A/N- I hope you enjoy this. I'm sorry if I offend anyone; it's not on
purpose. Please r&r!
As I walked down the street from my job at my neighborhood Starbuck's, the sun beginning to set in a brilliance of autumn colors I had seen in too many life times to appreciate anymore, I noticed a girl, walking in my direction, her hair being carried and lifted lightly behind her by a slight breeze, her white mini skirt straining against her slim thighs as she walked. She smiled at me, and I managed to conjure up a returning smile for her, that I drew from some old reserve of happiness. Then I continued on my way, not thinking much of her or her intentions, simply pushing the exchange to the back of my mind. I had no use for pretty girls, and, no matter what they thought, they did not need me.
I lived in a tiny apartment on the campus of the college I attended. The schooling was really just a way to pass the time, pass the weeks or maybe even years before my purpose came. But of course, the beginning of my betrayal could begin in the next minute, and then I would be free to do as I willed, with the heavy burden of guilt laying on my back like an ape with sharp nails, constantly digging and telling me that I had done wrong to people I loved and that there was no way to stop the cycle. Stop it, I told myself angrily. I did not want to think about it.
My room was boring. It was neat, especially for a young man in college, and it had a computer, a shoebox of a kitchen, a bathroom, and a tiny bedroom with a bureau and a nightstand and a bookcase. I had a phone, but it was never used. Friends were a privilege I could not afford.
Suddenly I smelled it. That sharp twinge, a metallic scent that sent chills up and down my body as I swooned and almost fell to the floor. It signaled one of two things. Either I was going to meet the person who I would kill, or there was going to be a storm. I looked out the sparkling window, at the cloudless, darkening sky, the stars beginning to pull off their veils like the women used to when they left the synagogue, and I knew which choice the smell meant. I thought of Mary, and then pushed that thought away too. She had hated me so, after what I did.
Little pricks of nausea raced up and down my body, and they felt like the wet little claws of mice roughly pattering all over me. I fell to the couch, the cheap brown fabric itching my back and the bottom sagging in. I remembered the feeling of the rope around my neck, as it squeezed my breath away. I remembered the panic that filled me when I realized I did not want to do this. By then it was too late. Any moment the person who I was going to betray would be here. The scent grew stronger and still I lay on the couch, not wanting to move or search. Maybe if I could just stay away from people, I could escape. Maybe if-
The doorbell rang. It was the loudest sound I had ever heard. It filled my consciousness completely. The doorbell was the only noise. I tried to fight it. I tried to not open the door as the doorbell rang again and again, the musical tones like daggers of sound piercing my heart. I stood, realizing it was pointless to fight. If I didn't meet my fate now, I would later. As I walked to the door, I felt as if I was watching it all from afar. That person was not me, it was merely a shadow of someone else, some unlucky person who was paying for past sins.
I opened the door, and there stood a pretty girl, the one with the white mini skirt. I wished it wasn't her. She was holding her books over her head, and I couldn't understand why. She was so pretty, so innocent looking. Why did she have to be the one?
She smiled nervously at me, a little frightened, I think, at what must have been a look of pure sadness and panic on my face, then said, "I'm sorry, but it's raining out here, and-" I heard nothing after she said rain. I stuck my hand out the door and felt the drops patter against my hand. It was a storm. A freak, unexplainable storm, but a storm nonetheless, proving that this girl would not be a victim of my curse. I tried not to sag against the door with relief.
I see him walk down the street, and my blood runs hot, and my face twitches into a smile. I cannot help but smile. He is so beautiful. Tall, thin, with that dark hair and orange skin. I must know him. I must know his blue eyes and his full lips. He draws me, like I am some kind of bee and he is the sweetest honey I've ever dreamt of tasting. I don't know why; maybe it is fate, maybe it is just his enchanting features. Maybe it is the sad look over his whole body. I want to change him and hold him and I want to see him laugh. I want his eyes to light up like flames when he sees me; I want his lips to curve back in a crescent moon smile.
I follow him to his house, at the same college I go to. I act like the little girl I am, the needy little girl who needs someone to take care of her. I am never taken care of, but maybe this man will care for me.
It starts to rain, the drops refreshing, caressing my skin, softening it like the tears of angels, crying for me and this boy, that lost girl and that sorrowful boy. I don't want their tears, but the angels continue anyway, and the rain feels good.
I have an excuse now, to talk to him. I can ask if I can stay at his house until the storm ends. My heart is light, and it lifts out of my body and rises, flying on wings, of excitement. The angels cry harder, and I begin to hear the sounds of their booming sorrow moans, the thunder. They don't bless this union, but I don't care. I am in love, for no reason other than a pair of beautiful blue eyes.
He opens the door, and I almost step back at his pain. I feel it radiating off of him, shooting in all directions, arrows that pierce my skin and shoot down the soaring eagle that was my heart. I smile anyway, and my smile seems to bring him more sadness. I say, "I'm sorry, but it's raining out here, and I was wondering," I smile coyly at him for effect, feeling fully confident in my beauty. But he seems to be ignoring me. He sticks his hand out the window in an inquisitive, hope filled way, and I can feel the relief fall over him like an anvil, the weight of the strain being lifted off of him crushing him against the door. Then he smiles, and his smile makes butterflies rise from my throat to my stomach. I continue. "I was wondering if I could stay at your house until it's over. I really don't want to walk back to my dorm." I make my eyes large and round, widening to the point of collapse. I want to look helpless. He nods his head and smiles again. Then he steps out of the doorway to let me in.
His room is so neat. Where, in the whirlwind of parties school friends does he find the time? Everything is in its place, and it has about as much personality as a Best Western. The only thing I see out of place are books, books sprawling over the floor, books in the kitchen, on the cabinets, an ocean of paper and the smell of a library washing over me.
He is so beautiful. Lithe, willowy, even, but muscular, with that dark and those sad eyes. The butterflies rise again.
"What's your name?" He asks me, and for some reason I turn red and can't answer. I have not acted like this, like some child, a little girl with a crush on some far out of reach rock star, in a very long time.
She was quite beautiful actually. Blonde hair, that shook and shimmered as if she sprinkled in bits of glass before she left the house. She wore a white skirt, with a pale, just opaque shirt. She was so young. I had the body of a young man, no more than twenty-three, but I had lived through so much.
I realized I was just staring at her, her naïve smile upon pink, moistened lips, black eyelashes fluttering like raven feathers, a sharp contrast on the white skin of her cheeks. I asked her name. She stared at me for quite some time, and then blushed.
"Meredith." She said, blushing furiously and looking as if she didn't know whether to giggle or cry. Young girls always acted like this, I had begun to realize from lifetimes of experience.
"Would you like to sit down?" She nodded, and suddenly it occurred to me that she was absolutely soaked. I quickly ran to get her a towel, and she smiled gratefully for it. I also handed her a coffee. She sipped it loudly. Most girls would never sip loudly in front of a guy. So far, the only thing I had heard her say was her name. It was a pretty name. It captivated me, just as her eyes did. I began to grasp the oddness of the situation. I was still living in the 100's. Why was she here, when in 2003, we had cars and buses and mass transportation? It made no sense to stay at some stranger's house when you could be going home.
"Where are you from?" I asked, not sure how to begin a conversation. When I was the Traitor, I was the opposite of charismatic. People would turn their eyes away from me, to focus on more brilliance. But after that, I have always attracted people, as if I am a honeycomb covered with bees, one that people love to stick their hands into to get that precious honey, knowing full well that they will get stung, relishing in the sting even as the honey slips from their lifeless fingers.
"New York City. Manhattan." She sipped again, her lips losing that pearly, pink sheen that they had before. I like them better natural. "Where are you from?"
In the back of my mind, I knew that my eyes were glazing over, trying to piece together the truth. Why I wanted to tell her the truth, I do not know. "I'm from Israel." I said, knowing the answer fit well with my skin and dark hair.
She grinned at me, and looked as if I was the most interesting person she had ever met, "Really? I've always wanted to go to somewhere other than America. Was it bad living there?" I decided to ignore her last question. She didn't need to know what life had been like for me in Israel.
"Why do you want to leave America? It's the most prosperous country this earth has ever seen. Even Rome wasn't." I stopped, realizing my mistake in mid sentence. She didn't notice. "Even Rome wasn't ever so prosperous."
"Do you study ancient history?" She looked so eager. She was so young. I wished I had ever been this interested in another person. I didn't think that I ever had, even when I had been her age.
"A little," I said. She looked down at her cup and smiled coquettishly again. It would be hard to distance myself from her. I realized abruptly that the rain had stopped. "The rain's over," I said, and stood, at the exact same time she did. I did not live in a large room, and we were very close. She smelled like chamomile and coffee. She looked up at me, and I realized how small she was. Like Mary. No, she was nothing like Mary, no resemblance, because there would never be another Mary.
He is so perfect. And he is exotic. He is a desert flower; he is a chunk of gold that I am lucky enough to find once I have shaken through the dirt. I won't let him go.
We stand at the same time. He is above me, and his eyes are bright and solemn, so sad for so young. His essence seems to surround me, and I feel myself drawn to him like I've never been drawn to anyone before. I put one hand on his chest, and cradle his face with the other. I am so taken and I can't let go. It's almost like his personality is an elixir that swallows me whole as I submit without a fight, wanting to be sucked down as far and as fast as I can.
I kiss him. Softly, because I'm not sure why I'm doing this. I know I have the tendency to throw myself at the feet of anyone who shows the least bit of care for me, but we have barely exchanged words.
He does not pull away, but rather sinks into the kiss, a surprise. He is wonderful. I think we will get married and move to the country, where there are perfectly symmetrical flowers and willows trees with hammocks laced beneath them, where five, no, ten children will play in green grass and light and where I will dry laundry in the sun and he will cook delicious spicy dinners that make my mouth water and the children laugh.
But then it is over, and I'm brought to the harsh reality of the rain and the messy college dorm and the problems that I have and the baggage that I carry. He pulled away. "I- I'm, I'm sorry," he says, turning around. I hear the complexity of emotions in his voice, like a tree of sorrow that has so many roots and leaves and layers of bark, all fighting to get the most attention. "I can't do this. Go."
I think he might be crying. I knew I couldn't be with him. I had known it from the first moment I saw him, as I had known when he touched me that he was forbidden. But I want him all the more now. He is an old drawer, covered in dust and with pieces that simply won't open, and I want to be the key and the restorative agent that makes him human again. I run out the door, into the sunlight that suddenly seems more hostile than the rain ever did.
I watched her go, and I fought back the feelings of torture. I had known that there was a chance she wouldn't be the one I had to kill. But I couldn't let he get too close. She flicked her hair out of her face. She was beautiful, the kind of girl that could be considered a perfect sculpture of a woman, but her scars are as visible to me as her pretty blue eyes. Something hurts her deep inside, like something hurts me.
But finding out could be more fatal to her than anything she carries inside. I turn on the television, watching a silly show about six friends who lived together. I hated them. And I hated television. It was a poison that made people wish for their lives to be more like what they saw, in that fantastic world of acting and fantasy. In the world of Friends, the biggest problem you have is that your boyfriend has dumped you. But, no problem, because there is always someone just waiting around to pick you up off your feet and bring you back to that happy place. T.V. is a drug. It's worse than heroin, and more addicting. I thought they should be banned.
I go home, to my empty house and empty room and empty life. I need to take my AZT. I search through the cabinet, finding it and popping down pills. My counter is white; spotless, like my life, until one mistake, and then everything turned black as night. I wish, sometimes, it would just end. Then I could go quietly into being another statistic, another lost cause before they find a cure, instead of being a living statue, frozen in one state of existence, the sate of AIDS.
I want that boy to love me. I want him to be able to not care if I am what I am. I miss being close to men. If any show an interest in me, if I love someone, I have to tell them I have AIDS, because I would never intentionally put someone through this. Then they pull away, slowly, at first, like the succulent sweet taste of bad wine, that starts out good and then leaves an aftertaste that stings and makes your tongue recoil and your insides squirm, until you have another drink, maybe of another bad wine, to quench the thirst and soothe the flavor. They think they are being kind, but they aren't; they are still leaving me alone with my pills and my dormant beauty; but I do understand. I need to be with someone who has nothing left to lose, and what young man ever has that?
I pick up a book and turn on the radio and the T.V. The words, the faces, the comprehension pouring from these to sources is lost to me, but the drone of creativity and art fills me as I shut my eyes. I fall asleep to the blue light of the T.V. screen, the shadows flickering and dancing on my face.
A/N- I'm sorry. This is as far as I've gotten. I guess it's kind of a cliffhanger.
As I walked down the street from my job at my neighborhood Starbuck's, the sun beginning to set in a brilliance of autumn colors I had seen in too many life times to appreciate anymore, I noticed a girl, walking in my direction, her hair being carried and lifted lightly behind her by a slight breeze, her white mini skirt straining against her slim thighs as she walked. She smiled at me, and I managed to conjure up a returning smile for her, that I drew from some old reserve of happiness. Then I continued on my way, not thinking much of her or her intentions, simply pushing the exchange to the back of my mind. I had no use for pretty girls, and, no matter what they thought, they did not need me.
I lived in a tiny apartment on the campus of the college I attended. The schooling was really just a way to pass the time, pass the weeks or maybe even years before my purpose came. But of course, the beginning of my betrayal could begin in the next minute, and then I would be free to do as I willed, with the heavy burden of guilt laying on my back like an ape with sharp nails, constantly digging and telling me that I had done wrong to people I loved and that there was no way to stop the cycle. Stop it, I told myself angrily. I did not want to think about it.
My room was boring. It was neat, especially for a young man in college, and it had a computer, a shoebox of a kitchen, a bathroom, and a tiny bedroom with a bureau and a nightstand and a bookcase. I had a phone, but it was never used. Friends were a privilege I could not afford.
Suddenly I smelled it. That sharp twinge, a metallic scent that sent chills up and down my body as I swooned and almost fell to the floor. It signaled one of two things. Either I was going to meet the person who I would kill, or there was going to be a storm. I looked out the sparkling window, at the cloudless, darkening sky, the stars beginning to pull off their veils like the women used to when they left the synagogue, and I knew which choice the smell meant. I thought of Mary, and then pushed that thought away too. She had hated me so, after what I did.
Little pricks of nausea raced up and down my body, and they felt like the wet little claws of mice roughly pattering all over me. I fell to the couch, the cheap brown fabric itching my back and the bottom sagging in. I remembered the feeling of the rope around my neck, as it squeezed my breath away. I remembered the panic that filled me when I realized I did not want to do this. By then it was too late. Any moment the person who I was going to betray would be here. The scent grew stronger and still I lay on the couch, not wanting to move or search. Maybe if I could just stay away from people, I could escape. Maybe if-
The doorbell rang. It was the loudest sound I had ever heard. It filled my consciousness completely. The doorbell was the only noise. I tried to fight it. I tried to not open the door as the doorbell rang again and again, the musical tones like daggers of sound piercing my heart. I stood, realizing it was pointless to fight. If I didn't meet my fate now, I would later. As I walked to the door, I felt as if I was watching it all from afar. That person was not me, it was merely a shadow of someone else, some unlucky person who was paying for past sins.
I opened the door, and there stood a pretty girl, the one with the white mini skirt. I wished it wasn't her. She was holding her books over her head, and I couldn't understand why. She was so pretty, so innocent looking. Why did she have to be the one?
She smiled nervously at me, a little frightened, I think, at what must have been a look of pure sadness and panic on my face, then said, "I'm sorry, but it's raining out here, and-" I heard nothing after she said rain. I stuck my hand out the door and felt the drops patter against my hand. It was a storm. A freak, unexplainable storm, but a storm nonetheless, proving that this girl would not be a victim of my curse. I tried not to sag against the door with relief.
I see him walk down the street, and my blood runs hot, and my face twitches into a smile. I cannot help but smile. He is so beautiful. Tall, thin, with that dark hair and orange skin. I must know him. I must know his blue eyes and his full lips. He draws me, like I am some kind of bee and he is the sweetest honey I've ever dreamt of tasting. I don't know why; maybe it is fate, maybe it is just his enchanting features. Maybe it is the sad look over his whole body. I want to change him and hold him and I want to see him laugh. I want his eyes to light up like flames when he sees me; I want his lips to curve back in a crescent moon smile.
I follow him to his house, at the same college I go to. I act like the little girl I am, the needy little girl who needs someone to take care of her. I am never taken care of, but maybe this man will care for me.
It starts to rain, the drops refreshing, caressing my skin, softening it like the tears of angels, crying for me and this boy, that lost girl and that sorrowful boy. I don't want their tears, but the angels continue anyway, and the rain feels good.
I have an excuse now, to talk to him. I can ask if I can stay at his house until the storm ends. My heart is light, and it lifts out of my body and rises, flying on wings, of excitement. The angels cry harder, and I begin to hear the sounds of their booming sorrow moans, the thunder. They don't bless this union, but I don't care. I am in love, for no reason other than a pair of beautiful blue eyes.
He opens the door, and I almost step back at his pain. I feel it radiating off of him, shooting in all directions, arrows that pierce my skin and shoot down the soaring eagle that was my heart. I smile anyway, and my smile seems to bring him more sadness. I say, "I'm sorry, but it's raining out here, and I was wondering," I smile coyly at him for effect, feeling fully confident in my beauty. But he seems to be ignoring me. He sticks his hand out the window in an inquisitive, hope filled way, and I can feel the relief fall over him like an anvil, the weight of the strain being lifted off of him crushing him against the door. Then he smiles, and his smile makes butterflies rise from my throat to my stomach. I continue. "I was wondering if I could stay at your house until it's over. I really don't want to walk back to my dorm." I make my eyes large and round, widening to the point of collapse. I want to look helpless. He nods his head and smiles again. Then he steps out of the doorway to let me in.
His room is so neat. Where, in the whirlwind of parties school friends does he find the time? Everything is in its place, and it has about as much personality as a Best Western. The only thing I see out of place are books, books sprawling over the floor, books in the kitchen, on the cabinets, an ocean of paper and the smell of a library washing over me.
He is so beautiful. Lithe, willowy, even, but muscular, with that dark and those sad eyes. The butterflies rise again.
"What's your name?" He asks me, and for some reason I turn red and can't answer. I have not acted like this, like some child, a little girl with a crush on some far out of reach rock star, in a very long time.
She was quite beautiful actually. Blonde hair, that shook and shimmered as if she sprinkled in bits of glass before she left the house. She wore a white skirt, with a pale, just opaque shirt. She was so young. I had the body of a young man, no more than twenty-three, but I had lived through so much.
I realized I was just staring at her, her naïve smile upon pink, moistened lips, black eyelashes fluttering like raven feathers, a sharp contrast on the white skin of her cheeks. I asked her name. She stared at me for quite some time, and then blushed.
"Meredith." She said, blushing furiously and looking as if she didn't know whether to giggle or cry. Young girls always acted like this, I had begun to realize from lifetimes of experience.
"Would you like to sit down?" She nodded, and suddenly it occurred to me that she was absolutely soaked. I quickly ran to get her a towel, and she smiled gratefully for it. I also handed her a coffee. She sipped it loudly. Most girls would never sip loudly in front of a guy. So far, the only thing I had heard her say was her name. It was a pretty name. It captivated me, just as her eyes did. I began to grasp the oddness of the situation. I was still living in the 100's. Why was she here, when in 2003, we had cars and buses and mass transportation? It made no sense to stay at some stranger's house when you could be going home.
"Where are you from?" I asked, not sure how to begin a conversation. When I was the Traitor, I was the opposite of charismatic. People would turn their eyes away from me, to focus on more brilliance. But after that, I have always attracted people, as if I am a honeycomb covered with bees, one that people love to stick their hands into to get that precious honey, knowing full well that they will get stung, relishing in the sting even as the honey slips from their lifeless fingers.
"New York City. Manhattan." She sipped again, her lips losing that pearly, pink sheen that they had before. I like them better natural. "Where are you from?"
In the back of my mind, I knew that my eyes were glazing over, trying to piece together the truth. Why I wanted to tell her the truth, I do not know. "I'm from Israel." I said, knowing the answer fit well with my skin and dark hair.
She grinned at me, and looked as if I was the most interesting person she had ever met, "Really? I've always wanted to go to somewhere other than America. Was it bad living there?" I decided to ignore her last question. She didn't need to know what life had been like for me in Israel.
"Why do you want to leave America? It's the most prosperous country this earth has ever seen. Even Rome wasn't." I stopped, realizing my mistake in mid sentence. She didn't notice. "Even Rome wasn't ever so prosperous."
"Do you study ancient history?" She looked so eager. She was so young. I wished I had ever been this interested in another person. I didn't think that I ever had, even when I had been her age.
"A little," I said. She looked down at her cup and smiled coquettishly again. It would be hard to distance myself from her. I realized abruptly that the rain had stopped. "The rain's over," I said, and stood, at the exact same time she did. I did not live in a large room, and we were very close. She smelled like chamomile and coffee. She looked up at me, and I realized how small she was. Like Mary. No, she was nothing like Mary, no resemblance, because there would never be another Mary.
He is so perfect. And he is exotic. He is a desert flower; he is a chunk of gold that I am lucky enough to find once I have shaken through the dirt. I won't let him go.
We stand at the same time. He is above me, and his eyes are bright and solemn, so sad for so young. His essence seems to surround me, and I feel myself drawn to him like I've never been drawn to anyone before. I put one hand on his chest, and cradle his face with the other. I am so taken and I can't let go. It's almost like his personality is an elixir that swallows me whole as I submit without a fight, wanting to be sucked down as far and as fast as I can.
I kiss him. Softly, because I'm not sure why I'm doing this. I know I have the tendency to throw myself at the feet of anyone who shows the least bit of care for me, but we have barely exchanged words.
He does not pull away, but rather sinks into the kiss, a surprise. He is wonderful. I think we will get married and move to the country, where there are perfectly symmetrical flowers and willows trees with hammocks laced beneath them, where five, no, ten children will play in green grass and light and where I will dry laundry in the sun and he will cook delicious spicy dinners that make my mouth water and the children laugh.
But then it is over, and I'm brought to the harsh reality of the rain and the messy college dorm and the problems that I have and the baggage that I carry. He pulled away. "I- I'm, I'm sorry," he says, turning around. I hear the complexity of emotions in his voice, like a tree of sorrow that has so many roots and leaves and layers of bark, all fighting to get the most attention. "I can't do this. Go."
I think he might be crying. I knew I couldn't be with him. I had known it from the first moment I saw him, as I had known when he touched me that he was forbidden. But I want him all the more now. He is an old drawer, covered in dust and with pieces that simply won't open, and I want to be the key and the restorative agent that makes him human again. I run out the door, into the sunlight that suddenly seems more hostile than the rain ever did.
I watched her go, and I fought back the feelings of torture. I had known that there was a chance she wouldn't be the one I had to kill. But I couldn't let he get too close. She flicked her hair out of her face. She was beautiful, the kind of girl that could be considered a perfect sculpture of a woman, but her scars are as visible to me as her pretty blue eyes. Something hurts her deep inside, like something hurts me.
But finding out could be more fatal to her than anything she carries inside. I turn on the television, watching a silly show about six friends who lived together. I hated them. And I hated television. It was a poison that made people wish for their lives to be more like what they saw, in that fantastic world of acting and fantasy. In the world of Friends, the biggest problem you have is that your boyfriend has dumped you. But, no problem, because there is always someone just waiting around to pick you up off your feet and bring you back to that happy place. T.V. is a drug. It's worse than heroin, and more addicting. I thought they should be banned.
I go home, to my empty house and empty room and empty life. I need to take my AZT. I search through the cabinet, finding it and popping down pills. My counter is white; spotless, like my life, until one mistake, and then everything turned black as night. I wish, sometimes, it would just end. Then I could go quietly into being another statistic, another lost cause before they find a cure, instead of being a living statue, frozen in one state of existence, the sate of AIDS.
I want that boy to love me. I want him to be able to not care if I am what I am. I miss being close to men. If any show an interest in me, if I love someone, I have to tell them I have AIDS, because I would never intentionally put someone through this. Then they pull away, slowly, at first, like the succulent sweet taste of bad wine, that starts out good and then leaves an aftertaste that stings and makes your tongue recoil and your insides squirm, until you have another drink, maybe of another bad wine, to quench the thirst and soothe the flavor. They think they are being kind, but they aren't; they are still leaving me alone with my pills and my dormant beauty; but I do understand. I need to be with someone who has nothing left to lose, and what young man ever has that?
I pick up a book and turn on the radio and the T.V. The words, the faces, the comprehension pouring from these to sources is lost to me, but the drone of creativity and art fills me as I shut my eyes. I fall asleep to the blue light of the T.V. screen, the shadows flickering and dancing on my face.
A/N- I'm sorry. This is as far as I've gotten. I guess it's kind of a cliffhanger.