Behind the doorframe
The seduction of illusion raps at you, twirling you around its steady finger, beckoning, luring you into a trance. Your wasted fingers curl around the Pilsner Glass. You allow the last of your resolve slip away, and in its wrath you are but a puppet, reduced to a state of abject. It tugs at your strings and you are a follower, vision slurred and murmurs incoherent. It becomes clearer now; the linoleum tiles tessellate into gleaming marble, glinting in the light refracted from the hanging fluorescent- no! It was a gold-rimmed, bejeweled chandelier. You turn in circles beneath it, eyes glinting in the gentle orange hues emitted from the opulent chandelier. Loosely gripping onto the Pilsner, the white routine begins. The creeping oblivion robs you of your sanity; senses fazed, you begin your dance. The glass tips over and spills, drenching your crumpled skin, splashing onto your clothing, but you feel a burning euphoria inside of you. Yes, this is exactly what you asked for. Glassy- eyed, a smile broadened on your lips.
You were on top of the world.
5.
I have a head of tousled blonde hair, not black, red or brown. My skin is brown, a deep and disturbing contrast to the fairness that surrounds me. My lips are slightly parted most of the time, my nose is slender, void of the bridge that the others have. I don't speak in that funny accent. I don't have an accent. My tongue rolls when I pronounce words with the alphabet 'r' in them and I like to drag my a's a little longer. I like reading and looking at the sky and I don't talk very much. I am Kristen.
7.
The spidery tendons that lay beneath her paper skin were distinct as she clenched her quivering fists. Her eyes were locked. Brows smooth like milk, lashes cast dancing shadows on her cheekbones. Her eyelids were a shade of mauve, eyes unmoving, hues of kohl settle beneath them. Her lips set in a straight line, she seemed impervious to all. Solid and strong, she was luminous, not consumed by the pain.
I press harder
I let my fingers chafe against her translucent skin.
The disquiet that rang softly within her intensified, threatened to erupt into a clamorous alarm, but she resisted. I turned to her fists. Fingernails dug into the heart of her palm, shades of pink and white flickering in a capricious manner in her knuckles. Yet her expression remained immune, unchanged.
The faint sunlight filtered in, penetrating the endearing translucence of her face, lighting it from within. The fey and quality of her features concealed her emotions and I was wholly convinced; taken in. The marks were a shade of bluish black not too long ago, but now are painted sinister ebony.
Keep rubbing, Kristen, they don't hurt at all.
I believed her.
9.
An impatient knock.
Widened eyes.
I scooped the ointment and tissue boxes in my arms and dumped them in the drawers beside my mattress. Mama heaved at her sleeves, until they draped over her sallow wrists. The ointment seeped through the clothing a little, woven threads sticking to her pallid arms.
Hurry, hurry.
Knuckles rapped hard against the door. I remained in the room. Footsteps fell limp, the silvery rattle of the doorknob, and then, silence. The man reeked of alcohol and gas; tobacco was embedded in the puff of his breath. His body rocked back and forth, cloaked in uncertainty as he waltzed into the flat. I watched from behind the doorframe as she hands him his Pilsner glass.
He drank to the silence. The silence he had so easily obtained by his mere presence. Its hundreds of teeth gleaming as it devoured all of us with the throbbing stillness of the hearts. A perverse chuckle thrust through the membrane of the air, fledging into reality and twitching through the spiraling chambers of our ears.
His small purse of a mouth was snugged tight with self-satisfaction. He was a distillate of his old self, what he had once been, who he was before.
But we're not in wealth anymore, Papa. We are not.
11.
Glinting despite the dull light, shivering hands clasped onto the handle for dear life, haunted by the tension that hung in the air. Seven years of pent-up emotions lay in her grip.
A wedge of light lay out like a carpet outside the room, a bold invitation. The blade glistened and glimmered in the poor light, illuminating its polished body, reflecting sliver of silvers.
All the sky harvested was a few starts and a lone half-crescent.
-
Clutching onto the doorframe, I felt stripped of my voice. A lump formed in my throat and I tried to swallow it, the scene was no more real than the silver of ice sliding down the small of my back.
The night was black. In the sky the starts seemed to float, to tremble, as if a symbol of foreboding.
She entered.
The door creaked as the carpet of light dissipated. Before rusty hinges came to a halt and the light diminished completely, the last rat of light emerged from the crack in the crevice of the door. Darkness.
I closed my eyes and cupped my hands to my face. I waited and waited. There came nothing, but the summer-night silence, a dead-of-night hush.
Then, glass shattering.
It becomes clearer now; the linoleum tiles tessellate into gleaming marble, glinting in the light refracted from the hanging fluorescent- no! It was a gold-rimmed, bejeweled chandelier.
In this escapism: You are mighty.
You are superior.
But in truth:
You are pathetic.