Wishes
Stuart sat alone in the dark in the back room of the comic book store, like he did most nights, surrounded by his favorite heroes, villains, and stories; all fiction, of course. He wished he could live in their world of action and adventure, where his problems wouldn't be real and at the flip of a page he could be a superhero loved by everyone. And everyone knows the hero always gets the girl.
How he wished.
But he wasn't in a fantasy or sci-fi world. The world he lived in was very much real, as were his problems. And he never got the girl. No matter how much he wished, he would always be the same nerdy, lonely, weak and pathetic man, named Stuart.
How he wished.
He wished for many things, things he didn't believe he deserved, but he still wished. He wished he didn't get kicked out of his apartment. He wished he didn't have to live in the back of the comic book store. He wished he wasn't such a loser. He wished he wasn't so depressed all the time. He wished he could have someone to love him and comfort him and tell him that his wishes would come true if he just waited a bit longer.
How he wished.
And he wished and wished.
And waited…
His wishes never came true. Of course not. He knew his pain wouldn't just stop one day. Happiness wasn't going to fall from the sky. Stuart realized that he had to take action, like the characters he loved to read about so much. He would end his own suffering.
He grabbed an old, rotting rope that he found in the store's back closet and begun tying it into the noose that would ease his pain. He did not cry. He did not think.
And he certainly did not make any more wishes.
He simply worked on the old rope diligently. When he finished, he hung the rope up from a pipe on the ceiling and he stood on a chair below it.
He did not wish.
Wishes, he learned, don't come true. Wishing will crush your hopes and your soul when they aren't granted. If you wish for something, you must go out and get it yourself.
He wrapped the noose around his neck and kicked the chair out from underneath him. After a moment, he could feel his head begin to pound from lack of oxygen and his vision started to go dark around the edges. He struggled and writhed around a bit. It was just a natural reaction. But that small amount of movement, coupled with the stress of the weight on the deteriorating rope, caused it to unravel little by little until… SNAP! The rope broke and Stuart fell to the floor, still conscious, coughing and gasping as he loosened the noose and rubbed his neck where a reddish bruise was in the process of forming.
At first, he just laid there on his side, the rope still hung loosely around his neck. He stared into the darkness. "Why?" he asked out loud to no one. "I can't even kill myself right… What's wrong with me?" As he said this, his eyes began to overflow with tears he had held back for a very long time. "For once… I wish something in my worthless life would go right."
How he wished…
A/N: I know I should be working on my other story, but this popped in my head and I wanted to write it. So I did! ^_^