Alone with No Light From the Tunnel
Marceline was alone. There was nothing to look forward too. She felt vapid.
She had a few friends, but it never helped her current state, which could be described than no other than like sleepwalking.
Her friends Finn and Jake made her laugh and smile. They checked her into the hospital when she drank too much or was near suicide. They could make her feel light for a few hours, and forgetful of the cards she'd been dealt. Even then, she felt so incredibly lonely.
Stuck in her apartment, though, her only friends would be the bottle and a little razor blade she hid in a photo album. Anything to fill the hole.
They said in her time at the hospital we often become our parents, or search for others like them because it's familiar, Comfortable almost. That couldn't be more accurate in her case.
When she was little Marceline's father was not the warmest. When she was a child he never looked her in the eyes, and often when they did things together on special occasions. Like say, going to a diner after working up a couple extra dollars, he would steal from her plate, eating her fries and such. Though this shouldn't be a big deal it was just more proof to Marceline her father did not care for her. When she was little she didn't know the world too well, and what her father would do to her was normal. Often after working long, her father would come home drunk and angry. This was normal. Covering bruises was normal. Covering scars was normal.
She still loved him though. All the way up until she was removed from their apartment when her father had pushed her a little too hard and she broke her arm. The neighbors heard her and called the police. She spent the rest of her childhood in a foster home.
Ash was an attractive guy, aside from his grayish tint in his skin, he had a mow-hawk and had kind of a punk-ish style, like Marceline's. He was often swooned over, which didn't bother Marceline too much, seeing she wasn't much of the jealous type.
Sadly though, Ash was no different from her cold father. So sweet at first, he called her "sweetheart" and "baby" he listened to her talk about her father. They would laugh together and would go to the park, talked about a future. They moved in with each other and everything seemed to be falling together. She loved him, and he cooed at her long enough for her to put her walls down. As soon as they went down things changed. He would demand her to do things for him. The nights she couldn't make dinner he would bark at her screaming "I work for you all day! FOR THIS SHITTY APARTMENT. FOR YOUR STUPID FUCKING BASS. And you can't make me a FUCKING DINNER?" he would slam his fist in the wall and Marcy got quiet. Quickly. For good reason as well.
Because it wasn't the wall he hit the next time.
She would do everything he asked from then on out. However when she skipped a beat, he was always there to get her back on track, quickly and with drunken anger.
After those times where he had been like this to her, he would lay on the couch with her, and coo apologies into her ear. She would sit stiffly as his hot liquor breath blew into her pale neck, and he took his fingers and brushed her hair back. Still whispering apologies he would start heavily and not to gracefully kissing her neck. When he deemed it fine to proceed, he would hastily grab the back of her head and shove her lips to his. They always felt cold and slimy, manipulating and deceiving. He would push her down on her back. She let him, and oh, how she wanted to tell him to stop. She knew better though, and she let him cover her sobs with forceful kisses. He snaked his arms all over her body and she tried to pretend everything was fine when he slipped off her top and her bottoms. While he groped her she would close her eyes and try her hardest to think of her better times. She would pretend to be satisfied. She faked little pleasure noises while he hungrily fondled her breasts or would shove her head down to meet his crotch. And while he pumped himself in and out of her she would swallow tears and gulp back her sobs she was sure to choke on. When it was over and he was laying on her, she would muffle her whimpers into the couch pillows and try to make it seem as if she was sleeping.
She would be thanking her lucky stars the day she found out he would be spending time for a brutal assault. He had been in a bar, drinking far more than he should. He was screaming at her for not getting the right type of tequila, and someone decided to tell him not to talk to her like that. He then proceeded to beat the living shit out of him. She thanked the man internally when she found out he would be gone, for at least five whole months.
Although she was glad that Ash was gone and her blackish purple bruises were healing into a sickly green, she couldn't help but feel horribly, terribly, lonely.
While her friends were there sometime, she couldn't help but slicing up her wrists a little bit and drinking away some of her emotions.
Her favorite place to do this was the Blue Moon, a dive bar in a rickety old alley. She used to play her bass there before her relationship with Ash went sour. Now she just watched people get on stage while her vision blurred and her orders to the bartender became more slurred.
One night in particular she was sitting, ordering another shot, she was watching as a boy with jet black hair got on stage. He caught her eye and smiled, then proceeded to play on his bass, which was quite a nice one, she noted.
He was wearing a red and black plaid flannel that fit him well. He had dark blue skinny jeans that weren't too tight and showed off his not-to-lanky body. He wore on his feet some faded red converse that must of seen some adventuring. His hair was messy and bed-headed, in an organized chaos kind of way, it was cute. Over all his clothes flattered his pale skin and dark eyes, that –not to be cheesy- were quite twinkly. Marcy inwardly giggled at how he was such the typical musician, with his entire cliché punk rock garb. It suited him though, she concluded, he was a very attractive boy.
While she proceeded to flag down the bartender, and hum along to the song that the boy was playing, a man approached her and boy did he stink of booze.
He had a yellow-ish skin tone, was wearing a dusty grey t-shit and sweatpants, he wasn't attractive. He had oblong beady eyes that seemed menacing.
She could basically taste the jose cuervo as he breathed "hey… what's a girl like you doing all alone here? Not awful smart of you to be in a place like this all by yourself"
Usually out of pure lonesomeness she would go home with him, and wake up in the morning in an unfamiliar bed and a pounding headache, finding herself unable to recall the night's events.
However, tonight Marcy just wanted to be left alone. She told him "I can handle myself, thanks"
He didn't seem to take hints well. He sat down next to her reaching his arm around the back of her chair. Marceline tensed, it was so uncomfortable she could die. He spoke again,
"nonsense, come now, I'm sure your with someone, who is it? Hmm? Someone as dashing as you can't possibly be here alone."
"nope. Alone."
"well then, why don't I join you?"
"I'm fine thanks…I really should just."
"no no no, you have to stay, couldn't have you wandering around this part of town by yourself"
"seriously, I'm fine dude." And she got up to leave
An arm shot out and grabbed her "oh come on, you know you want to come home with me tonight" smiling wickedly
A shot of pain rang up to her head, his arm just happened to be squeezing the bruise that Ash had given her the last time they'd seen each other
"OW, get off me man! Leave me alone!" she proclaimed as she shoved her arm back
"sweetheart, don't kid yourself. You know you want my number at least" he said squeezing harder
He could seriously not get any worse.
"take the hint .. you're so fucking creepy please go away!" I yelled
"STUCK UP BITCH MUCH? TELLING ME I'M CREEPY? MISS PASTY SKIN? THIS IS UNACCEPTABLE" he exploded in my face, he must have been really drunk, everyone was looking at us. His yellow tinted skin was red and he shoved me, looking like he was ready to strike me I closed my eyes. Preparing for what I was used to.
I was in the middle of telling myself not to worry becauseit was nothing I wasn't used to. When I realized nothing had happened, someone had stepped in front of me, and with a whoosh of black and red, the yellow skin guy was on the floor being restrained by the boy who was playing the bass, who had apparently finished his song.
Helping him was a boy with bright pink hair, who appeared to be rather uncomfortable, and with good reason, he wasn't exactly a regular here, he was wearing a polo for fuck's sake.
Yellow face's friends carried him out, trying to calm him down and everyone dispersed from the commotion.
You know from further analysis he totally looks like a lemon…
"what an awesome night" I thought sarcastically to myself.
The boy with the black hair adjusted his jeans and stalked his way over to me.
"hey, you okay?"
"yeah, I'm fine, thanks for..you know stopping him"
"don't sweat it…uh.."
"Marceline"
"cool, you come here a lot don't you? I've seen you with that guy…uh…crap whats his name?
Marceline shifted uncomfortably at the mention of Ash
"well, whatever his names not important, I've seen you here before though. My names Marshall, Marshall Lee that is."
"Cool" she replied, thankful the subject was off Ash "nice bass by the way, I have one that's kind of like it."
"thanks! Yeah, I'm obsessed with it, it's kind of treat like it's my child"
"yeah, I know the feeling, haha I call mine my baby"
"same!"
They both laughed.
'well..this is interesting..' Marceline thought to herself.
"you're really good by the way, I like that song you just did, kind of stuck in my head actually"
"I'm glad!" he laughed. A girl in baby blue walked up to us, along with the pink-haired boy from earlier.
"Marshall! What did I tell you about bar fighting! No more!" She stated
"but! But!.." he stammered
"I don't care what it is! They are dangerous! People here can be dangerous! Didn't you hear about the bar fight that happened here a couple of weeks ago? Some guy totally wailed on this other guy, I had a friend here who told me that the guy would of died if the cops weren't called!"
Does everyone freaking know my boyfriend! Jesus! She thought.
"Fi, he was helping this girl" gesturing towards Marcy "some crazy guy was going to hit her, so he stepped in, if he didn't she would of ended up with a black eye! Jeez, this place is so disgusting, so unkept and rowdy, I feel to out of place, can we just go?" Pink-hair boy complained
"oh! Oh my god I feel so dumb" she looked at me "I'm so sorry! This place can get a little sketchy, I'm Fionna by the way, and we call pink-hair boy gumball, or PG, and you've met the ever so chivalrous Marshall."
"nice to meet you" she smiled "I'm Marceline"
"See! I didn't do anything wrong!" Marshall exclaimed, looking rather happy with an I-told-you-so face on
"I'll just have to wait to catch you until next time then, darn it!" she said
Fionna then looked at me and said "hey..wait, I've definitely seen you here before with…" realization struck her face when she realized I was stuck at the hip with the guy she'd seen in the papers for beating the shit out of a guy here "with..uh..n-nervermind I don't remember"
Marcy looked at her and shoved her sleeve down her arm self-conscious about the bruises all covering them left over from Ash. Marceline thanked her internally for not explaining to the people around us that she was associated with such malicious company. "Yeah, I'm here a lot, I used to play bass here actually."
"sweet!" she said "hey listen, gumballs about to shit his pants here because this place is too scawy fo the wittle guy" she mocked "but since you're here so often we'll probably see you again, Marshall plays every Saturday."
Gumball, offended shouted "hey! Unkind!" Marshall and Fionna both laughed.
Marshall turned to Marceline and said "sweet meeting you, we should meet up sometime, I would love to see that bass of yours" he smiled at her, a little awkwardly though, and Marceline thought she saw his cheeks grow a little pinker.
I feel really childish for getting butterflies. She thought
"sure" she smiled back
"do you have a number I could call? Or here..I'll just give you mine.."
"no here" she scribbled down some digits on a paper "call me whenever, I don't do much" she giggled. Marceline blushed, she hadn't done this in a while, and probably shouldn't be since Ash and her weren't completely broken up. Marcy just counted being in jail as a break up, but she shouldn't play guessing games in Ash's case.
Fionna's eyebrow shot up, only for a second before turning to me and said "we'll see you later then" and she smiled as they all walked out together.
Marshall turned around and cooly waved at me and smiled, I returned it by smiling and lifting up my hand lazily.
Marceline could of swore she heard Gumball say to Marshall "youuuu like her!" because she saw Marshall punch his arm after and said "shut up dude!"
Marceline felt the corners of her mouth go up, it wasn't often life threw her a bone, and maybe this could change things.
Maybe. She thought.