Status: Complete
Disenchanted
we watched our lives on the screen .
July twenty-fourth, five years ago.
A pair of boys, one fourteen and the other fifteen, drunk on their parents' liquor and summery-sweet freedom, run through softly glowing suburban streets a few winking minutes after dawn. The shorter boy - Frank - laughs and stops, holding a chewed-down finger to wind-chapped lips. He listens for the sirens, and sure enough they're still wailing morosely behind them. The taller boy - Mikey - frowns behind his glasses and throws a spray-paint can to the ground before taking off again with his friend close behind. Maybe two elongated minutes after, they slam the torn screen door to a house nearly identical to every single other in the neighborhood and collapse on the stained carpet floor, panting and laughing. They drag each other down the stairs, skinny adolescent lungs aflame with the sting of rebellion and excitement. Laughing silently, they flick on the basement television and pinky-swear to satellite static. "I'll always mean something to you, right?"
December seventeenth, four years ago.
Two families' children watch the news in the same basement room while their parents drink expensive wine and giggle worriedly about them in hushed voices upstairs. You can almost see two boys' sock feet intertwined if you look through the now-patched screen door and down the stairway. The snow outside casts a faint light into the room, causing a glare on the TV screen, but the five sleepy kids don't really care. The queen of England is going off about some new cause she's supporting and the riots that bright her attention to it, and the short fifteen-year old laughs and rolls his greenish-hazel eyes. He mutters something through the same bitten lips into Mikey's ear and the bespectacled boy rolls his eyes and shakes his head. Frank pouts and points out that the others are all asleep. With a sigh, Mikey tousles Frank's hair in defeat and presses his lips to the kid's forehead. "I love you."
April sixth, three years ago.
Frank's boyfriend best friend hasn't been in school for a week and nobody has heard from him. The short boy has come across two black eyes, a few million spitballs, hundreds of shoves and a split lip in those infinite few days and he's taken to hiding behind bathroom stall doors for most of the day, checking his phone every 30-odd seconds for news from Mikey and squinting through bruised eyelids until his hands go numb inside of his fingerless skeleton gloves. The poor kid doesn't know what to do as he walks home early with nurse's leave, chewing at his bloody red lips. For once in his life, his mother meets him at his door. She's growing old, all tear-streaked crepe-like cheeks and furrowed over-plucked eyebrows. She pulls her little boy all dressed in black to her chest and whispers that Mikey's been diagnosed with terminal cancer. Frank is caught in a sob and pushes her away, insisting that she's wrong. She merely shakes her head. "He means a lot to you, doesn't he?"
March thirtieth, two years ago.
Frank sits by Mikey's hospital bed, the sunlight struggling through his corneas. The older boy is asleep now, his glasses laying on the table. The pair had stayed up all last night, Frank's dried-blood knuckles intertwined with Mikey's pale fingers as they talked about school and each other and how doctors love to lie and smile and say that you won't feel a thing and how Mikey doesn't think he'll survive long but Frank insists over and over and over that he's wrong. Now Mikey is asleep, the chemo-bald dome of his head smiling peacefully on the bright-white pillow, and Frank can't really comprehend anything entering his mind because he's so tired and so in love with this kid whose life is doomed to a hospital stay. He gives up on staying awake and plants a kiss on the older boy's forehead, whispering "iloveyou" before practically dropping onto the ridiculously ugly patterned cushion of the hospital chair and remembering that night before everything fell apart. "I'm sorry."
October thirty-first, one year ago.
Frank's birthday party is nonexistant; he refuses to go to any halloween parties. Mikey's been comatose for weeks and they don't think he'll pull out of it. Frank sits in the same ugly chair by Mikey's bed and hold his head in his hands, rocking back in forth in time to his heartbeat. The short boy is so afraid of the rhythmic bleeeeeeep-bleeeeeeep-bleeeeeeep of the EKG monitor but he can't possibly leave Mikey alone so he keeps rocking until he drifts off into some sort of worried delirium dream where Mikey is dead but he keeps coming back and holding Frank so tight he hears the small boy's ribs crack then disappearing into the cavity they make, over and over and over again until Frank wakes up sweating. Mikey's mom is talking in a hushed voice to the doctor and Frank can't form words out of the incoherent sounds but he knows it's serious so he stands up, shaking like a newborn butterfly. Mrs. Way sobs and nods. Frank knows what's happening now. Everyone floods him suddenly but he can't really hear them because he knows that he's about to lose his Mikey. And the bleeping stops and Frank's world falls. Through his panicked haze, he hears a doctor comforting Ms. Way. "It was inevitable."
Today.
The short hazel-eyed boy walks from his basement bedroom whitewashed with bad memories to a band practice in a friend of a friend's garage. He isn't even any good but the music makes him feel better than the gaping nothingness he usually is. His bandmates - most of them long-haired ex-stoner college dropouts - don't understand much about Frank, and he doesn't want to mean anything to them. They're just pawns keeping him in rhythm, and they never meant nothing to him. Only one person ever did, and he's gone. And as the black-haired boy fingers the chords, rocking back and forth in time to his heartbeat, watching his life play over and over and over again in the silver screen in his mind. He's awash in the music, long eyelashes closed tight as he tries to keep his old on his beautiful boy.
A pair of boys, one fourteen and the other fifteen, drunk on their parents' liquor and summery-sweet freedom, run through softly glowing suburban streets a few winking minutes after dawn. The shorter boy - Frank - laughs and stops, holding a chewed-down finger to wind-chapped lips. He listens for the sirens, and sure enough they're still wailing morosely behind them. The taller boy - Mikey - frowns behind his glasses and throws a spray-paint can to the ground before taking off again with his friend close behind. Maybe two elongated minutes after, they slam the torn screen door to a house nearly identical to every single other in the neighborhood and collapse on the stained carpet floor, panting and laughing. They drag each other down the stairs, skinny adolescent lungs aflame with the sting of rebellion and excitement. Laughing silently, they flick on the basement television and pinky-swear to satellite static. "I'll always mean something to you, right?"
December seventeenth, four years ago.
Two families' children watch the news in the same basement room while their parents drink expensive wine and giggle worriedly about them in hushed voices upstairs. You can almost see two boys' sock feet intertwined if you look through the now-patched screen door and down the stairway. The snow outside casts a faint light into the room, causing a glare on the TV screen, but the five sleepy kids don't really care. The queen of England is going off about some new cause she's supporting and the riots that bright her attention to it, and the short fifteen-year old laughs and rolls his greenish-hazel eyes. He mutters something through the same bitten lips into Mikey's ear and the bespectacled boy rolls his eyes and shakes his head. Frank pouts and points out that the others are all asleep. With a sigh, Mikey tousles Frank's hair in defeat and presses his lips to the kid's forehead. "I love you."
April sixth, three years ago.
Frank's boyfriend best friend hasn't been in school for a week and nobody has heard from him. The short boy has come across two black eyes, a few million spitballs, hundreds of shoves and a split lip in those infinite few days and he's taken to hiding behind bathroom stall doors for most of the day, checking his phone every 30-odd seconds for news from Mikey and squinting through bruised eyelids until his hands go numb inside of his fingerless skeleton gloves. The poor kid doesn't know what to do as he walks home early with nurse's leave, chewing at his bloody red lips. For once in his life, his mother meets him at his door. She's growing old, all tear-streaked crepe-like cheeks and furrowed over-plucked eyebrows. She pulls her little boy all dressed in black to her chest and whispers that Mikey's been diagnosed with terminal cancer. Frank is caught in a sob and pushes her away, insisting that she's wrong. She merely shakes her head. "He means a lot to you, doesn't he?"
March thirtieth, two years ago.
Frank sits by Mikey's hospital bed, the sunlight struggling through his corneas. The older boy is asleep now, his glasses laying on the table. The pair had stayed up all last night, Frank's dried-blood knuckles intertwined with Mikey's pale fingers as they talked about school and each other and how doctors love to lie and smile and say that you won't feel a thing and how Mikey doesn't think he'll survive long but Frank insists over and over and over that he's wrong. Now Mikey is asleep, the chemo-bald dome of his head smiling peacefully on the bright-white pillow, and Frank can't really comprehend anything entering his mind because he's so tired and so in love with this kid whose life is doomed to a hospital stay. He gives up on staying awake and plants a kiss on the older boy's forehead, whispering "iloveyou" before practically dropping onto the ridiculously ugly patterned cushion of the hospital chair and remembering that night before everything fell apart. "I'm sorry."
October thirty-first, one year ago.
Frank's birthday party is nonexistant; he refuses to go to any halloween parties. Mikey's been comatose for weeks and they don't think he'll pull out of it. Frank sits in the same ugly chair by Mikey's bed and hold his head in his hands, rocking back in forth in time to his heartbeat. The short boy is so afraid of the rhythmic bleeeeeeep-bleeeeeeep-bleeeeeeep of the EKG monitor but he can't possibly leave Mikey alone so he keeps rocking until he drifts off into some sort of worried delirium dream where Mikey is dead but he keeps coming back and holding Frank so tight he hears the small boy's ribs crack then disappearing into the cavity they make, over and over and over again until Frank wakes up sweating. Mikey's mom is talking in a hushed voice to the doctor and Frank can't form words out of the incoherent sounds but he knows it's serious so he stands up, shaking like a newborn butterfly. Mrs. Way sobs and nods. Frank knows what's happening now. Everyone floods him suddenly but he can't really hear them because he knows that he's about to lose his Mikey. And the bleeping stops and Frank's world falls. Through his panicked haze, he hears a doctor comforting Ms. Way. "It was inevitable."
Today.
The short hazel-eyed boy walks from his basement bedroom whitewashed with bad memories to a band practice in a friend of a friend's garage. He isn't even any good but the music makes him feel better than the gaping nothingness he usually is. His bandmates - most of them long-haired ex-stoner college dropouts - don't understand much about Frank, and he doesn't want to mean anything to them. They're just pawns keeping him in rhythm, and they never meant nothing to him. Only one person ever did, and he's gone. And as the black-haired boy fingers the chords, rocking back and forth in time to his heartbeat, watching his life play over and over and over again in the silver screen in his mind. He's awash in the music, long eyelashes closed tight as he tries to keep his old on his beautiful boy.
♠ ♠ ♠
:)