Copper Chimes Through My Fingers

something from an english prompt that i kind of sort of didnt expand exactly...

I felt the pennies between my fingers, like every word she said to me; the connotations, the losses of conscious, the invincibility of it all. A penny for every “I love you,” that was the deal. A penny for every drunken lullaby was in fact, the reality. I never thought to factor in the booze to what put me to sleep every night because it was just that, the sandman’s grains and the last breath I can remember when I next open my eyes. All I can remember is the sweet sound of copper chiming into the empty coffee cup as it slowly moved up to an even bigger dish. The kind someone had the idea to put candy in, but never thought that anyone under the age of ten would not be put off by the three remaining butterscotches, and would eventually set off in hopes of more somewhere in the kitchen. Single-mindedness like that always struck me as incredibly inefficient. What were the odds that someone would comply with your philosophy for Monday? Everyone has a rhythm that they listen to, a heartbeat of sorts, which prevents them from giving into the stress. Like that  of finding a reason to get up in the mornings, you know, hypothetically. To count how many pennies were still in the dish, just to make sure life could go on as usual, simply to justify the fact that I had to roll over. Justifying the reason that there was a little bit of spring in my step, a little turn to the corners of my mouth, complementing the polite indifference. Nothing unnecessary, things just have a way of making life as worse as possible for you by making you above and beyond happy, and building up to slowly tear the foundation down brick by brick. Mercilessly crumbling with no regard for the people inside, hopelessly watching what they thought they could hold onto and falling into the rubble they would have to walk over on their way out. How fitting, the ability to walk over happiness to achieve the rhythm you pretty much already left behind. Humanity has a way of parting waters to achieve normality, or at least its appearance, anything not to appear out of the ordinary, because who likes that sort of reputation? You get nothing for nothing, when it comes down to it. You can’t be expected to always border on what people see you as because then all you have become is a mirror reflection of the people across the street, nonchalantly watching your every move between their noses and the glass. For the basic fact that they want to see what they expect to, they do not wish for any more or any less than they originally bargained for. They thrive on the importance of habit and consistency because they want to be the grey in a black and white world. They do not care for standing out; they simply desire themselves as the background. All they want is keeping up their appearances, as long as possible. Perhaps they just need to busy themselves with something, or maybe they enjoy having their own hint of mystery when given the opportunity to explain every day life. To be perfectly honest, no one really knows of that so called mystery because no one really has the nerve to ask them. I would like to think highly of said people and believe that they already know the answer, but much more likely is the probability that they just do not want to question their isolated sense of reality because they secretly, or more openly, as it happens, enjoy being able to chatter on aimlessly about trivial things and never have to worry about their ground and sky flipping. They are completely buckled down by their inability to change. All they want is stability, a little incentive to hat up the cashier with thoughts of cheap women and gas prices. They have no regard for the bigger picture. From the looks of things, there does not seem to be an outlet for such a sad people, but every now and again you run into them; probably with a glass of some amber liquid in their hands, pondering the worth of pennies, as they drop another “I love you” in a should-never-have-been candy dish.