Authors note: For my English class we were assigned to write about a shoe that my English teacher once saw on the side of the road. We were asked to explain how it got there.
I took quite a literal turn on the idea and personified the shoe and how it was feeling and what its story was.
Naturally I ended up writing fan fiction because my mind cannot be swayed.
This story has not been read by my beta and has not been edited. I might have it edited later but I don't know if a one shot is worth the time of my beta.
With a simple tug on my tongue I was pulled onto his foot, feeling the warmth of his body and the beat of the blood pumping through him inside m
y torn canvas skin. I felt at home again as he pushed his foot back and used my rubber soles to balance up before jumping on top of cotton comforters and sheets. It seemed a ritual for him to jump up on his bed before tumbling off it again and skidding to his door.
He always moved with grace and simplicity, my sole hardly meeting the hard ground before being picked back up again by the strength of his own will and defiance against gravity.
Around other people his steps would grow heavier and cautious but his foot still twitched inside of me, yearning to move again and fly around with ease.
Even as he would sit I would still find myself in movement. His feet and legs would never stop bouncing off gravity in musical beats.
This wonderful master of mine was a dancer. It was in everything he did and every movement he took, above me I would see his arms move with straight and beautiful lines, determined to take the smooth way to their destination, very much like his feet. I considered myself lucky to be the in the possession of such movement. I took pleasure in protecting his precious feet from harm, though he didn't need much help because his movements were quick enough to dodge obstacles in his way.
It was a day when we were alone. It was just the three of us sharing a private moment on wooden floor: my partner and I, and our master. We glided over the orange and brown wood work and then I felt myself soaring upward, the breeze of the kick tangling up in my laces. My partner followed closely behind me and landed after me. We weren't touching the ground long enough to feel the hard impact of gravity, but that was how it always felt to be the pair that so wonderfully belonged to this boy.
He was alone with us a lot more since his own partner had left him and her shoes no longer accompanied us in spins. But I liked not having to dance with her boots and heels, never enjoying how heavy each step felt with her.
Even though I was elated about her departure I could tell by the change in step and rhythm that my master was not happy about it. As worried as I was about this I felt that he would find a way to heal these wounds and move on and learn to dance alone with us.
There were times when my partner and I were left alone with the others. There were times we both felt so alone without his company. These times were fleeting and we knew that he would come back to us. Even the days he picked up others next to us we knew our time was coming when we could dance with him again.
And when the next time came I found myself to be right about his heartbreak. It didn't seem that long until his light stepping was back again and the dancing with us was full of more spazzy and jumping movement like it had never been before, something had made the happiest he could possibly be. I could feel the beat of his heart inside of me, it was constantly speeding up and slowing down as the excitement varied.
As we lightly treaded halls of tile, gum, and marks left by others of our kind I could feel his heartbeat picking up again rapidly. He was stepping back into the dance room. Was this what made him so happy? To be dancing alone with us again after so long? I thought it was so as we soared again and I held him and my partner up in a magnificent pirouette, feeling the pressure of gratify on the front of my sole
I thought we would dance alone forever until the feel of someone entered the room. The vibration given off by their body was different. They were not light and full of rhythm like my master's, yet they were not as heavy as the clunking of hard heels and boots of his old companion.
We stilled moved. He was clearly unaware of the three new movements in the room. Like the three of us, this group seemed in sync and connected fully as they walked further into our once private dancing space.
He didn't stop when he spotted this addition, but his heart and body warmed up with excitement. His entire presence seemed to change and tingle.
When he did stop he pulled my partner and I up into small, untraceable skips. He stood in front of the stranger. He stood close, this stranger's shoes standing right next to my partner and I, separating our connection and replacing the normalcy with something new.
These additions to our dance floor were flat and brown with thin laces that were neatly tied. They were a very fine dark leather compared to our canvas and black and white checkered pattern. Our laces fat, bright, colorful and warn were odd compared to the neat and slim brown laces tying up our new company. How did this person keep their possessions so neat? Weren't these possessions bored with neatness and structure?
Above our new meeting with these other possessions our masters were pressing their bodies together in an embrace. I could feel the vibrations of both of them calming in this action until they started to pull away.
The vibrations started running faster than I have ever felt. Though each of them gave off a different rhythm, both were speeding up as their lips met.
Then stillness.
As they did this his feet went completely stagnant, the only movement I could feel was the pumping of beat moving throughout their bodies. The rapid beating did not influence movement in feet, legs, or even the arms that rested so comfortably on each other's bodies. Fingers didn't twitch as they were placed against the thin layer of fabric between the air and the skin of the stranger.
It felt unnatural to me. I wanted to move but the only things moving on the exterior of my boy's body were his lips and tongue. His eyes weren't even searching around with curiosity like they normally did.
He did this with his old partner. He wrapped his arms around her the way he did with this stranger. But the meshing that occurred between the two of them seemed stronger. Perhaps it was because this person was new? The partner before was already a routine before we had entered his life.
The Stranger pulled him toward the edge of the room after their lips had finished and they sat down. Their lips still moved for some reason I couldn't understand. I supposed it was a way of making a connection, like dancing, except this method was not clear to me. How did the moving of lips establish understanding in the eyes?
My boy's feet moved upward and rested in the lap of the stranger, introducing me to black, smooth fabric. It was the same kind of fabric that I met at the tip of my tongue sometimes, the kind of fabric that covered my master's skinny legs. Perhaps that was why they sat together? They both put on the same fabric to cover their flesh.
He never moved his lips as much as he moved them now. What was it that caused him to do so? I could feel a different vibration coming from his chest. It was not the rhythm that I was so accustomed to. Instead it was an addition to that and only occurred when his mouth was moving. Was that how they made connections then? Was it the humming that accompanied the beat?
The stranger's hands accosted me and pulled at my tongue. A bright smile was spread across their lips as they did this and they looked over at my master and moved their lips. Their eyes seemed to be sparkling. It seems my master was affected by the movement of lips again and his vibrations quickened.
He moved his lips and I could feel the stranger also quicken their vibrations in reaction.
I did not like this new partner, but they seemed to like my partner and me as they continued to tug at our tongues and trace over our patterns.
It seemed that this stranger's liking to my partner and I influenced our boy to dance with us more often. Every other day we would be picked out and our patterned would be traced by his long and graceful fingers.
Months upon months until we were worn down to thin soles but happiness to be involved so much in his life. This stranger became a regular companion of ours and seemed to smile even brighter as their eyes noticed us and pointed out our flaws like they were perfections.
I thought that the vibrations given when their lips met would die down after a while and become routine like the way they were with his old partner but even short meetings of this lips caused spasms through his body.
Sometimes these meetings would cause a strange sort of reaction that always ended up with my partner and I being kicked off and buried underneath fabrics of clothing as my master and his partner found themselves in the throes of a special dance.
After one of these strange occurrences my boy had slid his fabric back on and then pulled me on as well. His rhythm was strange and excited but also calmed as he led his partner out of the room. They fumbled down the stairs together as strange vibrations hummed from his chest again, still moving with the beat that was always there.
The grass was slimy and wet. The pavement was hard, but never as hard as it could be if gravity could completely tame my boy the way it tamed so many.
Vibrations electrified and stillness occurred as they pressed their mouths together and then the partner was walking away, leaving us alone with our master.
As we began to walk up the stairs he suddenly stopped and turned, our rubber soles grinding against the grey rock beneath us with sharpness.
Stillness again. Not the kind of stillness that happened between lip meetings and special dances. Rhythm picked up but hands were shaking. Sweat was building. All of these things happening were happening at the same time.
Then movement so fast that our soles barely nicked the ground as he chased his partner. Why was he chasing? He bolted toward his companion, an angry vibration accompanying his beats. He held his arms up and pushed the one who made vibrations quicken and stillness happen and stirred excitement.
Why? Why would he push this partner?
A big vibration, bigger and more shattering than anything I ever thought I would feel, hit the three of us. I never wanted to feel this again. I never wanted to feel the shaking and shock of this large overpowering thing. To my luck I didn't have to for long as I went flying into the air, thinking that we were all safe from this uncomfortable movement.
As my canvas skin skidded across rocky black pavement I knew I was completely alone and that my partner and master were not with me anymore. The shock had pushed me away from them.
I waited for them to retrieve me.
After strange lights came flashing above me and after the darkness of night shadowed over me I was found.
Shaking hands and a familiar rhythm were surrounding my skin and laces. I recognized these vibrations as my boy's partner and I was filled with hope that I would no longer be empty, that I would be with my partner again.
But the slow beat occurring in his partner's body made me wish that I could tremble. The wet drops that were falling upon my black and white squares made me wish that I could dance to ask why such saddening beats were happening to the partner my master held so dear.
I knew then, as this other boy gripped onto my laces and sole, that he was trying to grip onto something that was long gone. I knew that I would never find my master and partner again. I was alone.
He would not dance anymore, not with me and not with this shaking boy with the weak beat inside of him.