Breaking Suburbia

She had succumbed to one of those cycles once again.

That cycle that leaves her paralyzed, unable to move from the bed. There, she lays on the far from fresh sheets and stares out the window. Chester has called, the phone company has called, and Scarlet has called, the phone receiver beeps every ten seconds. Maggie has counted as she lazed in her bed, perched on her side and curled into the tightest of balls.

Every now and then, her eyes shut and she’s filled with a world of blackness. She does not fall into vivid dreams like she would as a child full of innocence and uninhibited imagination. Instead, she falls into peaceful reverie that swallows her body whole in black ink. In fact, she rather dream in this manner as she viewed sleep as a form of retreat from the complexities of life itself.

Life. Maggie thought at times that she just wasn’t cut out for one. There were no intentions of suicide whatsoever in her irrational being, but she feared one day there would be. She bit her nails at the possibility that one day the loneliness would get to her and that her mind would become warped beyond repair. One day, she’d be pushed off of this edge she’d been peacefully resting on.

I would write more of the intricate beauties of Maggie Wentworth’s mind, but I cannot. As she lays there she is without a thought, she is without a purpose, but she is ultimately numb and without a single pang of any emotion on the vast spectrum. The most astonishing, searing pain is what I find to be the sort of pain that feels like a chilling mist around your bare shoulders. That pain that leaves you ethereal and makes you question reality. When you feel like Atlas, the world on your shoulders, but there is nothing at all on your mind. This. This is arguably the worst feeling any human can endure.

But, alas, this is not a story of pain, though pain might be a factor. This is a story of trivial matters in life. Furthermore, this is a story about the blinding emotions of youth and the complexities that a human can make of feelings. Humans feel, oh God do we feel!

What a gift it is to feel, to be passionate.



Maggie rolled over on her side. Chest concaving as she exhaled, even breathing was laborious. There were steps downstairs, the hurried steps of a person in rubber soled shoes raced around the kitchen. “Maggie!” A voice echoed off of the walls. It was a man’s voice, a charming bright baritone that tickled her ears. Rustling, she managed to sit herself up, stretching in the light blue of the room. Raising an eyebrow, she stared out the streaked panes of the glass intently, taking in everything that was occurring at a speed too slow to process it before the footsteps were in front of her door. “Maggie?” The anxiety that riddled the baritone’s voice wasn’t a deep rooted one, as the door knob was turned and in came the man.

“Chester?” Her dry lips parted. A nearly empty water bottle stood erect in the window sill. Maggie yearned to sip the last drops of the glorious water, but she couldn’t be bothered to extend to grasp the plastic trinket.

He stood in the doorway, eyes blackened by the weathering of life. Chester smoothed down the rumpled denim of his jacket in a suave manner. Maggie blinked several times, trying to adjust to the brightness that was the stark white walls. While it was overcast and sparse showers coated the hills of the suburbs, light still poured into the room from the large windows that towered from pale wooded floor to white ceiling. It was cold; it was oh so cold as the goose bumps began to for on the milky surface of her skin. “Maggie?” He knitted his eyebrows together in a thick frustration. “Do you..?” He shook his head.

Maggie sighed; it was a gentle provocation, like a feather resting on the ground. “Do you even know what day it is?” Chester’s concern was audible in the decibels he emitted. It was a strange encounter at the least; Maggie stuck her arms out in front of her line of sight with a slow grace about the movement. Her brain tried to recall the days, her eyes traveled to the laptop on the floor and she was greeted by a black screen.

“No, I don’t think so.” Maggie answered in a girlish shrill. Everything was so quiet. Nothing buzzed in the kitchen, sad songs didn’t fill the emptiness of her room, not even the incessant buzzing of cicadas kept Maggie company.

“It’s been a week; I’ve called you four or five times.” Chester remained in the doorway, not daring to move onto the creaky floorboards of the bedroom.

“I’m sorry.”

“What is wrong, Maggie?” Chester narrowed his eyes to small slits, trying to focus in on the girl’s reactions. Maggie hated being someone’s fixation. But she remained in her near vegetative state. His words bounced right off of the surface of her skin, never bothering to saturate fully into her being.

“I…” She began, trying to find the words. Everything was blank. “I don’t need saving.” Maggie’s jaw twitched in an effort to seem tough.

Chester shook his head, inviting himself into her room. He traced the perimeter before he sat at the foot of the heavily blanketed peak. He took a deep breath in preparation. “You were so… Normal at the store the other day, you looked so giddy.” Chester huffed, staring at his shoes. He was dodging certain words for Maggie’s own good, she could feel it. She hated that too. She hated being spoken to in a censored manner like a child. “I just… I thought you were getting better.”

“I cannot get better.” Maggie spoke icily, the snow coming off of her statements in thick sheets. “How’d you even get in here any ways?” Maggie queried, resting her head atop of her knees.

Chester chuckled as if breaking and entering to homes was his job instead of restringing guitars and selling instruments was a mythical way of making a living. Maggie’s ears were anxious, ready to take note of what to change to her security system. “You left the gate and the front door wide open; I rang the bell several times before I realized that curtains had been torn down in a window… So, I sorta panicked and ran inside.” Chester scratched the back of his neck.

Maggie felt her eyes grow twice in size. No. She was not letting this happen. Crawling to the foot of the bed, she was aware that her hair was greasy and she smelt like a mildewed bathing suit, but she didn’t care; she plopped right next to Chester’s well-groomed stance and laid her hand over the back of his. “No. You can’t care about someone like me, okay?” She pleaded, her voice quavering with the dire need for him to understand she was no good, that she was going to be the end of him and everything he had built up.

“And you can’t tell me how to feel, Maggie.” Chester grumbled, removing the hand that lay beneath Maggie’s chill, near lifeless one.”Have you even had anything to eat?” Eyeing her stomach, Chester could see the bloating that was associated with not feeding the body.

Maggie shook her head, at a loss for any words. Chester spoke some sweet, soft, kind words that nestled her better than the quilts she’d piled on the mattress. He had a very soothing side to him, and it wasn’t long before he had brought her back a warm broth for her to put on her stomach. Reassuringly, he encouraged that it would take baby steps for her to build up a tolerance for actual solid food.

Chester was comfortable with her silence, as he was silent as well, watching over her and making sure she was utterly at ease and content with life. When she couldn’t go to sleep and had the need to stare out of the window, he joined her and pointed at stars while she simply nodded. It was a strange affair in polite terms, but it was one that Maggie felt completely herself in.

And while Chester didn’t necessarily consider this his comfort zone, he made do with it. For the girl he was caring for was far beyond words to begin with.