The Delicacy of Play.

A tome of a young intellectual man contemplating suicide.

                  The Delicacy of Play 

                                                              By: Valentine Mabuza

The rain stopped today. After a week long of cats and dogs, it finally let up. Let‟s see… There‟s a pair of mocking birds chirping playfully on a wilting tree branch across the street. They flutter, flying off after the sound of screeching tires disgruntles the poor things. I imagine a man in a suit late for some important meeting as the car passes by me, splashing a puddle of moist that lands a few drops on my shoe laces.

I‟m on my usual route walking back from school, my head tilted slightly downward to ease the weight of my bag pack which fells heavier than normally. 

A lone cloud above me is in a slow euphoric dance of ecstasy with the blowing wind. It swirls while the sun sends long persistent rays that shine through it. The blanket of very blue sky along with the sun gives off a sought of red slash pink slash orange fluorescence in the far horizon where two mountains collide and spread to separate. And I‟m sure there‟s a dolphin somewhere in the middle of the pacific doing something beautiful and captivating while a little girl in a cruise ship passes by just in time to point and witness all the beauty in all the write ways.

With all these maddeningly beautiful and unbearably perfect things happening around me, why would I decide to kill myself…? The globally accepted term for this act is suicide. Not that it makes a difference what you choose to call it besides the words going down a little easier when hearing them in conversation, the result is the same. I‟m a fan of mystery, the same mystery that‟s cousins with the curiosity driving you to keep reading this probably badly written banter of mine. So I‟ll leave it to you to decide my name for me. Here‟s a clue… it starts with an M.

Michael maybe?

I swing my bag around a short while after I get bored listening to the sound of my own footsteps hitting the tar. I jam my hand in it and feel around moving the bulky mass of rope away that will come in handy later on, but we‟ll get to that later. I pull out my iPod then slowly untie the head phones wrapped around it sloppily. I realize this is the last piece of music that I„ll ever listen to, so I should probably make it good. Maybe I‟ll go out in style with the theme song from Sleepless in Seattle, or go out with class and taste with some opera. Geostini or Telamandt perhaps. I decide on a classic at the bottom of my playlist �"Rocket man.

My name could be Milo.

I don‟t think I need a reason to kill myself, but for the sake of decency we can go down memory lane and stumble on an incident that will more or less satisfy that part of you that saying “What a dumb guy, doesn‟t he realize that there isn't a good enough reason to off yourself.” You know what? You‟re most likely right. Where do I start? Oh yeah… There‟s the messy divorce my parents went through last year but it wasn‟t all bad. My father‟s guilt for his extra marital affairs proved to be beneficiary on my end since his been trying to buy my affection by showering me with gifts I have no interest in excluding the iPod of cause.

I had terrible migrants throughout my childhood; I had an M.I.R, a cat scan and everything. And what was originally thought to be a tumor was later announced as a benign lump causing pressure on my cerebral cortex. I've also been striking out a lot with girls lately but that‟s not something that bothers me much, any guy will tell you �"even Casanova lucked out every now and then. To add to the list could be the car accident I had when I was fifteen that rendered the little piggy next to my toe paralyzed in growth and left me comatose for 82 hours. I imagine death to be something like a coma, a total and perfect silence of everything. The way a chair doesn‟t know it‟s a chair. There‟s only a still moment that stretches on forever. My mother says I used to be a happy kid, laughed a lot.

But after I came out of that coma Two years ago I've never been the same. Some dense and easily overlook-able thing was missing inside of me, a hallow emptiness now field that part which joy once inhabited. I‟m not an antisocial or a recluse. I've hosted senior ditch day parties and participated in the extensive alcohol and drug abuse that comes with it. Instigated beer pong and spin the bottle tournaments in my living room. In a way, you could say that I've single handedly been the underlining cause for a majority of my classmates losing their innocence. To be completely honest I don‟t know why I want to kill myself, yet here I am. Two blocks away from my house and no intention of ever turning back.

Marcel is a good name.

It‟s been said people do it because of self-hatred, they just don‟t like themselves. Well I‟m very fond of myself, I know that sounds ironic and all with what I‟m about to do but it‟s true. Put in a hypothetical scenario where choosing who lives between say you and me I would chose myself ten times out of ten no problem. Wait; there is one thing that could be a valid reason. Somewhere between searching for the truth and not giving a crap I came to a less than appetizing conclusion. After the coma I started seeing things differently, not just how I wanted them to be but how they really were. You should probably start listening to that small voice in your head telling you to stop reading this psychotic mambo jumbo just to be safe or at least fair. The last thing I want is starting a chain of suicidal teens across state.

This is my perception…

Everything, down to the vast emptiness giving birth to the atom and the cosmos, has no meaning nor purpose what so ever. Life in its most basic design is composed of a series of chaotic and randomly contrived occurrences. One day

when you‟re old and infinitely stupider than the day you were born there‟ll be this need to look around only to find your life is made up of the many tangible objects, regrets and experiences (some good, a lot of them bad) that you had in the past. Needless to say at this point, the idea of a God is about as significant as clown shoes.

How does the name Miles sound to you?

Now comes the interesting part as my hand reaches out to open the bronze handle that is the front door to my house. I walk inside and stand at the center of my mom‟s kitchen. I‟m alone. It‟s almost as if the silence and void in the house is aware that something is not quite the norm about my entrance. For some masochistic reason I smile, then with my hand on my chest I laugh hysterically at the plight of it all. Thinking „what a joke, everything is a big unfunny joke‟.

I walk to my room counting my footsteps, dragging the bag behind me. Once there, I shut the door and lock it then close my eyes and let out a lengthy sigh. Soon the piece of rope is out of the bag and in my hand; it has a steady weight to it. There‟s a chair a few feet away, I drag it under the turbine fan that cools the air in my room during those hot summer days. I take my shoes off and stand on the chair, then tie the rope around the turbine… clockwise. I take a disposable plastic cup, fill it with water and walk over to the mirror. I take a final look at myself, my pointy nose, the minor acne and the tiny beginnings of facial hair on my upper lip. I take it all in. Lastly I look at the reflection of my eyes reddening, that‟s when the heavy breathing starts. I take out a regiment of pain killers in the draw at my far left, they were prescribed for my migraines but I have other plans for them. I take one, drink some water, take another one, drink some more and so on. The pills will help in case I pass while playing hangman and the turbine can‟t support my weight, wouldn't want to be found napping on the floor with a noose around my neck now would I?

Explaining my warped thought process, that led me to suicide to my catholic mother is a conversation I‟d rather not have, I‟m sure you understand why. Where was I? Oh yeah �"overdose. Nine pills in, I‟m still going. My entire body is shaking; I didn't think I‟d be this afraid. I‟m actually tearing up a little. But I don‟t feel pain, infect I don‟t feel anything. Just raw fear accompanied by a stinging sensation in my stomach. The bottle of pain killers empties out at 13 pills, I head to the telephone on the side board and dial 911 and waited.

“911 emergency, how can I help you?” answered a middle aged woman.

“Yeah, I‟d like to report a suicide please”

“A suicide…?”

“Yes you heard right, suicide.”

“Okay sir may I ask who‟s committing the suicide?”

“Me” I replied.

“Is this some kind of a sick prank? Did Marty from logistics put you up to this?”

“This is no joke lady” I yelled out, surprised I still had any anger left in me “…my address is 255 Eastereer Lane that‟s 255 Eastereer, got that?”

“Okay sir. Please! Stay on the line with me you don‟t have to do…”

I hang up right around there; push the chair under the dangling rope. I stand on the chair again and fit my head trough the circle as if I was wearing a tie backwards and I feel it wrapping tight at the back. I think to myself “this is it, no going back now”. I scream out like soldiers do when they charge towards the enemy, kicking the chair across the room.

The reverse momentum of the chair sends me swinging back and forth from one wall to the other. The sudden and unsuspected squeeze makes me panic, I gasp

for air and tightens. You‟re probably thinking “I bet he regrets doing it now” and you know what? I do. Warm urine drips down the side of my leg and I think I just evacuated my bawls. Mid struggle, making choking noises and my tongue sticking out of my mouth like a fish out of water I manage to desperately hang on to a handful of curtains. However when the time came for the pendulum swinging motion to return to the other wall the curtains flew and landed on the bed ever so gently. The pills kick in and I feel weak and sleepy as foam pulsates out of my mouth. I let go. I stop struggling, my hands drop to land somewhere below my waste.

It‟s getting dark, too dark to see. My heart slows down gradually from its massive pounding and I can hear the sound of approaching sirens from a distance. I feel nothing, cause there‟s nothing to feel were I‟m fading into, there never was to begin with.

My name is Max, and I just died.

                                                                      The End

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Author's Note

I know... it was a little dark but i hope you liked it all the same.

Reviews

[Laminators Dubai]

this is just too good...and this is good because of this dark effect.
i love it! i love it! i love it!

[NAR]

i loved it!, dark isn't a bad thing.. someone once told me the people who have been through the most become the best writers out there