A New Life

Liza's ears still rang with Rock's last words. "Send us a postcard or something, if you aren't back in a week. Just to let us know you're…" then he'd shrugged to signal that the last word didn't matter. Liza knew what it would have been, anyway: alive. She was alive, but barely. She knew she needed to send a postcard like Rock had wanted, but even thrity-three cents was an amount she didn't have. Right then the balance of money in her pocket was $0.00 dollars. A couple of borrowed cigarettes from Cliff didn't cost anything, but food did. Luckily, the taste of cheap Chinese noodles mixed with smoke still burned in her throat, consoling her at least for the time being, and almost making her forget that she ate her last meal only about an hour prior at the small, forgotten Chinese restaurant known as Chung Fat's Eatery, five or so miles from the train station.

Sitting on a trashcan with only her duffel bag flung over her shoulder, Liza drew in a long, soothing trail of smoke from her last cigarette and sighed. The worst thing in the world was addiction. She exhaled, watching the line of smog dance into the musty night. Liza tried not to look at the jagged red lines cut into her wrists from the tacky disposable razor she found at the Quicky Mart as she threw the dead cigarette into a puddle and watched the ashes dissolve into the water. The only reason Liza even thought about slitting her wrists was because of how magical it felt, and how it seemed to make all her pain go away. But the incisions looked absolutely awful, and that was the only downfall.

The deepeningly complicated question of what to do seeped through Liza's skin and took over her body like a deadly disease. There's nothing left to do in this stupid town, Liza thought, jumping down from the dumpster and squishing all evidence of her presence with the heel of her red Converse.

The last light from the sun faded into the black hole of the universe while Liza lay on a cardboard box in her usual sleeping area behind Joe's Tavern. Propping her head up with her duffel, she could faintly see the neon glow of the blue lettered sign spelling, "Dancers" near the only window of the bar. Rain started to come down, forcing Liza to pull her windbreaker tighter around her. It felt like bad luck, or an omen, that she had brought only one coat - the one without a hood.

The sound of people playing pool and their shouts of glee and dispair drifted back to Liza's ears as she made herself the most comfortable she could on a flattened, and slowly becoming wet, cardboard box. She closed her eyes and desperately searched for sleep, but could only find tears. She rolled around so that she wasn't facing the bar, and instead the dense array of blackberry bushes that where shriveling and deteriorating in the rain.

Liza wanted to see Cliff, but more so, Rock. She remembered the day she had run away clearly, remembered almost every word she'd said. Most of her words were to Cliff, but that was only to hide what she felt for Rock. If she had talked to Rock endlessly, it would have been obvious that she liked him more than a friend. Liza knew, though, that if she ever told Rock her feelings and he didn't feel the same, whatever friendship they had left would be ruined. That was the sole reason she never planned to tell anyone.

Seamus, one of the reasons that Liza had decided to run away in the first place, was nowhere to be found. It was as if he had evaported into thin air right after Liza had talked to him last. He'd promised her everything that she never got - practically a new life. But she knew now that lives couldn't be bought at convenience stores as if they were bottles of hair spray. Liza continued to wonder if he was even in New Haven anymore, let alone living. Rock was more important, anyway, so she figured that she could forget Seamus. She couldn't just forget Rock.

Her stomach growled. She was hungry again. It was then that she started to wonder how she would manage to get something to eat. The dumpster, Liza decided, might be able to help, but just the mental image of eating raw fish and moldy cheese nauseated her.

There was nothing left to do. She couldn't eat, sleep, or even buy anything. She pictured herself slowly wasting away to nothing, and her death becoming a mystery. She could almost see her tombstone, inscribed with her personal quote, "Good Smarts."

Liza finally fell asleep, even with a fair amount of rain pattering onto her forehead and slipping under her eyelids; even though she was sleeping on a squished cardboard box; even though she was hungry and knew there wouldn't be any money in her pocket by morning; and even though just the thought of not ever seeing Rock or Cliff again was as painful as a thousand knives stabbing all over her body.

~

Liza woke up with her hair plastered all over her misty face. As she sat up, soaked in water, she peeled the locks of hair out of her eyes and wiped them behind her ears. All she felt was wetness, and coldness, all over her skin.

So many worries, so many things to think about came with the new day. Liza didn't like even thinking about these troubles. She needed somebody's help, but knew nobody would come and help her.

There was a hang-over ledge on the back of the tavern, and Liza, after gathering her things, scurried to get under it and out of the still falling, fresh rain. She left the cardboard box, withering into practically nothing, in a large puddle that had formed overnight.

Unzipping her duffel, Liza started to pull dry clothes out. A sweater that her grandmother bought her for Christmas a year ago, the kind you tell yourself you'll only wear if it is vital, was the first thing she found. Liza decided that the situation was vital enough for a grandma sweater and pulled out some jeans. Figuring her underwear was dry enough and didn't need replaced, she looked around to see if anybody was within ten feet of her, crouched under a window with steel bars over it, and began to change. When she was fully clothed again, she stuffed her wet clothes back into the duffel. As she did an object fell out: the razor.

As soon as she saw it, a million thoughts flooded into her brain. All of her doubts came back to her, and she remembered why she had bought the ridiculing device in the first place. Rock, Cliff, not having food or a place to stay, her abusive father, all of them opened the wound that had almost healed overnight. The pain and her issues suddenly became all that she could think about.

The razor was the answer, she realized. The pain could be gone in seconds, thanks to the blades of the plastic thing rested on the hard black surface of the ground. All the agony, all the hurt, could be pounded into nothing. The razor was the explanation for everything.

Liza sat down on the cold floor of the earth, leaning against the dirty brick of the tavern, and picked the razor up with a shaky hand. She didn't know why she was so nervous, she'd cut herself numerous times before. But somehow it felt like a bigger deal than before. Liza wasn't planning on killing anything but the pain.

She ran the razor's knife along her wrist at first, and then her arm, it felt so good. Little drops of blood drippled onto the concrete and stained the razorblade. The second arm felt even better. The blood, which usually scared Liza to death, gave her a feeling of strange comfort. It was another addiction she had just discovered. She cut herself, over and over. There was a point where Liza realized that it was too much, and that instead of easing the pain it was giving her more, but that was when it was too late.

~

Liza couldn't believe anything she saw. She spun herself around several times, trying to comprehend where she was. She was confused. Liza noticed that she wasn't really standing on anything. Looking down, all she saw was white. White puffs were consuming her feet, yet she didn't feel anything. It took Liza quite some time to register that they were clouds, and that she could actually walk without falling.

A voice was beckoning her from faraway, and when she finally lifted her head, she saw a girl in a long white satin robe behind a grandstand. A thick book with a white feather pen were rested on it, the girl's beautiful blonde hair blowing softly in the wind.

Liza started to run, more of a jog at first, then an all-out sprint. As she approached the stand and the girl, she began to slow down. The further she moved, the more Liza's intuition told her where she was, and why. Her arms, they were red and bleeding all over her clothes. All around behind the desk were people in white attire, walking on the clouds. There was only one explanation for all of that. She was in heaven.

"Could you tell me your name please, love?" asked the sweet girl with the blonde hair.

"I'm Liza. Elizabeth Vincent." Liza looked at the girl, watching her carefully.

The girl started flipping through the fat book like a pro. "Wait a second…you're not in here."

Liza, confused, just stared at the life behind the pedestal and gates, that she soon would have.

"How did you die?" It was a simple question, but Liza was afraid to answer.

All Liza did was hold up her arms to the girl. The girl examined the cuts in horror.

"Oh my goodness," she gasped. "Well, alright." she flipped to the back of the book and wrote Liza's name in perfect cursive handwriting, under the heading, "Suicide." Then she handed Liza a white robe and instructed her to put it on.

Liza nodded plainly, and with the robe draped over her arm, walked through the huge golden gates into her new life, leaving her old one behind without a single question.


OBITUARY

Elizabeth Vincent/Mobley: Elizabeth, formerly known as Liza, ran away nearly a month ago, but was found lying dead with her wrists slit behind Joe's Tavern in New Haven on Saturday, June 10th, 2000. Liza was an adventurous girl, and that quite possibly may have been the reason she ran away in the first place. She was about thirteen years old, but would have turned fourteen had she lived until July 31st. Elizabeth lived in a small town called Sheffield. Liza loved horses and the color purple. None of her relatives understand why she would commit suicide, but they do have an idea of why she ran away. "Liza loved the outdoors, and exploring," explains her step-father, Timothy Mobley. "She probably just wanted to investigate the world around her." While there is no evidence as to how or why Liza bought the razor, the police have concluded that she may have been going through a period of depression that pressured her to take her life. A service to honor Elizabeth Vincent will be held on Sunday, June 18th, 2000, at 1:00 in the afternoon.