Based on Picture Three
By SinfullyxSweet
The words around me were spinning. Not just that rollercoaster,
occasional up-and-down spinning, but the spinning as if I were on one of those
old, faded multicolored wheels that I had learned to love as a child. But
unlike those wheels, there was no chance of falling off, no risk of scraping my
fragile knees, not even a risk of getting sick. I was stuck, frozen, in the
middle of a large crowd. Around me, people were swarming against each other,
speaking in tongues I'd never heard, or for that matter, would never
understand. I wasn't like them, not at all. With striking cobalt blue eyes and
auburn-colored locks that fell gently around my face, occasionally getting in
my eyes, I was the extreme difference in the pile, the needle in the haystack.
I wondered what they were saying, if they were talking about me. A lady, maybe
in her late 30's or early 40's, came up beside me, pushing her way against the
crowd and every few seconds turning to mutter something to the little children
behind her, who were following her quietly, much like a mother duck and her
little ducklings. She was a smaller woman, with a delicate, pasty face, large,
crimson lips and a small nose, her eyes intricately shaped, the color a dull, shadeless black. She looked tired, worn out. She had tried
to cover up the small bags beneath her eyes with a layer of cheap cover-up, but
the cover-up had already failed to fufill its duty.
Her hair was a shining jet black, thin and crisp to the touch. The air around
us was so dull and lifeless that the only breeze was that of the people making
their way through the crowd.
The city around me had some type of mystical draw to it. The people were like
robots, getting from place to place, all looking somewhat the same, all with
the same crisp, thin jet black hair and the shadeless
black eyes. There was barely any coloration to the city, not like I was used
to, atleast. The buildings were all a silverish-gray color, all tall. All
suffocating. I was from a small town, the outskirt of a southern city;
where the local highschool had maybe 200, 300 people
at the most, where everyone knew their neighbor even though they lived the
distance of maybe two football fields away. But here, this
place? It begged to differ, going against anything I'd ever grown up
with. The faces were unfriendly, cold, distant. Not a word was spoken unless it
needed to be spoken. Another thing I wasn't used to: silence.
But we continued to move against the stream of oncoming people. I was only here
on business, but as I convinced myself that I needed to leave my <A
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room atleast once in the week and a half that I would
be in this place, I finally left the contains of my cramped, off-white room to
explore the world around me. If only I had known this section of the world
didn't want to be explored, espicially not by a
differing tourist like me. I continued to move, however. Constantly
moving, as if exploring this world was my challenge. As if this was
something I need to accomplish before I could leave. I don't know what I was
looking for; better yet, I didn't know if I would ever find it. All I knew was
that these people were staring at me. At my faded blue jeans with frayed edges,
at my button-down, baby blue dress shirt, at my auburn curls and cobalt blue
eyes. Still, my legs couldn't find the strength to just turn around and go back
like I hoped they would. The crowd of people had a strong pull, like a current
in a raging river. I was just one of the many fishes that dared to swim its
faulty ways.
I'm not sure how long I wandered among the crowd. All I knew was that,
eventually, I found what I was looking for, or atleast something that satisfied the passing whim in my
heart. I was starting to get caught up in the way it felt, starting to become a
robot, when all of the sudden, it appeared to me. It wasn't another silverish-gray skyscraper like all the rest of them. It was
like me, the needle in the haystack. A small red-brick
building, with a patio roof, and a small booth in the center of the patio.
Beyond that booth, shaded glass doors. But what
attracted me to this place were the people. Lined up against
the walls, smoking, talking, laughing. Still fighting their way against
the crowd, but doing it gracefully, as if this one small place is where all the
ballerinas exsisted amongst that raging world of
robots. I knew, nearly immediately, what it was: a theater. Whether it was a
theater where people were portrayed as one-dimmesional
or where they were 3D, alive, moving around and capturing my heart, was a
debatable one. But either way, it was a theater. I sluggishly made my way into
the twisting and curling line, people standing impatiently, jabbering on to
friends or relatives, mothers getting on to children whose eyes were pleading,
wanting candy or caffeine or whatever other fancy a child could want. It didn't
even hit me that, as I got to the booth, the person wouldn't understand a word
I said. The girl sitting at the counter had jet-black hair, shadeless
black eyes, and a pasty-white face. She reminded me of the older woman with the
5 children; eyes dull, lifeless, face worn out, quiet.
"One.. for that one. Right there." I pointed to one of the posters hanging
up against the black-colored wall behind her. The poster was a marble-colored
gray, with a person sitting, one leg drifting off the edge of whatever object
they were sitting on, the other leg bent, arms carelessly crossed over each
other and the knee. I couldn't tell exactly if it was a man or a woman, but for
some strange reason, I got the feeling that it was a woman. She had
grayish-blue hair, stringy but thick, and eyes almost the same color, if not a
bit bluer. Around her forehead, some type of jewelery
with an emerald as a centerpiece, and beautiful decorative clothing of all
different colors. I was drawn to the colors, to the majesty of it all. I was
drawn to the way she looked, and how she differed from the life here, or better
yet, my own life. But the lady kept looking at me, her eyes blank, now becoming
more or less confused.
"That one," I pointed again. "One ticket, please." She
shook her head and shrugged. She didn't understand. Oh great. I pulled my curls
behind my ears, and she continued to stare at me, as if there was nothing else
to do. I probably looked more than a bit silly standing there, and the line
became a bit impatient, people standing on their toes to get a glimpse of what
was happening. I was about to turn around a leave the line when, in the midst
of our confusion, a taller man came up behind me and spoke something to the
woman. She nodded quietly, and he took the money out of my hand, counting the
exact change needed, or atleast what he could manage
out of what I had, and gave it to her. There was also more than my money in his
hand. I could tell, just by the look of the amount in his hand and how I didn't
have that much money in my group to begin with, that he was going to the same
movie. He turned to me. He was exactly like them, but something was different. Something. It took me a while to recognize it at first, but
he had deep, crystal clear blue eyes, ones that reminded me of the ocean.
"You must be American," he said, in fluent English. He had a deep,
dark accent, with not even a hint of the language I had heard from everyone
else. I nodded quietly.
"I'm from
"I'm sorry," he said, and I heard just a pinch of that accent,
"it's just your accent. It's southern.. is it not? Yes. It must be, you're
from
"It's fine," my eyes were connecting with
his, and for some reason, there was a bit of a tingling feeling in the pit of
my stomach. "I'm used to it by now. My southern accent isn't a very big
hit with the people in the North, where I live now and went to college."
He nodded, as if he understand. I wonder if he did,
but we didn't have time to stay on the details of my life or his. Afterall, I didn't even know his name. He took my arm, his
hand big, big enough to grasp around my arm, and helped me weave through the
crowds of the people. They reeked of cigarette smoke and alcohol, much like
I've smelt before. But he kept leading me, and I watched the back of his head.
He was wearing black dress pants, fitting a somewhat muscular frame well, and a
baby blue button down shirt. I didn't dare laugh at such a coincidence but it
still striked me as odd that we were wearing the same
color. He lead me through crowd after crowd, hallway
after hallway. I was never quite concious enough in
my mind to actually pay attention to where we were going. He was leading me,
and I was happy to be following.
He chose a seat in the middle section, in the middle of the row. Strange placing, but as I settled into my seat next to him, a nice
place to be. We didn't talk at all in the period before the show;
instead, we sat silently, watching the people file in, laughing gently, talking in their different languages. At some point, I felt
his eyes staring at me; I never dared to look at him, but I knew he was looking
at me. Just as I was about to ask him for his name, the lights dimmed, and the
show started. I couldn't understand the language, but the bodies told all that
needed to be told. Beautiful, gorgeous women in colorful
clothing and dashing men in classy suits. <A TITLE="Click for
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fans.. they all dazzled and
shined in front of my eyes. It was a love story; a story almost like Romeo and
Juliet but not quite. It was beautiful. At one point in the show, where the
girl, with long, light blue hair, exactly like the poster on the black board,
and the man, tall, with jet black hair, were talking, he leaned down next to my
ear and whispered something quietly, something foreign. It sounded exactly like
what the actors had just said but at the same time I really couldn't tell. He looked
at my face, and I looked at him, confused. He could tell I didn't understand.
"It means, you're beautiful, different one."
I turned my face away from his, blushing. He smirked, his eyes turning back to
the show.
When it was over, he nodded to me. "Where do you
live?"
"Park Vista Hotel. I can walk," but he was persistant,
taking my hand and guiding me once again through the theater, into the now late
night street. The robotic rush was nearly gone; the faces were now joyfully,
some exceedingly drunk. Just another scene I had seen one too many times. He
called a cab, and opened the door for me, then got in beside me. He told the
man where to go, and how to get there, in that same strange language. The cab
driver, an old man with graying, nearly gone hair, just nodded. I wondered if
he was doing this out of kindness, or for some other unspecified reason. He
looked at me quietly, and smiled.
"You didn't understand the show, did you?" I shook my head. "I
figured. You looked confused, with that awe that I see Americans have."
But he wouldn't go any further, as much as I asked him. He said he'd tell me
with time. He opened the door for me as we got to the hotel, led me to the
elevator, to my room. I didn't remember ever telling him where my room was. He watched
me open my door, and I offered for him to come in, but he shook his head.
Instead, he leaned over, lifting my chin up, and pulled my lips to his. He had
a soft, sweet kiss, almost like eating a strawberry. A forbidden strawberry,
perhaps, one that I knew I shouldn't accept. He smiled, let go of me, and
whispered quietly. "The story was about us," but before I could
argue, he was gone. I stood, dumbfounded, and wondering if I was dreaming. I
stayed up all that night, trying to figure out if I had just been dreaming, or
better yet, drunk. But the kiss tasted so real, felt so real. I wondered who he
was, what his name was. And then everything started to come together, the
movie, and him. At the end of the movie, the man left, and the girl had no idea
where he went; she searched high and low for him, but never found him. He had
said everything, almost like a fairytale romance. A fairytale romance, and the
stars of the show: The One Who Differs, and Love.
Based on Picture Four
By SinfullyxSweet
"You deserve much better than me, Angie," his words were
plain, simple, as if there was nothing to it. As if he wasn't even hurting. I
directed my eyes in his direction, those red locks falling perfectly into
place, his beautiful ocean-blue eyes looking deep into mine. I couldn't believe
he was even saying half of this stuff. His feet, where his eyes were now
looking, were scuffing against the leaves quietly, his hands inside the pocket
of his black hoodie that I had curled up next to
night after night for a year.
"Oh, come on, Ry. We've been together for a
year. How many times have you told me that self pity gets me nowhere? How many
times have you told me to stop complaining and stop whining?" He looked up
at me, and I could tell that his anger was starting to boil. He had always had
a short temper, even with me, even with this girl he'd been with for a year.
"This is so different," he shook his head, looked down, then jerked
his head back up to look at me, "and you know what? I don't like that you
just said I was whining. Because I'm not whining."
I snickered at this, rolling my eyes and looking away. He looked at me quietly,
almost like a puppy dog would look at an owner who had just given it a nice
low-blow in the stomach. "And why the hell are you laughing?"
"Because. You're such a dumbass. I sware. You complain and scream
about me whining and then you whine and then, for God's sake, deny it." A
crisp autumn wind blew threw the air and tossed my golden curly hair to the
side. I struggled to pull it back behind my ears, but little stray strands
continued to blow in my face.
"What the hell is your problem, anyway?" I could tell his anger not
only boiling at this point, but steaming. Burning in the pit
of his stomach. I always knew how to push his buttons; not consciously,
of course, but I always had this way of pushing his buttons when I really
wanted to. I mean, after all, why not? He was the one being the ass here, the
one trying to break my heart just because I "deserved better." I
couldn't stand half of the little petty things he did. Unlike him, however, I
tolerated them; quietly, never saying a word about it, until he tried to do
this. Give up, just like that. And for one reason and one reason alone: his
past.
Okay, so no one has a perfect past. But his was "exceptionally" hard,
and "exceptionally" shitty. He made me talk about my past, he made me
spill my guts out and cry over things that I could have sworn I was over - and
all to never have it returned by him. Everytime I
asked him about it, he never said anything about it. The only thing I knew
about his "past" was that he cheated on his first girlfriend for two
months with some girl from his neighborhood. A really good
affair, too, considering they had been together for nearing 2 years. I
guess that's the proof that just because two people are together for a long
period of time doesn't mean that they're ever "in love" or would go
to the edge of the world for them. Some people just stay in relationships to be
in a relationship, no matter how often they saw the person or how much they
actually cared.
Seriously, though, this was starting to bother me. When I asked him why I
deserved better, he'd just quietly reply "look at my past," and I'd
tell him that I didn't know his past. Then, to aggravate the situation even
worse, he'd try to change the subject or turn away. Anything
to stay away from his past. Being the person I am, I never said anything
about it. I just got annoyed by it, stopped talking for a little while, never tried to really bother him about it. He would realize
that I was upset, and he'd look at me with his pleading ice blue eyes, then
nuzzle my neck, which he knew drove me crazy everytime
he did it. I couldn't resist. I forgot about it for the rest of the night.
That was one of the things, however, that keeps me up staring in to the center
of my ceiling for long periods of time, listening to the sound of some emo band playing their hearts out and just thinking about
Ryan and me. Why he wouldn't talk about his past, why he always avoided the
subject but forced me to tell him. I shouldn't have expected something more
from him, anyway, because he was always one to say "answer this and I'll
answer yours," and then never answer the question. But as we stood in the
cold autumn wind on the bridge of the lake in McManus park,
I wasn't even thinking of the restless nights where I wondered, wondered about
his past. About his family.
"Why do I deserve better?" He turned his head away, looking
out into the lake and grinding his teeth together. He did that whenever I did
something he hated.
"You know my answer. Why ask? It should be obvious." I shook my head
and he kicked one of the posts of the bridge. "Fuck, Angela. Fuck, fuck,
fuck! You know my answer. My past. My
past. What don't you understand?"
"What don't I understand?" My eyes were burning in their sockets, I
could feel it. I could feel that temper that I got from my mom boiling up, I could that arguing voice starting to bubble up in my
throat. "Your whole past, Ryan. I mean, come on!
I doesn't help that I have no idea what the hell your past was like, much less
why I would deserve better just from your past, something you should have
learned from!"
"Angela, you have no idea. You have no idea at all. Why are you pushing
this?"
"Because. Now I'm starting to think it's all a lie because you always
avoid the subject. Why can't you just tell me? Just go ahead and say it."
"Ang, I can't. I just..
I can't." That was the first time I saw it. A tear fell from his eye. He
struggled to wipe it away, but more and more came. I tried to walk up to him. I
wanted to wipe away his tears. But he wouldn't let me; he turned to the side,
and avoided my hand coming anywhere near his face. "Ang,
please.. don't make this
harder."
In the words of Taking Back Sunday, it's times like
these where silence means everything and no one is to know about this. He was
shivering in the cold wind. I bundled up closer to myself, the white soccer hoodie I had gotten the previous week not
even hardly warm enough for mid-September. I settled myself against the
bridge, facing the opposite way of him, and looking out on to the lake.
How did I even get in this position? We were being so strangely silent and I
couldn't feel anything. I was numb, paralyzed, and I wanted to cry so bad. I just wanted to go back to a time where everything
was, for the most part, alright. That's the problem with hard times; when hard
times come, it doesn't stop. It drags us down to the edge and hopes that we can
recover. I had leaned on his shoulder so many times, I had held on to his hand
as he guided me through things I would never even realize he was guiding me
through, that I didn't even notice that the road had been more than bumpy for
him. I didn't know what was going on in his family, or
in his life at all. And in a rush of thoughts, I struggled to realize one fact:
I didn't know him as well as I thought I did.
He started off slowly. His mom had been diagnosed with a form of breast cancer
2 months ago, his father was an alcoholic who was
never around. He had been left to take care of his mother, his little brother
and sister. I knew his grades weren't too good; but he always slept in class. I
just figured that he was lazy. Instead, he looked at me with sad eyes and told
me that the few hours he would have normally spent sleeping were spent next to
his mom's side or doing the homework he had to neglect. In turn, he would
eventually fall asleep in class, and lost track of what we were learning from
time to time, causing him to fail.
He told me about how he had been fighting his urges to just run for me. How he
knew that I was going through a hard time and he didn't want to leave my side.
But that everytime his mother started to get worse,
he had to give up. He was afraid that he would fall and that I would have to go
through it with him. He didn't want me to see him weak. A tear was slipping
down my cheek now, looking deeply into his blue eyes. He looked so tired, so
worn out, so completely exhausted. It was something I had never even noticed
before.
"Why didn't you tell me any of this?" I asked quietly, biting my lip
and hoping for an answer that wouldn't make this any harder.
"You were going through your own stuff, Ang. I didn't
want to dump my problems on you. I needed to be there for you, too," I
looked at him, dumbfounded. There was a tear running down his cheek now, and I
reached up to wipe it away, only a habit. This time he didn't even flinch,
didn't even move. He looked down quietly at me and lifted my chin, placing a
gentle kiss on my cheek, then wrapped his arms around my waist and put his chin
on top of my head. I could smell the same scent I had for the previous year,
and it reminded me of better times. Of times when things
weren't so complicated.
"Ry.. I can't believe you would hold all
that back from me," I started off quietly, and looked into his eyes,
"you know that what I was going through was just a phase. And I would have
been more than happy to help you."
"I don't want you to help me. I want you to be happy with me, and that's
all."
"Love's not just about being happy, Ryan," he looked at me with
cocked eyebrows, "it's about a struggle. A struggle that
we have to fight against. This is our struggle."
"Do you still love me?" I laughed at this, and he looked at me
quietly.
"Yes, Ryan. I'll love you until the end of time." And with that, he
pulled me closer, and kissed my cheek lightly.
I look back on that day and I realize how crazy it was. I was so wrapped up in
my own problems that I never even realized he was having a hard time. After
that day, we started our own pact. If something got too hard to handle, we
promised we'd talk to each other before just handling it ourselves, when we
knew we needed help. Together, we got his life pulled back together. His father
agreed to enroll at AA; we raised money for his mother to have treatment at the
local hospital. We traded shifts looking after his little sister and brother,
depending on who needed to study and who didn't. Usually, however, we'd spend
the nights studying together, wrapped up in his arms and talking about our
future. We found hope for the future: a picture he had tucked away into his
dresser, a beautiful spring day, one of the first days I'd spent with him, his
mom and dad laughing crazily, my older brother laughing in the background, and
him and me in the very front of the picture, as happy as we'd ever been.
Sometimes it takes a bad time to realize how much you really need that partner.
Ryan and I? Well, we're getting through everything.
Not only did I realize that he loved me enough to put aside his troubles, drop
them for me, but that he had a love brighter than just "puppy love"
or "beautiful love" - he had selfless love for me.