Hold On Till May

It didn’t take me long to find her, I knew she would be at the park on her favorite tree. Since we were kids she would go there to escape her home life. The tree only across the street from my home , she would pass the train tracks from her house to mine. Her parents often forgot about her, drug addicts the both of them. She would always runaway but only for a little bit, she cared about her parents to leave them on their own, she knew they needed her. If it weren’t for her they’d never eat, never have a clean home, or even be alive, she took care of them. She was a teenage girl taking care of her parents as if they were children, the tragedy of it all is that they never remembered her and never cared for her like she does them, she longs for their affection and I see it every day in her eyes.
She sat up high; the receding sun’s ray’s making her skin glow and her auburn hair sparkle. My heart always tugged seeing her cry on top of that tree hoping her parents would come looking for her. They never did. I climbed up the enormous tree and sat next to her, wrapping an arm around her shoulders she in turn leaned her head into the crook of my neck, sniffing and wiping away her tears. I kissed her head and held her tighter.
“How long have you been up here sugar?”
“Seems like forever.” She sniffled again, wiping her nose with her hoodie sleeve making it turn red. The sun continued to set over the horizon making the sky turn various shades of purple, pink and orange.
“Vic?”
“Yeah?”
“Did they look for me?”
“No…, I wasn’t home today.”
“I don’t know how much more I can stand this…” she searched for my hand before grabbing hold of it, “I’ve been up here so many times and for so long, I’m going crazy.” I wrapped my other arm around her and hugged her.
“We’ll get through this together, we always do.” She squeezed me back in response.
“Do you think I can stay over tonight? I don’t think I can stand to stay in that hell-hole tonight.”
“Now of course you can stay with me.”
“Let’s go, it’s starting to get cold out.” I climbed down the tree first and helped her down before grabbing a hold of her cold hand and leading the way across the tree to my home. The sky started to go dark and the street lights were beginning to flicker on.
After climbing down the window to my room in the basement, she tripped over herself but walked over to my desk which had pieces of paper with lyrics littered all over it.
“Working on new music?”
“Always. You know I’ve been on a touring band going on ten years.”
“Yeah, yeah, big deal. I guess you’re all official Mr. Rockstar.”
“Are you drunk?”
“Maybe…” she snickered
“Anyway… that’s not what I mean. I’m trying to say that I know how you feel. You feel burnt out. We all feel that way sometimes.” She sighed and plopped down next to me on my bed. The sadness in her eyes is all too familiar for her. She rarely smiled, it was even rarer for her to laugh; when I did she her laugh or smile, I did anything to make her happy some more. She was my drug and she didn’t know it. She makes me feel complete but she’s always filled with some much sadness, I’ll help her forget; tonight I’ll make her feel beautiful, like she has always been to me. I couldn’t help but stare into her icy blues. I reached out to move her hair away from her eyes and ran my thumb over her cheek, caressing it; she swiped my hand away and stood up abruptly.
“I can’t stand this anymore!” she yelled as she ran from me out the front door, I ran after her. I chased after her across my lawn, across the street and to her house. The front door was wide open, I went inside and didn’t see her parents there, and they were usually strung out on their couch in front of the TV.
“Mary! Mary where are you?!” I called frantically through the musty house. I came across what looked like her parent’s room, it was empty and the drawers were overturned. In the corner of the room was a shoe box that had a small box of bullets.
“Mary!” I ran straight into her room, I found her standing next to her bed, she held a gun up to her head.
“If I were you I’d put that away, your just wasted and thinking ‘bout the past again, darling you’ll be okay.” I held up my hands in front of me carefully approaching her.
“If you were me, you’d do the same.
‘Cause I can’t take anymore,
I’ll draw the shades and close the door.
Everything’s not alright and I would rather…”
“No!” I tackled her down, she screamed but it was drowned out with the sound of the train passing by followed by the train horn, the windows shook as I tried to wrestle the gun out of her hands, putting her body to the test with mine. I eventually got the gun away from her, taking it out the bullets so that they dropped onto the hardwood floor. After I threw the gun away she gripped onto me fisting my shirt in her hands and sobbing into my chest. I held her tightly, tears slipping from my own eyes, “you can’t do that to me… you can’t leave me like that… I love you!” she cried harder.
“Don’t leave me Vic… I can’t stand being alone anymore… please, don’t ever let me go.” She said in between heavy sobs.
“I won’t. I can’t, don’t you dare forget that I love you. I cupped her face in my hands and made her stare into my eyes, her beautiful blue eyes were glazed over with tears but still breathtakingly beautiful to me.
“I won’t. I love you too.” She finally smiled and hugged me tight. I would never neglect her, not like her parents did. I would always love her and give her the world if I could, I’ll always take care of her.
On that cold night, in that empty house we stayed and held each other close, falling asleep on the floor, not daring to let go of one another. We didn’t care how we would get through living in this cruel world anymore, as long as we had each other.