Status: complete.
Dead Sound
One.
We were on the brink of death.
Or so I thought. I was in a black mustang going a hundred and twenty miles an hour over a bridge. Of course I thought I was going to die. I wanted to scream like a little girl. The windows were rolled down, which was ridiculous considering the fact that it was January and absolutely freezing, especially at night. Especially at two in the morning.
“Could—could you please slow down?” I managed to chatter out with my arms wrapped around myself, buried deep within a coat that was ill equipped for this type of insanity. The stinging wind whipped through my hair and grazed my cheeks until they were bright red, the blood swimming on the upper layers of my skin like floating dead fish. I looked over to Sarah, who seemed to be possessed at the moment, and decided it was best not to disturb her while she was speaking to the Devil.
Okay, so she wasn’t going so mad that she was conducting a business deal with the Devil, but she was definitely heading in that direction. She was scaring the shit out of me.
“Sarah it’s fucking freezing.”
“Way to point out the obvious,” she laughed, keeping her eyes on the city lit horizon. At least she was trying to practice safe driving.
“I’m serious, how can you now be in pain right now?” I managed to choke. “Is the wind just not as strong on yours as it is on mine?”
She grinned, and failed at keeping a laugh to herself. “My window is up.”
What? WHAT?
“You bitch.” My sobering abilities must have caught up to me because right then I reconnected with proper articulation and unfolded my arms. I unbuckled my seatbelt, which had, since I got in the car, become a shackle to my doom, and lunged across the driver’s seat, fumbling for the button to unlock the window controls.
“Ohmy—get off of me, I’m tryin’ to drive you ass,” Sarah spat out, her long arms stretched over my back as she tried to control the car. As soon as I found the button, I drew back into my seat and rolled up that damn window.
“Oh my god.”
“You’re a wuss,” she chuckled, reaching for the stereo. How typical of her to have chosen Sex and Candy. For awhile we just sat in silence, as if this spontaneous car ride had any real purpose, and when we reached the end of the bridge we would find what we were looking for. But Sarah baby, there ain’t no pot of gold on this end of life.
I looked over at her, as she was busy lighting a cigarette while trying to drive, and so it seemed she had belong in that moment. In that place and time, and she knew somehow that this ride, this intersection of our lives, was the fury of a wild river that would carry her away as if she were a trout in route of the pattern of migration, and I was just a minnow that would watch. If only she knew that all seas were alike, cold and blue and wild as her blonde hair rushing around her face as if this would repair the disorganization she had already embodied and adopted as a lifestyle.
For a reason I can’t place, I wanted to reach over and kiss her. Not in the sense that there was ever any sexual tension between us, but sometimes I wonder what it would’ve been like to be Ryan, to see what he saw and feel what he felt. I wonder how it felt for her to be my girl, to fight with her over little things and wake up with her nakedness next to mine in the morning. I don’t think I would’ve done much better than Ryan did.
I was staring at the trees now, the endless trees. The legs of a forest I had never seen before, and was afraid to venture into. The road did not stop even as it became crude and narrow. I didn’t bother asking where we were or where we were going because Sarah probably didn’t know either.
After a while, when the road was no longer recognizable, and I had dozed off with the sounds of nineties rock, and fell into dreams about minnows and trout and rivers and a picture of me and Ryan as kids floating down that river. Any other person would have called it a weird dream, but it felt like a nightmare. I was swimming after Sarah in the dream, but I was too small and weak to keep up. All around me the algae and bubbles of air and grassy river floor looked the same, and I soon lost sight of her. It felt like hours and hours before I reached the end of the river, the mouth that opened into the ocean. Sarah was nowhere.
After the dream had drifted away, I came out of my sleeping and realized that the car was no longer moving, and that we were no longer on a road, but a distance away from it in a thicket of trees whose roots were caked in a layer of mud and leaves. Picking my head up, I rubbed the tiredness out of my eyes and looked around. There was no sound. I glanced at Sarah.
She was bent over herself with her face resting against the top of the steering wheel, and I couldn’t see her face in neither the light or through her hair. For a moment I thought that maybe she was crying, but quickly slapped the idea away when I remember that Sarah didn’t cry. I reach for her shoulder and nudged it lightly. “Sarah, come on,” I mumbled. “Where are we?”
Silence didn’t satisfy that question, so when I pushed on her shoulder a little bit harder to wake her up, I mumbled a few profanities and threw my head against the seat. Sitting there in frustration, I looked over at her again and said, “Okay it’s time to go home,” and pulled on her shoulders with both hands.
She fell back against the seat and just sat there, staring up at the roof of the car with her shapely mouth open. Her blue eyes seemed to have held nothing, and they moved in no other direction. A lifetime couldn’t have captured what I felt in that brief moment between fear and clarity. I could feel my face begin to twist and my hands tremble, and the rest of my body began to shake when I recognized a transparent orange, white capped bottle tucked in her left hand. Oh god oh god oh god.
My breathing became heaves of cold air and they appeared in wrenching hiccups while I brushed the rest of her hair out of her face. To see myself in those blue eyes, in another world I only ever heard her go on about, was something I wanted to stifle and hide away to never be touched again. Her gaze was directionless, and so wherever I went it followed.
I felt myself begin to cry. I couldn’t really feel it begin, but I could feel the wetness on my face. It was at first silent and rigid, and then became a strange kind of anger.
“Wh—why would you do—“ I stuttered between the sobs which electrocuted my body. Why? Was this what she wanted me to see? Was this her stupid fucking way of running off? “You’re so f-fuckin’ stupid…” I heard myself throwing around these vulgarities and felt my body thrown back against the door and unbuckling my seat belt. “Oh my god…” my voice came out a high pitched crack and my eyes squeezed shut. It was as if I wasn’t me, and I was only watching myself from a distance.
In my anger and love for her I grabbed her again by the shoulders and shook her hard, her hair once again falling around her face to curtain that haunting gaze. “I can’t make it without you…” I sobbed.
I sobbed and I sobbed and I sobbed until my own hair had felt the wet edges of my face.
I looked at her again and felt a pang of helplessness.
“I wasn’t ready for this…” I trailed off. “I wasn’t ready for this…”
After what seemed like hours, I had stopped crying and forced myself into a shallow sleep. I would not allow myself to see her face again. I had no idea why I was still in the car, with a dead girl sitting next to me, but I guess it was better than losing myself in those woods. I pulled on the silver handle and pushed myself through the door, my ankles sinking into a pool of leaves and water and mud. There were shades of blue in the night, which suggested that it was nearing sunrise.
Through the thicket of trees I trudged, nicking myself while stepping over a limb of thorns, until I reached what must have been a road. I sat on a bed of gravel for hours and hours, not once repositioning myself. Only that gaze. Over and over and over, in all scenarios in which I could have done something.
Soon, for I had no way to tell the time, the sound of the road grew louder and the air around me became thick with dirt when an old truck was stopped in front of me, and an old man inside leaning over his seat spoke to me. “Hey, you stranded or somethin’?” When I did not answer him, he possessed a look on his face that seemed either angry or annoyed. “Hey, I’m talkin’ to you, son. Are you alright?”
I looked up and realized that I had been here for several hours, and tried to imagine myself really being stranded. I smiled. “Yeah, I think I might need a lift. Do you mind?”
The old man looked around with a doubtful expression. “That your car over there?” He asked, nodding his head to the black mustang. I didn’t turn to look at the car, but only nodded my head. “Blew out the engine."
Or so I thought. I was in a black mustang going a hundred and twenty miles an hour over a bridge. Of course I thought I was going to die. I wanted to scream like a little girl. The windows were rolled down, which was ridiculous considering the fact that it was January and absolutely freezing, especially at night. Especially at two in the morning.
“Could—could you please slow down?” I managed to chatter out with my arms wrapped around myself, buried deep within a coat that was ill equipped for this type of insanity. The stinging wind whipped through my hair and grazed my cheeks until they were bright red, the blood swimming on the upper layers of my skin like floating dead fish. I looked over to Sarah, who seemed to be possessed at the moment, and decided it was best not to disturb her while she was speaking to the Devil.
Okay, so she wasn’t going so mad that she was conducting a business deal with the Devil, but she was definitely heading in that direction. She was scaring the shit out of me.
“Sarah it’s fucking freezing.”
“Way to point out the obvious,” she laughed, keeping her eyes on the city lit horizon. At least she was trying to practice safe driving.
“I’m serious, how can you now be in pain right now?” I managed to choke. “Is the wind just not as strong on yours as it is on mine?”
She grinned, and failed at keeping a laugh to herself. “My window is up.”
What? WHAT?
“You bitch.” My sobering abilities must have caught up to me because right then I reconnected with proper articulation and unfolded my arms. I unbuckled my seatbelt, which had, since I got in the car, become a shackle to my doom, and lunged across the driver’s seat, fumbling for the button to unlock the window controls.
“Ohmy—get off of me, I’m tryin’ to drive you ass,” Sarah spat out, her long arms stretched over my back as she tried to control the car. As soon as I found the button, I drew back into my seat and rolled up that damn window.
“Oh my god.”
“You’re a wuss,” she chuckled, reaching for the stereo. How typical of her to have chosen Sex and Candy. For awhile we just sat in silence, as if this spontaneous car ride had any real purpose, and when we reached the end of the bridge we would find what we were looking for. But Sarah baby, there ain’t no pot of gold on this end of life.
I looked over at her, as she was busy lighting a cigarette while trying to drive, and so it seemed she had belong in that moment. In that place and time, and she knew somehow that this ride, this intersection of our lives, was the fury of a wild river that would carry her away as if she were a trout in route of the pattern of migration, and I was just a minnow that would watch. If only she knew that all seas were alike, cold and blue and wild as her blonde hair rushing around her face as if this would repair the disorganization she had already embodied and adopted as a lifestyle.
For a reason I can’t place, I wanted to reach over and kiss her. Not in the sense that there was ever any sexual tension between us, but sometimes I wonder what it would’ve been like to be Ryan, to see what he saw and feel what he felt. I wonder how it felt for her to be my girl, to fight with her over little things and wake up with her nakedness next to mine in the morning. I don’t think I would’ve done much better than Ryan did.
I was staring at the trees now, the endless trees. The legs of a forest I had never seen before, and was afraid to venture into. The road did not stop even as it became crude and narrow. I didn’t bother asking where we were or where we were going because Sarah probably didn’t know either.
After a while, when the road was no longer recognizable, and I had dozed off with the sounds of nineties rock, and fell into dreams about minnows and trout and rivers and a picture of me and Ryan as kids floating down that river. Any other person would have called it a weird dream, but it felt like a nightmare. I was swimming after Sarah in the dream, but I was too small and weak to keep up. All around me the algae and bubbles of air and grassy river floor looked the same, and I soon lost sight of her. It felt like hours and hours before I reached the end of the river, the mouth that opened into the ocean. Sarah was nowhere.
After the dream had drifted away, I came out of my sleeping and realized that the car was no longer moving, and that we were no longer on a road, but a distance away from it in a thicket of trees whose roots were caked in a layer of mud and leaves. Picking my head up, I rubbed the tiredness out of my eyes and looked around. There was no sound. I glanced at Sarah.
She was bent over herself with her face resting against the top of the steering wheel, and I couldn’t see her face in neither the light or through her hair. For a moment I thought that maybe she was crying, but quickly slapped the idea away when I remember that Sarah didn’t cry. I reach for her shoulder and nudged it lightly. “Sarah, come on,” I mumbled. “Where are we?”
Silence didn’t satisfy that question, so when I pushed on her shoulder a little bit harder to wake her up, I mumbled a few profanities and threw my head against the seat. Sitting there in frustration, I looked over at her again and said, “Okay it’s time to go home,” and pulled on her shoulders with both hands.
She fell back against the seat and just sat there, staring up at the roof of the car with her shapely mouth open. Her blue eyes seemed to have held nothing, and they moved in no other direction. A lifetime couldn’t have captured what I felt in that brief moment between fear and clarity. I could feel my face begin to twist and my hands tremble, and the rest of my body began to shake when I recognized a transparent orange, white capped bottle tucked in her left hand. Oh god oh god oh god.
My breathing became heaves of cold air and they appeared in wrenching hiccups while I brushed the rest of her hair out of her face. To see myself in those blue eyes, in another world I only ever heard her go on about, was something I wanted to stifle and hide away to never be touched again. Her gaze was directionless, and so wherever I went it followed.
I felt myself begin to cry. I couldn’t really feel it begin, but I could feel the wetness on my face. It was at first silent and rigid, and then became a strange kind of anger.
“Wh—why would you do—“ I stuttered between the sobs which electrocuted my body. Why? Was this what she wanted me to see? Was this her stupid fucking way of running off? “You’re so f-fuckin’ stupid…” I heard myself throwing around these vulgarities and felt my body thrown back against the door and unbuckling my seat belt. “Oh my god…” my voice came out a high pitched crack and my eyes squeezed shut. It was as if I wasn’t me, and I was only watching myself from a distance.
In my anger and love for her I grabbed her again by the shoulders and shook her hard, her hair once again falling around her face to curtain that haunting gaze. “I can’t make it without you…” I sobbed.
I sobbed and I sobbed and I sobbed until my own hair had felt the wet edges of my face.
I looked at her again and felt a pang of helplessness.
“I wasn’t ready for this…” I trailed off. “I wasn’t ready for this…”
After what seemed like hours, I had stopped crying and forced myself into a shallow sleep. I would not allow myself to see her face again. I had no idea why I was still in the car, with a dead girl sitting next to me, but I guess it was better than losing myself in those woods. I pulled on the silver handle and pushed myself through the door, my ankles sinking into a pool of leaves and water and mud. There were shades of blue in the night, which suggested that it was nearing sunrise.
Through the thicket of trees I trudged, nicking myself while stepping over a limb of thorns, until I reached what must have been a road. I sat on a bed of gravel for hours and hours, not once repositioning myself. Only that gaze. Over and over and over, in all scenarios in which I could have done something.
Soon, for I had no way to tell the time, the sound of the road grew louder and the air around me became thick with dirt when an old truck was stopped in front of me, and an old man inside leaning over his seat spoke to me. “Hey, you stranded or somethin’?” When I did not answer him, he possessed a look on his face that seemed either angry or annoyed. “Hey, I’m talkin’ to you, son. Are you alright?”
I looked up and realized that I had been here for several hours, and tried to imagine myself really being stranded. I smiled. “Yeah, I think I might need a lift. Do you mind?”
The old man looked around with a doubtful expression. “That your car over there?” He asked, nodding his head to the black mustang. I didn’t turn to look at the car, but only nodded my head. “Blew out the engine."
