52 that morning. She examined the emptiness in the bench next to that tree, as well as in the field beyond it. It hung in the air like a heavy mist and sank into the crevices. She sat down on the wood and looked into the field, filling it with memories.

            The girl was seventeen. Her dark hair fell in waves against her face, which held a color too pale for the season. The leaves had only just begun to change colors, and already she wore her skin like a ghost. The boy who was with her was eighteen, but he often seemed much older. His eyes carried stories that his lips would never speak, especially to those he wanted to protect. The girl was one of those people.
           “Are you okay?” he would always ask her.
           “I am okay,” she would reply. But never did she reciprocate.
            The reason they were in the field that day was because the girl had wanted to hold the sun. She lay in the grass with her arms spread wide and let the warm rays sink into her chest. He lay beside her and they were quiet for a while, listening to each other’s breathing.
           “Do you ever wonder if the air changes according to who is breathing it?”
           “What?”
           “Do you think it would taste differently if I wasn’t here?”
           “What do you mean, Olivia?”
           “I don’t know.” She sat up. “I mean I’ve always thought it would be a lovely thing to be a sort of mist, a vapor, passing through people’s lungs, crawling in and out of ribcages… so that they could feel my love rather than only hear it.”
           The boy took a breath like he was using the air to pull him up next to her. “Why do you think people don’t feel it now?”
           “I just think they don’t understand it.”
           “And you think they would understand better if you weren’t here?”
           “No.”
           “But you said, ‘if you weren’t here.’”
           “Yes.”
            Olivia stood up and walked to the maple tree. She stared for a moment at the wooden bench, as though a person was sitting on it. It was a lovely bench, but it ached of too many years, supporting too many people with weights upon their backs. The polish was chipping and the metal armrests were loose, but not one of the light brown slabs had given in. After one final glance, she turned her back to it and faced her friend.
           “What are you doing?” he called across the field.
            She didn’t answer. She closed her eyes and filled up her lungs. The wind blew a little harder, and a few more leaves met the ground. When her eyes opened, she motioned for him to come.
           “Was it different?” she asked him.
           “What?”
           “The air.”
           “Oh. I wasn’t paying attention.”
           She didn’t reply but just started walking. They were small steps but taken with great care. She made sure that with each step, one leaf was crushed. He watched those steps closely, studying her every movement.
           “I wish I could get inside your head sometimes,” he said.
           “Is there something wrong with being in your head?”
           “What?”
           “Well, what’s it like being in your head?”
           He thought for a moment before answering. “It’s busy, I guess. A lot of things are always trying to come out at once.” His eyes flickered. She saw it but didn’t ask. She didn’t ask what was in there, trying to come out. She didn’t ask what he was always hiding from, running from. She only brought the conversation back to herself and the air that she was breathing.
           “Was it different for you?”
           “It was.” She continued walking.

           The two characters became silhouettes before slowly fading away. Another moment, another story, remembered and gone again. Except this wasn’t just another story, and never would it be. Because she now knew of the rope her friend hung around his neck less than a year later. And she believed that this day, August 28, is the day she should have known. She should have known that he was begging for her to stay. She should have asked about the stories screaming to be released from those eyes. He wasn’t paying attention because he wanted her to.
           He graduated high school that year, leaving her just one grade behind. She tried to keep in touch, leaving a few voicemails, but he never called back. He never reciprocated. It was two hours after she had left her last voicemail when she heard the news. She didn’t remember how her mom had found out. She only remembered the look on a mother’s face as she told her daughter that her friend took his life. And once the shock had subsided, the tears began to fall…
           Her heart broke into pieces. Feeling again the bench seat beneath her, she cried over and over, “Danny, are you okay? Are you okay, Danny?” She cried for Danny. She cried for herself. She cried each tear like it was a piece of her own heart.
           “Are you okay?” he had always asked her.
           “I am okay,” she always replied. But never did she reciprocate. She didn’t know she had reason to.
           Looking down at the heart, still limp in her hand, she let her tears come. She cried, then and there, for every broken heart that had ever been disconnected from the soul for which it beats. She wanted to fix it—to be a kind of savior—but more than anything she wanted to shove it back into its owner’s chest. Here, she would say. Keep this. And don’t ever let it out of your sight again. It may not seem like much, but it is what keeps you breathing. Do not let it slow down. Do not let it stop. Do not give up on it, or it will give up on you. If she knew only one thing, though, she knew she did not want to lose it, and if your eyes had closed for the shortest of seconds, you would have missed the part when she tucked it into her pocket.

A Couple of Poems

I found love in the spaces
between, my fingers,
where the dust lies.
And you are settled there.
I bring you to my face,
and I breathe,
where my lungs can consume you,
where my heart can feel your heart
and make one beat,
one beat the same before
the dust lies in you
and you become the dust.
And I breathe.
I found love in the spaces
between, destruction.

©FlyAway180 2011

I can only ask my heart to beat
so many times before
it tells me there is nothing to beat for.
Nothing more than shriveled leaves
that couldn’t wait to kiss
the feet of the earth.
Drained of color,
Drained of face,
that beautiful Maple
in the shadow of my dream.
The bits of sun that
reach her, she eats,
and sends them to her shoelaces—
where sole meets sole;
where leaves die,
I bury my heart.
It lives there.

©FlyAway180 2011

Almost like Magic (A flash fiction assignment)

“I carry all of our stories in my pocket,” she said. Then she pulled one out and I watched her eyes dance the dance of memory. I wanted to step back and just admire them for a while, but I knew she was waiting for me to join her, so I danced, too. And with every step we painted the moments of our existence.

It was one of those days when she would dangle her feet over the bridge—the one when she called me “silly boy.” Many times we were on that bridge, and she never used the same name twice.

“Why don’t you jump?” I teased.

We were seventeen at the time. It’s that wonderfully stupid age when you’re trying to make sense of things while still clinging very hard to the invincible spirit of the young teens. But I knew she wouldn’t jump. She was always even afraid of the tallest monkey bars because they were “too high.”

“It’s too high, silly boy.” That’s when she said it. And she threw me a smile as though it completed the phrase.

I adored that smile. It was almost like magic, rich with the drippings of her sweet personality. But in only seconds it began to fade, and suddenly we were on that bridge for the last time. I thought maybe she had accidentally pulled a second story from her pocket, but I remembered I carried that one on my own. I found her dangling her feet, just like always, but she didn’t wait for me to speak this time. Her eyes were fixed on the dark waves below her.

“Why don’t I jump?” She wasn’t teasing.

I looked for any kind of sign from her, but I knew her well enough to know that the answer was in her voice. It took me exactly four seconds to find it.

“It’s too high—“

I stopped myself before saying her name. I held it inside of me for a few seconds and watched her eyes beg me for it. I only wanted to know that she was paying attention.

The girl on the bridge gave me a fragile smile. And it still dripped. But I realized I was now alone. I had hoped she would stay for the ending this time, but instead she tucked herself away.

I never did say I like dancing.

Sincerely,

Some days I don't want to write pretty words. I just want to cry pretty tears that streak down my face, glimmering with the colors of my soul. I want to find pretty people who know my heart and just sit in that truth for a while. Because that is indeed a glorious truth to find flowing through your veins. But if there is one thing in this whole world that I want right now, it is to package my heart and learn how to breathe that way. I want to know that in-out feeling and to know it in the smallest of places. Because there will then be no limit as to where my heart can go. 

I have a list of things I like to do when I am sad. I made it on a day when the nighttime was still in my heart. The space was filled with beautiful tragedy, and the ink flowed in waves. I remember I had this really big hug I wanted to give away... It was one of those hugs that scream, "I LOVE YOU," without so much as a word. I had really wanted to give you that hug, but I had to keep it to myself, and it started seeping through my eyes. You said you didn't understand why I cried for so long, and I said that you don't understand my heart.

You might remember that there was a day when I lost someone very close to me. Some people manage to find the box in my heart labeled "favorites," and she is one of those people. We love each other because we want to, and we like each other in the simplest of ways. The quiet air will get us to each other's hearts in a way I have found with no other; for we can feel the weight of our breathing. And on the day she flew away, I worked so hard to find her. I even constructed her on paper and tried to convince my heart she was there. But I knew that she was gone. Because a piece of me went with her. You might remember that I learned to accept her absence and didn't cry for so hard and so long. But you should also remember that I knew, no matter how small our pocket of time for talking, that she was going to come back. For we still shared the same home.

Now I practice wrapping my heart and hope the wind can carry it.

Maybe there are things about my heart that you will never understand, but I hope you can love me regardless. And I hope you can find little pieces of me to like and carry them with you, that you might never forget.

Strength [Ever]lasting

I fell asleep one night dreaming my summer dreams, and I have to tell you, that one night I could not be destroyed. Fire could not deface me, for it had become a part of me, finding itself a home in a corner of my heart. It danced between my heartstrings and played a pretty tune. I would not say it mattered so much, except that pretty always matters. It has a sort of uniqueness in relation to this world. And when it comes from a thing that would at one time always break me, I like to tuck it away, that it will sink into my soul.

If you want to know what it is that would always break me, I will tell you how many nights I spent wasting, wasting paper. How many days I spent wrestling my mind. And how much time was lost.

There was a day when I put you in my mind and wrestled you to the ground. I do not think there are many days when I so often wonder why. Not because I thought she had more strength than you, but because I hoped you would understand what great strength she had. I watched her try not to scorch you as the passion within her burned. And I watched a piece of her heart cave in when you pulled her from the flame. I did not have to watch you in order to see... You shook her world until she bled, then told her not to bleed. And I will tell you that few things fill my heart with a greater sadness.

Something you must know about sadness is the way it drips the mournful heartbeat. And then you cannot hear the love that screams within your veins. A surge of overwhelming desire and you are on your knees, pleading for a recognition, pleading to be free. I only tell you this because I know that being recognized for what is in your heart is sometimes the most freeing thing. But other times all you needed was to collect the little droplets and find them a light under which they could glisten. 

I just wish you would understand how intricate are the dreams. Because then you would understand how powerful is the one who holds them.