Lint

Mark awakes to the deep croaks sounding from the toads, and the hum of a car engine roaring just outside his bedroom. Abruptly, he then sits up from his bed, struggling to throw off the tangles of the sheets and duvet wrapped around him. He can only curse when he hears the screech of tires, indicating not only was he too late to stop them, but also that he is now left alone with her.

An aggressive panic begins to settle into his core; electrical impulses send to his clammy hands, making them furiously shake along with his unstable temper. He is a mess- as he may complain aloud- and the sweat that is coating his entire body is only promoting the horrendous physique of the monster he imagined taking over his soul at that very moment.

Relax, Mark's thoughts command of him as he grips the edge of the night table, which is the only object supporting his weight that seems to be growing heavier with each pulse of pressure circulating throughout his body. He shakes his head just enough to visualize in his fantasies the corrupt thoughts that were flashing with red lights before, fall gracefully from his ears. They were alarms signaling danger to his emotional stability, which was already beginning to tumble down, and to the ill-fated success that would result from his attempts helping her. If he wanted to walk without another battle scar, then he would have to compose himself and reassure his determined characteristic that it would do great in the long run if it kept with him for a while...

After slowing down his breathing rate, and diminishing the amounts of pressure circulating throughout his body that the monster thriving within him was using as adrenaline, Mark is able to peel his sweaty hand from the night table. He is now capable of staring out of the bedroom doorway, and into the hallway that leads to the living room without feeling as if he will fall over from every overwhelming aspect surrounding him both internally and externally. And so finally, with a great flex of his shoulders, he begins walking to where he thought she would be.

It didn't take long before spotting Lorraine sitting on the carpeted ground, with her head resting upon her scrunched up knees. When seeing her back tense to his arrival, Mark knows that he arrived at a bad time, but considering the circumstances, he feels that he needs to persevere no matter the peril condition he may falter into with his words and her reactions.

'Go away...' she pleads, which is not custom of her to do. Of other times that he has come to her "rescue", Lorraine would order him to leave her alone- for which he nonchalantly ignored the demand- in order to weep in her demented world that suffocated her with puffs of sorrow. It didn't make sense to him that she is now sounding hopeless and less demanding, which means that there is only to be more trouble to come by in the near future. If anything, Mark feels more frightened than he has ever felt that morning, and probably even his entire life spent with Lorraine. For to hear her plead, is just the potion that not only gives the monster an immortal presence in his body, but furthermore poisons Mark with a crucial amount of grave doubt. Could this be the last straw?

'Now Lorraine,' he tries to sound as if her attitude hasn't strung him out in the least bit. 'We both know that is not how everything will be resolved.'

'How do you know?'

Even if it was just a mumble, to Mark it pushed him back a step as if it were a deafening shout just centimeters away from his face. The suspicions that he willed away before he had spoken had returned with a sense of affirmation, and that could only puncture his courage even more.

'Don't say that, Lorraine.' he says with a shaky breath contradicting his strong voice.

The young lady lifts her head, at last, and turns her body just slightly behind in order to face her partner. She stares with an indifference painted onto her face, unlike Mark whose facial features are contorted with mixed, but all the so pessimistic, emotions. He feels disconnected from her at that moment, despite the fact that she is no longer averting herself from him in any way, really. It is just that he is not capable of deciphering her mental state like she can to him. Her eyes are such a dark brown that Mark cannot see if her iris has grown, allowing her pupil to appear smaller. With other much brighter-eyed people, that usually means that they are undergoing a drastic sensation, such as being scared or excited. But Lorraine can blatantly see the fear being emitted from Mark's light blue eyes, which drives him into a more frantic state of affair.

And so upon his visible, feeble reaction, Marks sees that she made up her mind.

About what, though, had she made up her mind?

Lorraine, whilst sitting on the carpet almost a half an hour before Mark came out of his bedroom, was pondering over whether or not she should just abandon this house with him in it. She was wondering if she really deserved the pain being received from just inhabiting this house. Mark and she were obviously very unwelcomed to the densely populated town that they had built their house in; this was the fourth time it had been egged by the college students she encountered at the local bar a couple weeks ago. But of course Lorraine then had to ramble her thoughts off on the number four, because it was unlucky to the Chinese. Would four be as harmful to her as to them, apparently?

She began to think that it was, considering this was the only time she found herself so saddened that she lost most of her ferocity. Lorraine, too, had noticed the pleading she had done towards Mark, which would have usually been a command. But even if it had been a command or a plead, it seemed final when she said it. Just the way that the statement rolled off of her tongue made her stomach churn in an unfamiliar and foreboding way. She didn't like that feeling, so she therefore turned to see Mark, looking to see if there truly was something worth staying here for.

What she picked out was his future that could be without her. She sensed that he would be devastated, even enough to where he might have tore down the structures of the house with just his bare hands. It was unbearable for her mind to visualize such a depressing scene...

'I'll stay with you, Mark.'

With just the soft tone of her voice, Mark feels as if a soothing lotion was poured all over him and into him. The excruciating burns that he felt were sticking to him inside and out, were now washed away. The words and their meaning only made his troubles leave more rapidly than ever. Lorraine staying meant fidelity that could arrest the felons trying to rupture and make extinct their relationship. If only I had a notepad and a pen right now, Mark thinks. I would write a symphony of a thousand songs about how I feel right now... But I know that could actually never happen; the music comes first, not the lyrics. A notepad would only do so good as to draw Lorraine's pretty face down on it.

'Smile for me, Lorraine.'

And what a great symphony it would be if I called it that.