That Boy

A Story by Perrine

regret

“I wish I had some time.” Sitting on the living room’s floor, he had almost forgotten he had to sleep sometime. Heavy rain was pouring down the window, darkening the early morning sky. It was 7 AM and he had gone all night without sleep, without even realising time had passed. The ticking of the metronome came back to him, like the first sounds of an alarm clock that breaks into sleep, making him go back to reality. He had tried to work, his guitar laid on the floor beside him, paper sheets were scattered everywhere, almost drowning him in a sea of white. The sudden brightness of their colour hurt his sleepless eyes, sunglasses would be necessary if he were to go out today. The details rushed back to his mind. Maybe he had been asleep after all, because all this felt like waking up. Waking up and realising that the dream may have nightmarish consequences. He picked up a sheet, so he had come up with a few lines... Were they any worth? He grabbed his guitar and played a few notes, the chords where arranged in the way he wanted them to be. The words worked well together. But it was all too short. And not what he meant it to be. When would this stop? He felt suddenly dizzy, nauseated, the guitar was heavy and the sounds escaping its strings felt unearthly. He collapsed on the sofa, and let the torpor get him....

He was feeling weak, indeed he was, the 2 hours sleep had not been enough. He picked up the sheets, read a few lines again. You stumbled into something but ran back to anything, chose the lit path so you were sure to see - Too scared to face what’s not yet there, even when it leads to what could be - A stranger to your own life - you are a stranger to your own life. Everything was going too fast and he wasn’t ready, it felt like yesterday he was still that boy, in whose life everything was perfectly arranged, like his songs used to be, every note in its right place, monotone yet bearable. Not out of the ordinary, not great, but enjoyable. Until the disturbance. He had fought against the revolution that brought the first melodious discordance in his universe, first in his life, and then in his music, it started to shade his world with new sounds, new emotions. First came the lightness, then the anticipation, a sense of what it was like to be whole, a glimpse of what he thought did not exist. He came close to touch what his dreams are made of. A part of him wanted to embrace it, feel the whole of what it could be like to give in to emotions, and a part of him did not like that at all because they couldn’t be controlled. So he rejected them, he rejected it all, the emotions, the sounds, and what brought them in. He turned his back on it, and now, “now, you miss it” he said out loud. Now he was that boy who had almost touched it all, almost tasted it all, and let go of the unknown to stick to what he knew but had no more desire to enjoy. A stranger to his own life.