One-shot based on the song "Mr. Brightside" by The Killers.
I don't own Harvest Moon, I don't own the song, all I own is this laptop... if that.
I'm Mr. Brightside
A writer writes because he feels, you don't need any skills to be a writer. Writing is putting on paper your emotions, and just hoping they're powerful enough to keep people interested. Reading is just gazing through a window into the writer's mind.
He was a writer. He had been since he had first walked into that English class and met his kind teacher, Mr. Bradbury, he had learnt the language of beauty and loved every letter of it. From that day he had aspired to be a writer, not just as his career, no, writing would be part of his soul, the very essence of who he was.
The only problem with this was that writing doesn't always pay that well, unless you work for a magazine or a newspaper, you find yourself writing novels that are never published along side writing reports for a dead-end job.
His last few ideas for novels had been atrocious, he accepted that fact. He needed an idea fast, not just any idea, but a good idea. So that is precisely why he took a small boat over a choppy blue ocean on one of the coldest days of Autumn, to a farm in the middle of nowhere. He needed not only time to write, but a calm setting in which to write.
Of course he began with the intention of writing, but once young Jack Smith found himself on his grandpa's old, rundown, desolate farm he could not in good conscience leave it in that state. It was that day that Jack Smith the writer became Jack Smith the farmer.
He lived that way for a long time, he fixed up the farm, made some good friends and met the girl of his dreams, a Miss Popuri Rose, and soon farmer Jack became lover Jack, and that love fuelled the writer in him more than anything else could. From the feeling of love came many other intense emotions: Envy, Anger, Hatred, Depression, Loneliness, Elation and Passion. So although he was now a farmer, he would always be a writer. I suppose that is where his story begins:
I've never been all that keen on parties, if I'm honest, they all seem so loud, so bright, so colourful… it's like walking into a headache. Parties are never as fun as you think they're going to be anyway, you exaggerate how good it will be in your mind, then you have a dull time when you're there. But afterwards, although you didn't enjoy the party, you will exaggerate it again, and say that you had a phenomenally amazing time. It's all so ridiculous.
This party was no different, I would have preferred to be curled up with a good book, or better yet my beautiful Popuri, who's lips can only be likened to strawberries, identical in hue and gloss and equally as sweet. However she insisted that we both attend, and that I meet her old friend, who used to visit every summer I am told.
His name was Kai, he was perfect, and I hated him. I hated the way her face lit up around him, how she laughed at his charming jokes and how her hand seemed to find its way to his chest every time she let out a musical giggle.
The party could only get worse when she wandered off with Kai to talk with others, leaving me there alone, sipping bad wine next to Karen, who quite frankly smelt like the basement of a vineyard.
I finally caught up with Popuri again, after much time spent with people I would rather not associate with, and I asked her if we could leave.
"Oh no," she protested, her chestnut brown eyes wide. "Can't we stay longer?"
Kai chose that moment to jump in and agree that it was still early. In my bitterness I asked then if I could leave, she pouted slightly but as soon as Kai said he would look after her she smiled.
I was dejected. So I began to walk away, not bothering to say goodbye to anyone, even those I prized as my best friends. As I turned to look back at my lover, I saw her plant one of her sweet strawberry kisses on Kai's golden cheek. Unwelcome tears welled in my eyes as I turned and stormed home through the dark night.
Storming down the dark pavement of Mineral town, sometimes tripping over the small snags in the bricks in my fury of emotion, I finally found myself back in my farm house. I was pulling out my old type-writer and forcing in some yellowing paper, wiping the sweat from my brow and pushing back the white sleeves of my shirt. The words seemed to come to me, just like that, it was as though this were my destiny, as though Popuri was meant to give away one of her strawberry kisses so that I might write in my anger. Destiny was calling so to speak, and I was noting down every enticing word it whispered into my ear.
But even as I wrote, I could not shake the fears from my mind, the bitter images of the two in the heat of passion. Kai planting a kiss onto her sweet lips, his hands all over her, burning marks into the exposed cream skin. In my over-active mind's eye I could see him pulling off her black bodice with fervour, running his hand down her body. I could see her touching his golden chest, as though carved for some statue of a king but gifted to a mere mortal.
Jack Smith bit his lip, looking over the paper quickly, his eyes running over and over it, like warm hands run over cool skin. All of his writer's block was gone, just as he had wished, but he couldn't help wondering if he was indeed paying a price for it.
I could almost hear the sounds of their passion, the heat, the burning flame that never quite burnt out. What would happen in the morning? But I found, even writing this memoir to her betrayal, that it had become too painful. I ran the mantra through my head quickly, it was only a kiss, it was only a kiss.
My stomach felt filled with burning acid, I felt so nauseous, my beloved Popuri, how could she betray me with another? How could she just throw away all we had for a night of passion? Would it become more than just one night? I had to keep telling myself that it was all in my head, just some story I was conducting… but now, as I looked at my writing I realised it was more than that. This wasn't a story about some obscure character, no, I was writing my life, my life as it hadn't even happened yet… or as far as I knew.
I couldn't think about it anymore… I couldn't keep typing this nonsense, but I was.
Jack stepped away from the typewriter, suddenly it felt like some tool that had finally taken over him, rather than the other way round. He breathed in deeply, walking over to the bed and lying down, but he knew he wouldn't be able to sleep, not until he knew the truth. But he couldn't help wondering, was what he was writing on his type writer going to become real, just because he had written it?
He couldn't believe that. That was crazy. That was fiction.
He was completely correct in his prediction that he wouldn't sleep that night, he tossed and he turned, seeing the images of his girlfriend and her tanned lover together. He breathed, it was finally early enough to go to her house and knock down her door to demand the truth from her.
He knew it would be psychotic though, to arrive at her door at 6am demanding the truth about an event he had no proof had ever occurred.
But he did just that. When the writer did he was greeted by his bleary-eyed girlfriend, dressed in just a shirt, with what could only be described as bed hair, he jumped straight into the accusations.
"Where is he?" Jack demanded. Looking down at her crumpled shirt, she looked at him confused. "Kai, where is he?"
"Oh, um, the inn I think…" She said, cocking her head to the side. She ran a hand through her tousled hair and blinked. "Isn't it a bit early to be looking for him?"
"You just want to decide your alibi with him first, don't you!" He accused, and she blinked again.
"Am I missing something?"
"AM I?" He demanded and she recoiled slightly, the pink lips he loved so much formed into a cute pout. "How could you?"
"How could I what?"
"I know you and Kai… last night…" Her innocent looks were just to throw him off and he knew it.
"I came home last night… I said goodbye to him at the party…" She frowned. "Ask Karen if you like…"
"Karen was drunk, how would she know what you got up to?!"
"Why don't you go home and get some sleep." Popuri suggested, holding the edge of the door, ready to slam it in his face. He knew she would choke on her alibi. "See you when you calm down."
"Just admit that you cheated on me with Kai!" He said, anger forcing him into speaking his mind.
"How could you think I'd do that? God, don't you trust me? It was only a kiss!"
"It was only a kiss…" The words seemed to echo in his head, wasn't this what the typewriter had predicted she'd say?
"A kiss can tell a lot." He murmured, before turning away.
"Jerk!" She yelled, flicking back her pink hair. "I can't believe you think I'm that much of a whore." With that she slammed the door shut, and left the writer with his thoughts.
He hurried back to his trusty typewriter, his heart racing in time with his fingers clacking over the keys. The best thing about being a writer was that he could choose the ending to his piece.
I spoke to my beloved, hearing her choking over her alibis I could feel my jealousy spiral, it was obvious she had betrayed me. The look in her eyes spoke of deceit, and those lips were too delicious to tell the truth. I knew from the moment I saw her that fateful morning that it was over, but that I was stronger now than I had ever been before. I was now more powerful as a writer too, I owned the power of destiny in typewriter form, I just wrote my future. I may have lost the love of a deceitful woman, but I gained the power of the written word. I am a writer.
Mr. Brightside
He finished typing his pseudonym on the page, it was almost too perfect.
A writer does not just write, he does not just put words onto a page, he becomes his words. He types them because they are a part of him, a part he wants to share. A writer is not just a job, a writer is an identity. To be destined to be a writer is to be destined for sin, tragedy, comedy, horror, angst, suffering, action, adventure, fantasy and more… A writer writes because if he did not he would not be anything.
-Lapizlazuli-