Disclaimer: "Daria" and all related characters are the exclusive
property of MTV networks.
"Can't seem to find the time for each other? The Ottman approach
to Couple Connectedness can help! Designed exclusively for the
busy executive, this intense two day seminar will show the two of
you everything you need to revitalize your marriage. And the two
nights on our beautiful grounds will give you the chance to ..."
Daria put the brochure back on the coffee table, before she
inadvertently learned what the two nights would give her parents the
chance to do. All she cared about was the fact that two days plus two
nights added up to a weekend without them.
Rounding out that equation was the fact that Quinn would be out of the
house all weekend as well. She had already left for Tiffany's, the
Fashion Club base of operations closest to Cashman's, where she would
be tonight and Saturday. Sunday she'd be at Stacy's, ideally situated
for an attack on the mall.
In Daria's mind, all these subtractions from the house somehow managed
to add up to a very large positive value. Shortly several sources of
perpetual irritation would be gone for over 48 hours.
As she was starting to plan the weekend, the ever-present sound of
Helen talking to the office on her cell phone ended, and she walked
from the kitchen to the living room.
"And here's one of those sources now," Daria muttered under her
breath.
Helen, with some obvious difficulty, turned off her phone and faced
Daria. "Your father and I will be leaving in a few minutes. You
know, it would be fine with us if you want to spend the weekend at
Jane's, or have her over here."
There was the one negative that actually *was* a negative...
"Jane and Trent flew out of state this morning. Somehow both her
parents and three cousins collided in the same city at the same time,
and in the interest of maintaining peaceful diplomatic relations, they
were required to attend the impromptu summit."
"So what are you going to do all weekend, honey?
"The usual, a quick flight on the concord for tea with the queen, then
a jaunt over to Belgium for some of those exquisite pomme frittes."
"I'm serious, Daria. I don't want you to just lay around the house
alone all weekend. Promise me you'll go out at least for a while."
"Okay. I hear the local crack den is having an open house tomorrow."
"Daria! That's not funny. All I'm asking..."
Helen's comment was interrupted by the thump-thump-thump of a large
piece of luggage tumbling down the stairs. This was followed by Jake,
carrying more bags.
Helen walked over to the foot of the stairs and picked up the fallen
suitcase. "Jake, I asked you to be careful! I think my perfume's in
this one."
Jake looked crestfallen, then angry. "I tried, but the damn thing
just got away from me. Damn rolling suitcases, those damn little
wheels never point in the same direction you're going!"
Helen didn't respond, she just took another bag from Jake and the two
of them walked towards the front door. Before exiting, she turned
around to face Daria. "I mean it, promise me you'll do something over
the next two days."
Daria sighed. The sooner she made this empty promise the sooner they
would actually leave. "Okay, I promise."
Jake likewise turned to face his daughter "Yeah kiddo, have fun!"
"I will. The football team is probably heading over for the orgy
right now."
Jake almost dropped the remaining suitcases. "Orgy! What orgy!?
Helen, did you know about this?!"
Helen sighed. "She's kidding, Jake. Come on."
The two carefully negotiated the luggage out the door and closed and
locked it behind them. Daria remained seated until she heard the car
drive off.
Silence was not completely unknown to the Morgendorffer household.
There were times when Jake would be reading the paper, Helen
occasionally had to listen to what was being said by whatever entities
at the office she was always communicating with, and every once in a
great while even Quinn had to stop talking long enough to inhale.
Sometimes, rarely, all these things happened in phase and the constant
background noise just stopped.
Daria treasured these rare moments when she didn't have to talk to, or
worse, listen to, anyone else. The words she was reading, or perhaps
planning to write, were always able to come through much clearer then.
Daria exhaled and felt herself relax into the moment, when a
remarkable thing happened -- it didn't end. The silence expanded into
both time and space, getting longer as her aural awareness expanded
past the living room, to the kitchen and upstairs.
The relaxation deepened. Daria usually only experienced this kind of
serenity alone in her room, and it was distinctly odd to experience it
in a space so much larger. "It's the difference," Daria thought to
herself, "between the silence of no one bothering me at the moment,
and there being no one around who could even potentially bother me."
Just at that moment, the phone rang.
Daria had a keen appreciation of irony, but nonetheless the unexpected
shrillness almost made her jump. Rather than actually jumping though,
she channeled the sudden energy into putting as much scorn as possible
into the word "Hello" as she answered the phone. Her vitriol was
completely wasted on Jamie, who was on the other end, but it made her
feel better.
The conversation went exactly as it had the last hundred times she had
answered a call from Jamie. Or maybe, she thought, the last three
hundred times she had spoken to any of the interchangeable Js.
"No, she's not here. I think she's off touring convents, something
about preserving her chastity for all time." Daria smiled at the
panicked sounds coming over the phone. "Don't worry, I'm sure she'll
drop the idea when she discovers that habits aren't available in
pastels... Yes, I'd be thrilled to take a message."
Daria half heartedly wrote "call Jamie" in the air with her index
finger and hung up. Immediately the silence swept back into the
house, and Daria's state of relaxation returned.
Many people in this situation would feel the need to shout or sing,
desperate to fill the void left by the removal of other people's
sounds with their own. But Daria had better ways to fill a void than
with meaningless noise. She headed up to her room to continue the
book she was currently reading.
As she stepped on the last stair before the landing, it let out a
small creak. Daria was a little surprised that she had never noticed
it before. Perhaps it had just started, or perhaps the few times she
had trod on that step late enough for the house to be quiet, she had
been too tired or worried to notice it.
In any event, unlike the phone, Daria didn't particularly object to
this. It was a soft, inoffensive sound that rather than intruding on
her solitude somehow reinforced it.
"Squeak to you, too," she said, and continued to her room.
The book was on the bed where she had left it, and Daria prepared to
join it. Then she thought otherwise, smiled, picked it up and went
back downstairs. She got a tall glass of soda and parked herself on
the couch, secure in the knowledge that she would not be disturbed.
She started reading.
When she found herself squinting due to lack of illumination coming in
through the windows, she turned on the lights and continued.
Some indeterminate amount of time later, the phone rang again. This
time it was less shocking, but no less annoying. Nor was the ensuing
conversation, an almost exact replay of the previous one with a
different J at the other end. Or perhaps it was the same J,
forgetting that he had already called.
Daria paused as she put down the receiver. Inevitably there would be
another call from another J, or the same one, and after that Roberto
or Donnie or whoever the hell Quinn's second tier boyfriends were this
week. Perhaps she should switch the ringer off, and turn the volume
on the machine all the way down, ensuring that she wouldn't even
notice when the phone rang. No one was likely to call actually
wanting to talk to her, except perhaps Jane. Daria thought it
unlikely that Jane would have any time to call anyone, but if she did
get a free moment and used it to call her, it would probably be pretty
important...
After debating the matter for a few minutes, Daria did silence the
phone and answering machine. Jane would understand. And, anyway, if
she really did need to talk to someone she'd be more likely to call
Tom.
Daria made the rounds through the house, switching off the other
phones. She imagined herself fortifying the walls of an ancient city
where art and science were just starting to flourish.
After disabling the last phone in the house, the one that required
actually exposing herself to Quinn's room, she congratulated herself.
"Another victory over the barbarian hordes who would inflict their
existence on me."
She refilled her glass and continued where she'd left off.
She finished the book just before eleven o'clock. It hadn't been the
best thing she'd read that month, or even that week. The writing was
pretty crisp and some of the turns of phrase were clever, but she had
never really liked the protagonist, who came off as too stupid and
too cheerful to be really interesting.
A story had been percolating in the back of her mind for a couple of
days, and her disappointment in the novel provided the inspiration to
prove she could do better, and actually start writing. But first,
dinner. She heated up some leftover lasagna, brought it back to the
couch, and turned on the TV...
"This strip club lowered costs by replacing the dancers... with
robots! It's A.I. T&A, next, on Sick Sad World!"
Daria sighed "rerun" and started flipping channels.
"Hmm, loud, annoying guy wants me to buy a car... (click) different
loud annoying guy wants me to buy a practically identical
car... (click) people chasing after some sort of ball as if it were
somehow important... (click) Oh great, another "Real World" marathon.
Would you people hurry up and return to the seething pit of obscurity
that spawned you?"
That last one had soured Daria on the possibility of finding anything
worth watching, and she flipped off the set in disgust. Then she
turned it off.
Eating in silence lead Daria to think more about how lack-of-sound had
as many different qualities as sound. Previously she had been
enjoying the absence of normal background noises, while eating let her
relish the absence of specific dinner sounds. In particular Quinn's
endless prattling about her social life, and the rare misfired
questions from her parents about her own lack of same.
She finished eating, brought the plate and glass back into the
kitchen, and put them in the dishwasher. She hadn't bothered to turn
on the kitchen lights, and the glow of ambient light coming through
the large window was visible over the light streaming in from the
living room. She went out to the backyard to investigate it.
The night had turned out somewhat chilly, and Daria drew her jacket
close as she stared up. Most of the light was from street lamps and
the glow from the center of town, some miles away. But there were a
few stars and a half moon visible, and Daria basked in their silent
companionship for a while.
The only sound was the distant hum of traffic. Daria smiled as she
thought about how those sounds probably represented the humans
physically closest to her, and that most of them were moving away at
over 50 miles per hour. She stepped back inside, and headed upstairs
to start writing.
She started up the word processor and stared at the cursor for a few
minutes. The story was pretty well sketched out in her mind,
basically, but she had no idea how it actually began... her eyes
drifted to the "CyberKron II" icon on the desktop.
"Okay," she said to the icon, "one pass through level eight, and then
I'll start."
That quickly turned into four passes through level eight and a couple
through level nine, but somehow that turned out to be just the right
amount of procrastinating. Just as her avatar exploded in a splat of
red pixels for the fifth time, she realized how the story had to
start, and brought the word processor back up.
The sound of clicking keys filled her room and leaked into the
hallway, and continued until well past four am. Then they stopped,
the sole light in the house went out, and Daria went to sleep.
* * * * *
She awoke around one the next afternoon, to a bright, clear, sunny
day. But fortunately her heavy curtains prevented her from seeing any
of it.
There wasn't much reason to change out of her nightshirt, so she just
went downstairs and poured herself a bowl of cereal. Her mother
wasn't around to reprimand her for sleeping so late, and she wasn't
about to do it herself. But at some level she must have considered it
somewhat wrong, because as she looked at the cereal she could hear an
echo of Trent's voice saying "Late breakfast... or early
lunch... whatever."
She responded to the echo out loud "I am *not* turning into Trent.
Eight hours of sleep is a mere between-nap snooze for him, I just
chose eight unconventional hours."
She ate the cereal while reading the paper, then headed straight back
to her room to do some more writing.
* * * * *
Several hours, pages, and levels of CyberKron later, she typed the
final period and saved the file with no small amount of satisfaction.
It didn't last long, however, as she reread the entire piece from the
beginning. "I guess it's OK," she thought. "Maybe I use 'cudgel' too
many times, but 'bludgeon' is so cliche."
She pushed back from the desk and wandered downstairs, so engrossed in
the story's perceived flaws that she didn't notice the squeaky stair.
She walked into the kitchen with a vague notion of getting something
to eat, but the sight of the remaining lasagna pushed thoughts of
hunger back behind thoughts of self-criticism. She walked back out
into the living room, thinking "Maybe she shouldn't use a blunt
instrument at all, maybe something sharp instead... Yeah, scalpels
are always good..."
She sat down on the couch and continued to play with alternate
scenarios, some of which were promising.
A while later, she noticed she was no longer sitting, but had
stretched out on her back with her head propped against the throw
pillows.
Some time after that, she noticed she wasn't thinking about the story
any more. Or indeed, much of anything else. She realized she had
been staring up at the ceiling for a good twenty minutes.
It wasn't uncommon for her to zone out like that, especially after a
prolonged stretch of writing. She always figured it was just her
conscious mind switching off to divert power to her unconscious, where
her inspiration came from. Nonetheless, it worried her more than
she'd ever admit to herself.
"That's OK," she said out loud. "It's not like I was staring at the
same old cracks in my ceiling. This is a whole new uncharted galaxy."
"Of cracks."
She sat up.
"The talking to myself is probably not OK, though. Umm. Maybe I
should get up and do something."
She thought about the lasagna she hadn't eaten, and considered that
she must be hungry. She thought about it again and remembered why she
wasn't.
"Pizza, then" she said. She glanced over at the clock and was only
somewhat surprised that it was already 10:30, but was disappointed when
she realized that at this hour the pizzaria would be closed. Well,
anyway, she didn't really *want* pizza, although she would have gone
for the "two toppings, two slices" special if Jane had wanted to...
...but of course Jane was miles away.
"Okay stomach, it's up to you then. Something quick and easy."
Her stomach, having long lived in subordination to her brain, wasn't
immediately forthcoming with any ideas. Eventually though the image
of a microwavable burrito popped into her head.
"Not what I would have chosen," she told her midsection, "but you're
the one who has to digest it."
She went back up to her room, quickly changed into her usual
face-the-world attire, grabbed the car keys, and headed out. As she
started the car, she said "Going to the 7-11 on Degas Street probably
isn't what mom meant by 'getting out of the house,' but it counts in
my book. Promise kept, mom."
At this hour Degas street was usually pretty empty, the usual denizens
having already taken their assigned places in front of, behind, or
under various bars or stages. However, the street turned out to be
packed with people, all wearing black velvet, or black leather,
or... other materials Daria couldn't immediately identify, beyond the
fact that they were definitely black.
For the most part she took little notice of them beyond a minor
irritation that she needed to park further from the convenience store
than she might have liked. However, just outside the 7-11 she passed
a group standing around a car, its tape deck playing something
lugubrious. As she entered the store she picked up a few lines of the
lyrics, and for some reason immediately thought of Jane. She wasn't
sure why, they weren't at all an accurate description of her.
She was so lost in trying to figure out the connection that she didn't
hear her name being called until the third time it was repeated. She
looked around for the source and spotted Andrea standing by the
Slurpee machine, amidst a group of black-clad teenagers saying
something about "ice sucky" and laughing.
"Ummmm, hi," Daria said, struggling to locate the recently dormant
'dealing with other humans' section of her brain. It started up in
its usual mode.
"I see the invasion force from your home planet has arrived. I
imagine you'll be getting a commendation for your advance reports."
Andrea didn't smile, exactly, but she sounded amused. "God, I wish.
No, 'Faith and the Muse' are playing the Zen tonight. I have no idea
what terrible cock-up booked them in a wretched club in wretched
Lawndale, but I'm not missing the opportunity. And it looks like
neither is any other goth in the state."
Daria's knowledge of gothic music consisted entirely of things she'd
read in the popular press, and once asking Trent about the 'Sisters of
Mercy' poster over his bed. But it was her turn to say something and
this seemed as good a topic as any. "They anything like Marilyn
Manson?"
Andrea's not-quite smile quickly turned to an exaggerated mock grimace
of disgust. "A couple of differences. For one, 'Faith and the Muse'
are actually gothic. And for another, they don't really, really
suck."
Maybe that *hadn't* been as good a topic as any. "Oh."
There was a pause as two sets of eyes glanced around at anything but
the other set's owner. Eventually Andrea's gaze settled somewhere
around the floor. "Hey, if you're not doing anything, would you...
like to come? Erm. They really are very good, and... erm... your
boots will be the envy of half the people there."
Daria was taken completely off guard by the offer. She quickly
weighed the options. On the one hand, the safety of her room and the
quiet, empty house. On the other, lots of noise and strangers, but a
chance to get to know another classmate, who, if nothing else, at
least wrote some pretty cool poetry.
There was clearly only one real choice.
"Ummm, thanks, but no thanks. Exposure..." she had started to say
"exposure to too many fashion club meetings has left me terrified of
foundation and eyeliner." She stopped herself when she remembered how
relieved Andrea had been to discover that she and Jane weren't about
to tear into her at the megamart.
"Actually, the truth is I'm not in the mood for crowds." ("Where
'crowd' is defined as more than one," she added to herself.)
Andrea looked up, but Daria couldn't tell whether her expression was
one of disappointment or relief. "Yeah," she said. "I know that
feeling. Well, I'll, um, see you in class Monday."
"Yeah."
With that, Andrea walked to the counter, paid for whatever she had
bought, and left the store. Daria noticed that the 'brain freezy'
group, which she had just assumed were Andrea's friends, was still
there, one of them asking the cashier to "make his pain end."
Later, as Daria pulled away from the curb, the burrito a frozen lump
in a sack beside her, it occurred to her that maybe Andrea was also out
alone, and maybe she had been kind of desperate for some company.
"Not like me," Daria said out loud, "completely self-reliant."
"Even if I do talk to myself."
* * * * *
The burrito took 3 minutes to cook, and about as long to eat. But it
kept Daria shooting, revising, and occasionally stretching her legs by
wandering around the house, until the sun was about to rise.
* * * * *
She awoke once again to a still, dark room. She strained her ears for
the sounds of motion in the house, and was relieved when she still
couldn't hear any. However, there was an expectant air, and Daria
knew that there were things she needed to take care of before everyone
returned sometime that evening.
She showered and dressed, if for no other reason than to avoid the
inevitable question from her mother about whether she'd been in her
night clothes all weekend.
She turned the phones back on, and cringed as she expected them to
start yelling at her any second, but as the day wore on and they
remained silent she relaxed somewhat. She figured that either
everyone who was going to call already had, or that Quinn's fan club
had managed to track her down.
However, from the moment the phones were back on she wasn't able to
fully relax, knowing the outside world could intrude at any moment.
She was completely unable to write with that hanging over her head, so
she spent the day reading instead. First the Sunday paper, then a
collection of short stories.
By six o'clock she was trying to stretch out each minute, knowing that
it might be her last one alone. At 6:48, she was right. Quinn
exploded into the living room, arms clutching more shopping bags than
Daria could immediately count. Daria closed her book with the air of
someone burying a beloved puppy. "And so it ends," she thought to
herself.
Quinn was, not surprisingly, oblivious to Daria's displeasure at
seeing her. "Oh, hi Daria. Any messages for me?"
"Last time I checked the machine it was so painfully bloated with
messages that it was about to rupture. It begged me to kill it, but I
told it the fate of the free world depended on the information it
carried, and forced it to keep suffering."
"You let the *machine* answer?"
"I won't start receptionist training until *after* high school.
Anyway, this way you have recorded evidence that I'm sure you can use
to blackmail a more expensive meal out of someone."
"Hey, yeah!"
Quinn rushed into the kitchen, and seconds later Daria could hear the
unmistakable sound of a tinny speaker playing back the voice of
someone trying to think of something clever to say to an answering
machine, and failing. Shortly after, this was joined by the snap of
carrot sticks.
Daria returned to her book and tried to ignore this static with only
limited success for twenty minutes, at which point it got worse. A
veritable cacophony started up outside; a car pulled up, doors
slammed, and Jake's voice could be heard coming up the walkway.
"... had no idea what the hell he was talking about! Damn unmarried
marriage counselors!"
Jake stopped mid-rant as he and Helen entered the house and spotted
Daria.
"Hey kiddo! How was having the place to yourself?"
"Well, actually..."
"Great!" Jake yawned and stretched, neither very convincingly.
"Well, big day tomorrow, I should be getting to bed." He then quickly
turned and headed upstairs.
Helen followed quickly. "Jake! We need to finish this..." but as she
was talking she had pulled the cell phone out of her purse, and
switched it on. It rang immediately. Daria could hear the
conversation receding up the stairs. "Hi Eric. Yes, I'm back, but I
need to... what... for how much...?"
Daria listened for the small squeak of the top stair, but it was
completely drowned out between the sounds of Quinn's giggling, Helen's
scheduling, and Jake damning something or other.
"Well actually, being alone by myself was fine," she said, sure that
no one would hear. "What I hate is being alone while surrounded by
people."
* * * * *
The noise was too much, Daria realized that the only way she could
escape it was to give up her hard won - well, ok, easily won -
territory throughout the house and make a strategic retreat back to
her room.
With the door closed and the thick padding surrounding her, she could
almost believe she still had it all to herself. Almost. Small clues
gave away the truth; muted sounds, the light from the hallway coming
in through the crack under the door, the occasional dimming of that
light as feet walked by.
These things faded and stopped as the evening wore on and the rest of
the family went to sleep. There was a brief interruption to her peace
as Helen and Jake stuck their heads in to say good night. And then
she once again was alone, if more confined in her solitude.
By midnight her creative energies were running at full. She had given
a minor character in her last story a throw-away line about her past,
something to provide motivation for what she was about to do. It
occurred to her now that the character hadn't been telling the whole
truth, and Daria found herself mentally fleshing out the event in more
detail. By 12:30 she had a file with a full outline, and by 2 she had
written several pages of first draft.
As she finished a paragraph she noticed the time, and realized if she
didn't force herself to sleep now she'd be exhausted all day tomorrow.
Sure, there were plenty of chances to sleep in class, but if she went
that route she'd find herself in a vicious circle of insomnia. She
switched off the computer and got ready for bed.
As she did so, she reviewed the past two days. They had been good.
Really good. There was no telling when she would next have this kind
of solitude. She was pretty satisfied about the writing she had done;
she would let the first story sit for a week and then go over it
again, but it was too bad she hadn't had more time to work on the
second. Maybe she would skip lunch with Jane tomorrow, just have a
sandwich or something in the school library and continue to work on it
then...
The realization that she had just considered skipping out on Jane hit
her hard. Even worse was how casually, how very, very casually the
thought had occurred to her.
Worst of all, the damn lyrics she had heard last night came flooding
into her brain, and Daria realized that their relevance lay not in a
characterization of Jane, but in a chillingly accurate description of
herself.
The realization left her trembling, and looking desperately around her
room, from the small spot of paint on the carpet from one of Jane's
brushes, to the many books Jane had given her as presents, to the tv
they'd often watched together.
Daria turned to her clock, set the alarm back an hour, and went to
sleep.
* * * * *
The next morning she woke before anyone else, scribbled a note about
needing to get some book before class, and walked over to the Lanes'.
The early morning silence was notably different than the night
silences she had gotten used to. This was the silence preceding
noise. Horrible, brain-scrambling noise. In a way Daria almost
appreciated this more because it was ephemeral.
Daria knew that Jane would also have been up early, for a morning run.
Somehow she always needed an extra-long one after spending time with
her extended family. As expected, she was up and ready to leave when
Daria rang the doorbell.
"Well, the queen has ventured from her castle to walk amongst the
peasants. So, how was your weekend as undisputed lord and master of
Dun Morgendorffer?"
"It was a madcap whirlwind. I barely had time to schedule the bouts
of catatonia."
Jane grabbed her knapsack and locked the door behind her. The two
started walking towards Lawndale High.
"Sounds like you were pretty bored."
"No, in fact I was perfectly content. That's the disturbing thing."
"Once again you confuse and yet intrigue me. Care to explain that?"
Daria stopped walking and turned to look at Jane. "Being alone is
easy. I've spent whole summers like that, sleeping from five in the
morning to noon to avoid the family as much as possible, then drifting
between books, notepads and video games. I get a lot of writing done,
I stop having to deal with all the daily annoyances. But... it's like
a really comfortable chair that you just keep sinking deeper into
until you can't get out."
"Geez Daria, you're talking about man-eating furniture. You *have*
been alone too long."
"Exactly. And there was this song I overheard on Saturday, some
overly melancholic British thing. But one line struck me -- 'the
further I get from the things that I care about, the less I care about
how much further away I get.' If you had come back a week later you
probably would have had to apply deadly force to even get me out for
pizza."
"You exaggerate, the first time I only had to brandish a crowbar a
little."
"Well, umm, keep that crowbar handy, just in case."
"You know me, always willing to crush a friend's skull. Especially if
it's for their own good."
"Thanks. So how was your nightmare weekend?"
The two resumed walking as Jane launched into her story. "Oh,
nightmare doesn't begin to describe it! First off..."
As Jane proceeded to talk about her fiasco-ridden weekend, the rest of
Lawndale started its day. Babies cried, parents screamed at their
children to get ready or they'd miss the bus, vapid morning TV oozed
out of hundreds of speakers.
But Daria didn't hear any of this irritating noise. She didn't even
hear the soothing silence that hid just underneath it, waiting for
her. She only heard her friend's voice.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Author's notes:
This was my first work of fanfic. Please feel free to send comments,
positive or negative, to larnep@canetoad.com.
The lyrics are from "Fear of Ghosts" by The Cure, a b-side from the
"Distintegration" era.
property of MTV networks.
"Can't seem to find the time for each other? The Ottman approach
to Couple Connectedness can help! Designed exclusively for the
busy executive, this intense two day seminar will show the two of
you everything you need to revitalize your marriage. And the two
nights on our beautiful grounds will give you the chance to ..."
Daria put the brochure back on the coffee table, before she
inadvertently learned what the two nights would give her parents the
chance to do. All she cared about was the fact that two days plus two
nights added up to a weekend without them.
Rounding out that equation was the fact that Quinn would be out of the
house all weekend as well. She had already left for Tiffany's, the
Fashion Club base of operations closest to Cashman's, where she would
be tonight and Saturday. Sunday she'd be at Stacy's, ideally situated
for an attack on the mall.
In Daria's mind, all these subtractions from the house somehow managed
to add up to a very large positive value. Shortly several sources of
perpetual irritation would be gone for over 48 hours.
As she was starting to plan the weekend, the ever-present sound of
Helen talking to the office on her cell phone ended, and she walked
from the kitchen to the living room.
"And here's one of those sources now," Daria muttered under her
breath.
Helen, with some obvious difficulty, turned off her phone and faced
Daria. "Your father and I will be leaving in a few minutes. You
know, it would be fine with us if you want to spend the weekend at
Jane's, or have her over here."
There was the one negative that actually *was* a negative...
"Jane and Trent flew out of state this morning. Somehow both her
parents and three cousins collided in the same city at the same time,
and in the interest of maintaining peaceful diplomatic relations, they
were required to attend the impromptu summit."
"So what are you going to do all weekend, honey?
"The usual, a quick flight on the concord for tea with the queen, then
a jaunt over to Belgium for some of those exquisite pomme frittes."
"I'm serious, Daria. I don't want you to just lay around the house
alone all weekend. Promise me you'll go out at least for a while."
"Okay. I hear the local crack den is having an open house tomorrow."
"Daria! That's not funny. All I'm asking..."
Helen's comment was interrupted by the thump-thump-thump of a large
piece of luggage tumbling down the stairs. This was followed by Jake,
carrying more bags.
Helen walked over to the foot of the stairs and picked up the fallen
suitcase. "Jake, I asked you to be careful! I think my perfume's in
this one."
Jake looked crestfallen, then angry. "I tried, but the damn thing
just got away from me. Damn rolling suitcases, those damn little
wheels never point in the same direction you're going!"
Helen didn't respond, she just took another bag from Jake and the two
of them walked towards the front door. Before exiting, she turned
around to face Daria. "I mean it, promise me you'll do something over
the next two days."
Daria sighed. The sooner she made this empty promise the sooner they
would actually leave. "Okay, I promise."
Jake likewise turned to face his daughter "Yeah kiddo, have fun!"
"I will. The football team is probably heading over for the orgy
right now."
Jake almost dropped the remaining suitcases. "Orgy! What orgy!?
Helen, did you know about this?!"
Helen sighed. "She's kidding, Jake. Come on."
The two carefully negotiated the luggage out the door and closed and
locked it behind them. Daria remained seated until she heard the car
drive off.
Silence was not completely unknown to the Morgendorffer household.
There were times when Jake would be reading the paper, Helen
occasionally had to listen to what was being said by whatever entities
at the office she was always communicating with, and every once in a
great while even Quinn had to stop talking long enough to inhale.
Sometimes, rarely, all these things happened in phase and the constant
background noise just stopped.
Daria treasured these rare moments when she didn't have to talk to, or
worse, listen to, anyone else. The words she was reading, or perhaps
planning to write, were always able to come through much clearer then.
Daria exhaled and felt herself relax into the moment, when a
remarkable thing happened -- it didn't end. The silence expanded into
both time and space, getting longer as her aural awareness expanded
past the living room, to the kitchen and upstairs.
The relaxation deepened. Daria usually only experienced this kind of
serenity alone in her room, and it was distinctly odd to experience it
in a space so much larger. "It's the difference," Daria thought to
herself, "between the silence of no one bothering me at the moment,
and there being no one around who could even potentially bother me."
Just at that moment, the phone rang.
Daria had a keen appreciation of irony, but nonetheless the unexpected
shrillness almost made her jump. Rather than actually jumping though,
she channeled the sudden energy into putting as much scorn as possible
into the word "Hello" as she answered the phone. Her vitriol was
completely wasted on Jamie, who was on the other end, but it made her
feel better.
The conversation went exactly as it had the last hundred times she had
answered a call from Jamie. Or maybe, she thought, the last three
hundred times she had spoken to any of the interchangeable Js.
"No, she's not here. I think she's off touring convents, something
about preserving her chastity for all time." Daria smiled at the
panicked sounds coming over the phone. "Don't worry, I'm sure she'll
drop the idea when she discovers that habits aren't available in
pastels... Yes, I'd be thrilled to take a message."
Daria half heartedly wrote "call Jamie" in the air with her index
finger and hung up. Immediately the silence swept back into the
house, and Daria's state of relaxation returned.
Many people in this situation would feel the need to shout or sing,
desperate to fill the void left by the removal of other people's
sounds with their own. But Daria had better ways to fill a void than
with meaningless noise. She headed up to her room to continue the
book she was currently reading.
As she stepped on the last stair before the landing, it let out a
small creak. Daria was a little surprised that she had never noticed
it before. Perhaps it had just started, or perhaps the few times she
had trod on that step late enough for the house to be quiet, she had
been too tired or worried to notice it.
In any event, unlike the phone, Daria didn't particularly object to
this. It was a soft, inoffensive sound that rather than intruding on
her solitude somehow reinforced it.
"Squeak to you, too," she said, and continued to her room.
The book was on the bed where she had left it, and Daria prepared to
join it. Then she thought otherwise, smiled, picked it up and went
back downstairs. She got a tall glass of soda and parked herself on
the couch, secure in the knowledge that she would not be disturbed.
She started reading.
When she found herself squinting due to lack of illumination coming in
through the windows, she turned on the lights and continued.
Some indeterminate amount of time later, the phone rang again. This
time it was less shocking, but no less annoying. Nor was the ensuing
conversation, an almost exact replay of the previous one with a
different J at the other end. Or perhaps it was the same J,
forgetting that he had already called.
Daria paused as she put down the receiver. Inevitably there would be
another call from another J, or the same one, and after that Roberto
or Donnie or whoever the hell Quinn's second tier boyfriends were this
week. Perhaps she should switch the ringer off, and turn the volume
on the machine all the way down, ensuring that she wouldn't even
notice when the phone rang. No one was likely to call actually
wanting to talk to her, except perhaps Jane. Daria thought it
unlikely that Jane would have any time to call anyone, but if she did
get a free moment and used it to call her, it would probably be pretty
important...
After debating the matter for a few minutes, Daria did silence the
phone and answering machine. Jane would understand. And, anyway, if
she really did need to talk to someone she'd be more likely to call
Tom.
Daria made the rounds through the house, switching off the other
phones. She imagined herself fortifying the walls of an ancient city
where art and science were just starting to flourish.
After disabling the last phone in the house, the one that required
actually exposing herself to Quinn's room, she congratulated herself.
"Another victory over the barbarian hordes who would inflict their
existence on me."
She refilled her glass and continued where she'd left off.
She finished the book just before eleven o'clock. It hadn't been the
best thing she'd read that month, or even that week. The writing was
pretty crisp and some of the turns of phrase were clever, but she had
never really liked the protagonist, who came off as too stupid and
too cheerful to be really interesting.
A story had been percolating in the back of her mind for a couple of
days, and her disappointment in the novel provided the inspiration to
prove she could do better, and actually start writing. But first,
dinner. She heated up some leftover lasagna, brought it back to the
couch, and turned on the TV...
"This strip club lowered costs by replacing the dancers... with
robots! It's A.I. T&A, next, on Sick Sad World!"
Daria sighed "rerun" and started flipping channels.
"Hmm, loud, annoying guy wants me to buy a car... (click) different
loud annoying guy wants me to buy a practically identical
car... (click) people chasing after some sort of ball as if it were
somehow important... (click) Oh great, another "Real World" marathon.
Would you people hurry up and return to the seething pit of obscurity
that spawned you?"
That last one had soured Daria on the possibility of finding anything
worth watching, and she flipped off the set in disgust. Then she
turned it off.
Eating in silence lead Daria to think more about how lack-of-sound had
as many different qualities as sound. Previously she had been
enjoying the absence of normal background noises, while eating let her
relish the absence of specific dinner sounds. In particular Quinn's
endless prattling about her social life, and the rare misfired
questions from her parents about her own lack of same.
She finished eating, brought the plate and glass back into the
kitchen, and put them in the dishwasher. She hadn't bothered to turn
on the kitchen lights, and the glow of ambient light coming through
the large window was visible over the light streaming in from the
living room. She went out to the backyard to investigate it.
The night had turned out somewhat chilly, and Daria drew her jacket
close as she stared up. Most of the light was from street lamps and
the glow from the center of town, some miles away. But there were a
few stars and a half moon visible, and Daria basked in their silent
companionship for a while.
The only sound was the distant hum of traffic. Daria smiled as she
thought about how those sounds probably represented the humans
physically closest to her, and that most of them were moving away at
over 50 miles per hour. She stepped back inside, and headed upstairs
to start writing.
She started up the word processor and stared at the cursor for a few
minutes. The story was pretty well sketched out in her mind,
basically, but she had no idea how it actually began... her eyes
drifted to the "CyberKron II" icon on the desktop.
"Okay," she said to the icon, "one pass through level eight, and then
I'll start."
That quickly turned into four passes through level eight and a couple
through level nine, but somehow that turned out to be just the right
amount of procrastinating. Just as her avatar exploded in a splat of
red pixels for the fifth time, she realized how the story had to
start, and brought the word processor back up.
The sound of clicking keys filled her room and leaked into the
hallway, and continued until well past four am. Then they stopped,
the sole light in the house went out, and Daria went to sleep.
* * * * *
She awoke around one the next afternoon, to a bright, clear, sunny
day. But fortunately her heavy curtains prevented her from seeing any
of it.
There wasn't much reason to change out of her nightshirt, so she just
went downstairs and poured herself a bowl of cereal. Her mother
wasn't around to reprimand her for sleeping so late, and she wasn't
about to do it herself. But at some level she must have considered it
somewhat wrong, because as she looked at the cereal she could hear an
echo of Trent's voice saying "Late breakfast... or early
lunch... whatever."
She responded to the echo out loud "I am *not* turning into Trent.
Eight hours of sleep is a mere between-nap snooze for him, I just
chose eight unconventional hours."
She ate the cereal while reading the paper, then headed straight back
to her room to do some more writing.
* * * * *
Several hours, pages, and levels of CyberKron later, she typed the
final period and saved the file with no small amount of satisfaction.
It didn't last long, however, as she reread the entire piece from the
beginning. "I guess it's OK," she thought. "Maybe I use 'cudgel' too
many times, but 'bludgeon' is so cliche."
She pushed back from the desk and wandered downstairs, so engrossed in
the story's perceived flaws that she didn't notice the squeaky stair.
She walked into the kitchen with a vague notion of getting something
to eat, but the sight of the remaining lasagna pushed thoughts of
hunger back behind thoughts of self-criticism. She walked back out
into the living room, thinking "Maybe she shouldn't use a blunt
instrument at all, maybe something sharp instead... Yeah, scalpels
are always good..."
She sat down on the couch and continued to play with alternate
scenarios, some of which were promising.
A while later, she noticed she was no longer sitting, but had
stretched out on her back with her head propped against the throw
pillows.
Some time after that, she noticed she wasn't thinking about the story
any more. Or indeed, much of anything else. She realized she had
been staring up at the ceiling for a good twenty minutes.
It wasn't uncommon for her to zone out like that, especially after a
prolonged stretch of writing. She always figured it was just her
conscious mind switching off to divert power to her unconscious, where
her inspiration came from. Nonetheless, it worried her more than
she'd ever admit to herself.
"That's OK," she said out loud. "It's not like I was staring at the
same old cracks in my ceiling. This is a whole new uncharted galaxy."
"Of cracks."
She sat up.
"The talking to myself is probably not OK, though. Umm. Maybe I
should get up and do something."
She thought about the lasagna she hadn't eaten, and considered that
she must be hungry. She thought about it again and remembered why she
wasn't.
"Pizza, then" she said. She glanced over at the clock and was only
somewhat surprised that it was already 10:30, but was disappointed when
she realized that at this hour the pizzaria would be closed. Well,
anyway, she didn't really *want* pizza, although she would have gone
for the "two toppings, two slices" special if Jane had wanted to...
...but of course Jane was miles away.
"Okay stomach, it's up to you then. Something quick and easy."
Her stomach, having long lived in subordination to her brain, wasn't
immediately forthcoming with any ideas. Eventually though the image
of a microwavable burrito popped into her head.
"Not what I would have chosen," she told her midsection, "but you're
the one who has to digest it."
She went back up to her room, quickly changed into her usual
face-the-world attire, grabbed the car keys, and headed out. As she
started the car, she said "Going to the 7-11 on Degas Street probably
isn't what mom meant by 'getting out of the house,' but it counts in
my book. Promise kept, mom."
At this hour Degas street was usually pretty empty, the usual denizens
having already taken their assigned places in front of, behind, or
under various bars or stages. However, the street turned out to be
packed with people, all wearing black velvet, or black leather,
or... other materials Daria couldn't immediately identify, beyond the
fact that they were definitely black.
For the most part she took little notice of them beyond a minor
irritation that she needed to park further from the convenience store
than she might have liked. However, just outside the 7-11 she passed
a group standing around a car, its tape deck playing something
lugubrious. As she entered the store she picked up a few lines of the
lyrics, and for some reason immediately thought of Jane. She wasn't
sure why, they weren't at all an accurate description of her.
She was so lost in trying to figure out the connection that she didn't
hear her name being called until the third time it was repeated. She
looked around for the source and spotted Andrea standing by the
Slurpee machine, amidst a group of black-clad teenagers saying
something about "ice sucky" and laughing.
"Ummmm, hi," Daria said, struggling to locate the recently dormant
'dealing with other humans' section of her brain. It started up in
its usual mode.
"I see the invasion force from your home planet has arrived. I
imagine you'll be getting a commendation for your advance reports."
Andrea didn't smile, exactly, but she sounded amused. "God, I wish.
No, 'Faith and the Muse' are playing the Zen tonight. I have no idea
what terrible cock-up booked them in a wretched club in wretched
Lawndale, but I'm not missing the opportunity. And it looks like
neither is any other goth in the state."
Daria's knowledge of gothic music consisted entirely of things she'd
read in the popular press, and once asking Trent about the 'Sisters of
Mercy' poster over his bed. But it was her turn to say something and
this seemed as good a topic as any. "They anything like Marilyn
Manson?"
Andrea's not-quite smile quickly turned to an exaggerated mock grimace
of disgust. "A couple of differences. For one, 'Faith and the Muse'
are actually gothic. And for another, they don't really, really
suck."
Maybe that *hadn't* been as good a topic as any. "Oh."
There was a pause as two sets of eyes glanced around at anything but
the other set's owner. Eventually Andrea's gaze settled somewhere
around the floor. "Hey, if you're not doing anything, would you...
like to come? Erm. They really are very good, and... erm... your
boots will be the envy of half the people there."
Daria was taken completely off guard by the offer. She quickly
weighed the options. On the one hand, the safety of her room and the
quiet, empty house. On the other, lots of noise and strangers, but a
chance to get to know another classmate, who, if nothing else, at
least wrote some pretty cool poetry.
There was clearly only one real choice.
"Ummm, thanks, but no thanks. Exposure..." she had started to say
"exposure to too many fashion club meetings has left me terrified of
foundation and eyeliner." She stopped herself when she remembered how
relieved Andrea had been to discover that she and Jane weren't about
to tear into her at the megamart.
"Actually, the truth is I'm not in the mood for crowds." ("Where
'crowd' is defined as more than one," she added to herself.)
Andrea looked up, but Daria couldn't tell whether her expression was
one of disappointment or relief. "Yeah," she said. "I know that
feeling. Well, I'll, um, see you in class Monday."
"Yeah."
With that, Andrea walked to the counter, paid for whatever she had
bought, and left the store. Daria noticed that the 'brain freezy'
group, which she had just assumed were Andrea's friends, was still
there, one of them asking the cashier to "make his pain end."
Later, as Daria pulled away from the curb, the burrito a frozen lump
in a sack beside her, it occurred to her that maybe Andrea was also out
alone, and maybe she had been kind of desperate for some company.
"Not like me," Daria said out loud, "completely self-reliant."
"Even if I do talk to myself."
* * * * *
The burrito took 3 minutes to cook, and about as long to eat. But it
kept Daria shooting, revising, and occasionally stretching her legs by
wandering around the house, until the sun was about to rise.
* * * * *
She awoke once again to a still, dark room. She strained her ears for
the sounds of motion in the house, and was relieved when she still
couldn't hear any. However, there was an expectant air, and Daria
knew that there were things she needed to take care of before everyone
returned sometime that evening.
She showered and dressed, if for no other reason than to avoid the
inevitable question from her mother about whether she'd been in her
night clothes all weekend.
She turned the phones back on, and cringed as she expected them to
start yelling at her any second, but as the day wore on and they
remained silent she relaxed somewhat. She figured that either
everyone who was going to call already had, or that Quinn's fan club
had managed to track her down.
However, from the moment the phones were back on she wasn't able to
fully relax, knowing the outside world could intrude at any moment.
She was completely unable to write with that hanging over her head, so
she spent the day reading instead. First the Sunday paper, then a
collection of short stories.
By six o'clock she was trying to stretch out each minute, knowing that
it might be her last one alone. At 6:48, she was right. Quinn
exploded into the living room, arms clutching more shopping bags than
Daria could immediately count. Daria closed her book with the air of
someone burying a beloved puppy. "And so it ends," she thought to
herself.
Quinn was, not surprisingly, oblivious to Daria's displeasure at
seeing her. "Oh, hi Daria. Any messages for me?"
"Last time I checked the machine it was so painfully bloated with
messages that it was about to rupture. It begged me to kill it, but I
told it the fate of the free world depended on the information it
carried, and forced it to keep suffering."
"You let the *machine* answer?"
"I won't start receptionist training until *after* high school.
Anyway, this way you have recorded evidence that I'm sure you can use
to blackmail a more expensive meal out of someone."
"Hey, yeah!"
Quinn rushed into the kitchen, and seconds later Daria could hear the
unmistakable sound of a tinny speaker playing back the voice of
someone trying to think of something clever to say to an answering
machine, and failing. Shortly after, this was joined by the snap of
carrot sticks.
Daria returned to her book and tried to ignore this static with only
limited success for twenty minutes, at which point it got worse. A
veritable cacophony started up outside; a car pulled up, doors
slammed, and Jake's voice could be heard coming up the walkway.
"... had no idea what the hell he was talking about! Damn unmarried
marriage counselors!"
Jake stopped mid-rant as he and Helen entered the house and spotted
Daria.
"Hey kiddo! How was having the place to yourself?"
"Well, actually..."
"Great!" Jake yawned and stretched, neither very convincingly.
"Well, big day tomorrow, I should be getting to bed." He then quickly
turned and headed upstairs.
Helen followed quickly. "Jake! We need to finish this..." but as she
was talking she had pulled the cell phone out of her purse, and
switched it on. It rang immediately. Daria could hear the
conversation receding up the stairs. "Hi Eric. Yes, I'm back, but I
need to... what... for how much...?"
Daria listened for the small squeak of the top stair, but it was
completely drowned out between the sounds of Quinn's giggling, Helen's
scheduling, and Jake damning something or other.
"Well actually, being alone by myself was fine," she said, sure that
no one would hear. "What I hate is being alone while surrounded by
people."
* * * * *
The noise was too much, Daria realized that the only way she could
escape it was to give up her hard won - well, ok, easily won -
territory throughout the house and make a strategic retreat back to
her room.
With the door closed and the thick padding surrounding her, she could
almost believe she still had it all to herself. Almost. Small clues
gave away the truth; muted sounds, the light from the hallway coming
in through the crack under the door, the occasional dimming of that
light as feet walked by.
These things faded and stopped as the evening wore on and the rest of
the family went to sleep. There was a brief interruption to her peace
as Helen and Jake stuck their heads in to say good night. And then
she once again was alone, if more confined in her solitude.
By midnight her creative energies were running at full. She had given
a minor character in her last story a throw-away line about her past,
something to provide motivation for what she was about to do. It
occurred to her now that the character hadn't been telling the whole
truth, and Daria found herself mentally fleshing out the event in more
detail. By 12:30 she had a file with a full outline, and by 2 she had
written several pages of first draft.
As she finished a paragraph she noticed the time, and realized if she
didn't force herself to sleep now she'd be exhausted all day tomorrow.
Sure, there were plenty of chances to sleep in class, but if she went
that route she'd find herself in a vicious circle of insomnia. She
switched off the computer and got ready for bed.
As she did so, she reviewed the past two days. They had been good.
Really good. There was no telling when she would next have this kind
of solitude. She was pretty satisfied about the writing she had done;
she would let the first story sit for a week and then go over it
again, but it was too bad she hadn't had more time to work on the
second. Maybe she would skip lunch with Jane tomorrow, just have a
sandwich or something in the school library and continue to work on it
then...
The realization that she had just considered skipping out on Jane hit
her hard. Even worse was how casually, how very, very casually the
thought had occurred to her.
Worst of all, the damn lyrics she had heard last night came flooding
into her brain, and Daria realized that their relevance lay not in a
characterization of Jane, but in a chillingly accurate description of
herself.
The realization left her trembling, and looking desperately around her
room, from the small spot of paint on the carpet from one of Jane's
brushes, to the many books Jane had given her as presents, to the tv
they'd often watched together.
Daria turned to her clock, set the alarm back an hour, and went to
sleep.
* * * * *
The next morning she woke before anyone else, scribbled a note about
needing to get some book before class, and walked over to the Lanes'.
The early morning silence was notably different than the night
silences she had gotten used to. This was the silence preceding
noise. Horrible, brain-scrambling noise. In a way Daria almost
appreciated this more because it was ephemeral.
Daria knew that Jane would also have been up early, for a morning run.
Somehow she always needed an extra-long one after spending time with
her extended family. As expected, she was up and ready to leave when
Daria rang the doorbell.
"Well, the queen has ventured from her castle to walk amongst the
peasants. So, how was your weekend as undisputed lord and master of
Dun Morgendorffer?"
"It was a madcap whirlwind. I barely had time to schedule the bouts
of catatonia."
Jane grabbed her knapsack and locked the door behind her. The two
started walking towards Lawndale High.
"Sounds like you were pretty bored."
"No, in fact I was perfectly content. That's the disturbing thing."
"Once again you confuse and yet intrigue me. Care to explain that?"
Daria stopped walking and turned to look at Jane. "Being alone is
easy. I've spent whole summers like that, sleeping from five in the
morning to noon to avoid the family as much as possible, then drifting
between books, notepads and video games. I get a lot of writing done,
I stop having to deal with all the daily annoyances. But... it's like
a really comfortable chair that you just keep sinking deeper into
until you can't get out."
"Geez Daria, you're talking about man-eating furniture. You *have*
been alone too long."
"Exactly. And there was this song I overheard on Saturday, some
overly melancholic British thing. But one line struck me -- 'the
further I get from the things that I care about, the less I care about
how much further away I get.' If you had come back a week later you
probably would have had to apply deadly force to even get me out for
pizza."
"You exaggerate, the first time I only had to brandish a crowbar a
little."
"Well, umm, keep that crowbar handy, just in case."
"You know me, always willing to crush a friend's skull. Especially if
it's for their own good."
"Thanks. So how was your nightmare weekend?"
The two resumed walking as Jane launched into her story. "Oh,
nightmare doesn't begin to describe it! First off..."
As Jane proceeded to talk about her fiasco-ridden weekend, the rest of
Lawndale started its day. Babies cried, parents screamed at their
children to get ready or they'd miss the bus, vapid morning TV oozed
out of hundreds of speakers.
But Daria didn't hear any of this irritating noise. She didn't even
hear the soothing silence that hid just underneath it, waiting for
her. She only heard her friend's voice.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Author's notes:
This was my first work of fanfic. Please feel free to send comments,
positive or negative, to larnep@canetoad.com.
The lyrics are from "Fear of Ghosts" by The Cure, a b-side from the
"Distintegration" era.