David's Aquarium
Mike Newton
The room was dark and empty, almost as if any and every form of light was afraid to enter it. The room had a sort of retro look about it, which would have been fine maybe thirty years ago but definitely not now. As of today, the stucco ceiling had completely changed to another color, which just so happened to be on the complete opposite end of the color spectrum from the original. The water spots in three of the corners were slowly merging into one while the forth was on its way. All the way down the wall, from the ceiling to the floor, the paint was a sort of pale vomit yellow, and no one even ventured a guess as to how the paint had faded without any light. The room seemed to have sucked the color from the paint, just as it sucked the life out of everyone and everything else that entered. Where the ugly walls met the even uglier carpet made the room that much more repulsing. The pale yellow walls were offset by the brightest, deepest, reddish purplish shag carpet on the face of the earth. The only window in the whole room was barely big enough to fit a gallon of milk through, and conveniently, three fourths of the window looked straight out into soil, while the other fourth looked into the tanish, brownish bricks of a retaining wall. And there, the only thing in the room with any life, but fading fast, was David Theodore Martin.
David Theodore Martin laid on the floor of his room in perfect snow angel making position, lifeless. The room, his room, had finely taken it's toll on the little boy, and his life, his heart, and especially his soul were fading fast. He blinked. He blinked again. He blinked a third time and, while keeping his eyes shut, he let out a quiet sigh before he sat up and listened to the noise coming from outside the closed door, down the skinny hallway, in the kitchen. His mom and his third step dad. Wait, was he even a step dad? Who fucking cared anymore? Obviously she didn't, she was twenty nine and would put J-Lo to shame with how many men she'd married. But it wasn't her fault, it's not her fault she couldn't see the abusive nature of the men she dated, or the drug habits, or the alcoholism, the list was endless.
David could hear pots and pans smash onto the stove and then the brown tile floor. More than likely they were both drunk. Again. And they were probably fighting. Again. Whether it was money, who was going to take the car and where, sex, or drugs, they fought all of the time. None of it really bothered David anymore, by now he had grown accustomed to it and had learned how to tune it out. But when they fought about him, it was an entirely different story. All of a sudden the yelling stopped. David could hear footsteps heading for his mother's room and were shortly followed by the sound of her door slamming and the lock turning. About a minute later the faint sound of a bed squeaking and his mothers headboard hitting the wall could be heard throughout the five tiny rooms of the apartment.
Another small sigh managed to escape from his closed mouth and he walked towards the door to his room. The hallway seemed narrower than usual, almost as if it were collapsing in on itself, as he made his way towards the dimly lit kitchen, which had become a haven for pests and vermin of all sorts. As he entered the kitchen, the stench of old beer and rotten food overwhelmed his senses and he had to cover his mouth and nose as he walked across the dirty, sticky floor to the sink. He grabbed the closest glass to him and stared at the odd array of molds and fungi that had begun to grow all over the glass, and not only that one, but they were all over every glass in the kitchen. He set the glass back down on the counter and felt the right hip pocket of his shorts. He reached into his pocket and withdrew a tiny plastic bottle with a nice clean white label across the center, the contents of which provided the only means of escape that could release the bonds of reality that kept David so depressed. He stared at the label, reading his name, followed by his address and a few other bits of information about the Walgreen's Pharmacy from where the bottle was purchased. Beneath that information, there was a word that David couldn't spell, let alone pronounce, followed by the instructions to take one pill daily to help relieve depression and to help calm the demons and troubles inside of David's young mind. He opened the childproof seal and shook the contents out into the palm of his hand. The perfectly round tiny white pill sat in the middle of his palm, a perpetual reminder that David wasn't like every other kid, but different. Very different. He sat there staring, wondering how something so small could provide him with such euphoria and tranquility, and relieve any and all of the pain and problems inside of his mind and body. He brought his hand up to his mouth and let the pill slowly slide from his palm, down into his mouth, and bent over to get his head under the faucet to wash the pill down. After he had swallowed the pill he closed his eyes, knowing that for at least the next twenty-four hours, all of his pain and problems would be gone.
This had become routine by now, he had been here before, although he couldn't remember exactly when, he knew exactly how to get here. Every day David, as well as hundreds of other people on their way to wherever they were going, would pass by this very building. As he stood there, hands in his pockets, he looked the building over. As far as he could tell, it appeared just the same as it had every other time. Nestled in at just a noticeable distance from the sidewalk, partially buried in the growing trees, it was amazing that David had even noticed it at all. The concrete, grey and cold, ran from the top to the bottom, the right to the left, embodying and protecting what was inside from the outside world. The only part of the building that wasn't concrete was the tiny rusty iron door, just left of center, that was the only blemish to the otherwise perfectly symmetrical structure. David reached out and felt for the cold metal door handle, just as he had every other time, and turned the handle to the left and slowly pulled the door towards him. Before he entered the building he turned one last time to look over his shoulder at the dozens of other people walking aimlessly down the sidewalk. None of them however even seemed to notice the young boy or the open door to the building, as though neither even existed.
He stepped through the doorway and into the inside of the building. As he reached the only room inside of the building, he gazed at the walls of the room which were comprised entirely of aquariums. The colors were breathtaking and vivacious; from the rich, deep greens and browns of the coral, to the vibrant, almost blinding, yellows, reds, blues, purples, and greens of the fish. David stepped into the middle of the room and spun in a slow counterclockwise motion, his eyes taking in every color, every detail, every element that they possibly could. The slow steady hum of the water filters provided him with a sweet solace that he could never experience around his family, and carried almost enough power to lull him to sleep.
The beauty that encompassed the room was breathtaking, and David settled into a state of peace and happiness as he stared from plant to plant and fish to fish. The warmth and exuberance of the colors and the very life force of the animals seemed to seep from the aquariums and form an invisible shield around David. This is where he came when life became too much of a burden for him to handle and it seemed like there was no escape to the harsh reality that was his life. Being here gave him inner peace and all of his problems went away and it helped him to realize that life was beautiful after all. He had spent countless hours here, hours in which he should have been learning in school, or should have been playing with the other kids his age, or even should have been with his family.
After soaking up every inch, every sight, and every smell of the room, David laid down right in the center of the room and let the muscles in his eye lids slowly relax until they formed a tight seal against each other, letting not even the smallest amount of light in. There he lay, just as he always did and slowly drifted into a calm, quiet, peaceful sleep.
David was jarred from his slumber by the deafening noise of his mom and step father fighting just outside of his cracked open bedroom door. It sounded as if they were fighting about money again from what he could pick up from his dazed state. He slowly slipped out from underneath his covers down onto the cold hard floor and slowly crawled closer to the door. He could almost feel the tension between the two and he could tell by his mothers tone of voice that she was worried about something.
"What do you mean you owe him seven hundred dollars?" He heard his mom ask nervously, as he sat, crouched just behind the door.
"I bought some stuff from him, and now I owe him seven hundred." His step father said.
"I thought you said you were off that junk now. You lied to me."
"I know I did."
"Well you have the money right? I mean you're going to pay him back for that shit right?"
"I don't have it right now." He answered. "But I can get the money, I just need a little bit of time."
"Time. What time? We don't have any time, you owe that man seven hundred dollars Jim, seven hundred dollars."
"I know," he replied. David could hear his frame slump against the hallway wall straight across from the door. "He said he'd be by around ten o'clock tonight, I'll explain everything to him then. Everything should be o.k., I promise."
The screech of David's alarm put an abrupt end to the conversation and David stood up from his place of hiding and pushed the raised black button on top of the clock, silencing the banshee like wail. He carried out his routine as usual as he got ready for school, but this morning was far from normal. The conversation he had overhead kept running itself through David's head, and as hard as he tried, he couldn't shake it from his mind. The words kept repeating themselves, against his will, throughout the day at school and hard as he tried, he couldn't get them to vacate his brain.
Later that night David returned from the kitchen and swallowed his pill. He could sense the worry in his mother and step father as they watched the nanoseconds tick by on the aging Crayola orange wall clock. It was nearly ten o'clock and their nervousness seemed to grow with every passing moment. There they sat, motionless and silent, until a thunderous knock on the front door sent an immediate shock wave through everyone's body. A second knock had to come and then a third before his step father could finally calm himself enough to open the door. David quickly escaped into the safety of his room and closed the door slightly just as the familiar creek of the front door reached his ears.
He could hear the faint noises f people talking, but the tension of the situation seemed to almost muffle the way that sounds normally carried in the tiny apartment. He could hear his step father miserably trying to rectify the situation but whoever he was talking to didn't seem to be buying any of it from the bits and pieces that David could pick up. He could hear his mother weeping from the couch and the voices from his step father and the man seemed to dissipate into almost nothing.
Two loud cracks from a pistol ripped through the silence and sent David falling to the ground. Standing back up and shaking his head he could now hear his mother screaming and pleading from the other room as he regained his senses. Two more cracks could be heard from the other room and a very queasy, uneasy feeling fell over David as he waited for the coming events to unfold.
The only thing David could hear were loud footsteps inching closer and closer to his door from the living room. He could do nothing but let a faint smile creep over his face as his door was opened before his eyes and a tall dark figure loomed before him. Another crack from the pistol was heard and without any notice, a warm sensation had become present in David's lower torso. The liquid, dark and red, crept out of David's body seemingly without any sense of urgency. The smell of iron and bile soon followed, and the acrid aroma hung in the air the way cheap perfume never leaves. He looked down, the puddle of solid crimson at his feet became larger and larger as the seconds slowly progressed. He didn't even fight the urge to keep his drooping eyelids open any longer and let them slam shut, leaving only the faint hint of a smile on his pale face. He could feel his body crumpling down upon itself as he fell towards the ground in a tiny heap. He lay there , calm and collected, as the warm puddle of liquid continued to surround his entire body and let his mind free.
He stopped walking and squinted into the dying sunlight towards the familiar shape of the building. Almost as if it were detaching itself from the rest of the world, the building seemed to have almost moved further into the trees than it had ever been before. There was no one else on the sidewalks or streets for a change, David stood there, alone as always. With the sunlight almost gone and the temperature dropping, the concrete seemed colder and more menacing than it ever had before. As he reached the building, David slowly reached out and opened the door and without any hesitation he stepped inside.