Tuesday, July 6, 2010

Walking at Night, Alone

Written in October of 2007 for a creative writing class in Japan. The title is also the title of an Armor for Sleep song; you should totally look into them. They do awesome things with a guitar. Also I'm too lazy to do any formatting or whatever, so shut up and read it anyway.

Walking at Night, Alone

He hadn't realized it, but he was holding his breath as he walked along with the girl next to him. It was cold. And dark. He didn't exactly enjoy either of those concepts, but for a chance to walk again with her, he'd swim with piranhas made of broken glass.
If it was a dream, then maybe she'd stay with him. He was torn between hoping that it was a dream, so he could be with her forever in his mind, and being grateful that it was reality, that she was indeed walking alongside him.
Neither of them spoke, their path alongside the main road crossing over a small, slow stream. He wasn't sure what to say, or even if he should say anything at all. He had tried when he had seen her and met up with her as she was walking, but she seemed to refuse to speak to him, to even acknowledge that he was there. It had been two years since he'd last seen her, last spoken with her. She had cried on his shoulder, sobbing and stuttering about how she could not be alone any more, how she needed him next to her. She had made him promise, made him swear on her very tears, to never let her be alone. Then the accident had happened.
He didn't remember much from when the accident happened and when he had regained use of his consciousness, but a long time had passed between those two events. He could picture her living in such a lonely state again, like before. She'd often cry herself to sleep, wake up crying. She'd try to make things not so lonely, go to parties and the like, but... she always ended up leaving in tears, running back to her dormitory room and locking herself up, and crying.
Always she would cry, always she had been alone. Even now, as he hazarded a glance at her, she looked painfully alone. Maybe it was his fault, for having the accident. He had been walking to her room, the very day after he had promised her, when it happened. A car, its driver obviously drunk, had slammed into the railing he walked next to, pinning him against it and nearly cutting him in half. The driver had perished immediately when the explosion rocked the ground around the empty shell of a car. After that, things seemed to go fuzzy; he remembered several times feeling like he had been taken to another place, perhaps another hospital or county or something. He could not remember.
He heard her sniff. She was crying again. He wanted to put his arm around her shoulders, to tell her everything would be all right now, but when did such a gesture ever help anyone? Instead he just walked on beside her, making a vow to himself that he'd never leave her alone.
It was definitely his fault; he could see it in the way she walked, she blamed him. Cars passed in the dark, their headlights casting an artificial glare over her delicate frame, slightly hunched forward, either because of the cold or because of something more personal. Why wouldn't she speak to him?
“...for what it's worth, and I'm certain it's not much of anything now, I'm sorry. I know that there is something I could have done to have not broken my promise, but...” he began. She kept walking, setting her brow a little lower. “...now, you'll never be alone again. Isn't that what you want? I'm right here, right here with you.” He didn't falter in his stride, but his voice seemed to quaver a little. He felt it, felt the anger emanating from her, felt it like he'd never felt anything else the same way.
“I know you are angry, but I've come back to keep my promise I made to you. I've found my way back,” he said, turning toward her and pleading. “It's for you, for you I've come back. Say something, anything!” he cried. “I don't have to ever leave you again! I can stay with you forever! You will never be alone again!”
The girl kept walking. On the right side of the road, near a section of railing that parallelled the road, painted a slightly different color than the rest of the railing, a wooden cross stood a foot or so high, with a red ribbon tied tightly around the top. He looked at it, things suddenly connecting in his mind. He knew then, knew why he'd never have to leave her again, knew why he couldn't remember anything, knew why she wasn't speaking to him.
A tear ran down his cheek this time, but he didn't feel it. With a cry of defeat he turned and tried to embrace the girl he'd left two years ago, to no avail. She stood still for a few minutes, staring solemnly at the cross in the soil. With a heavy, sad sigh, she turned and walked away from the boy's grave marker.

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