He is a boy. He believes in love and all things quixotic. He played in the streets. Where else
was he to go? He'd make up games for himself. Sometimes he just sat and watched. He watched
people. The people on the street, the people in the upstairs apartments, the shopkeepers, anyone.
He didn't like staying inside. inside was where it hurt. sometimes he played with other children.
at the end of the day, when it started to get dark, and the moths began to surround the
street lamps, the children would leave. he always wished he could go with them, but he never dared ask. he had been taught that he was dealt only one hand of cards in life, and that he couldn't
change them. he understood that, and accepted it, grudgingly. he liked school. he liked his
teacher. she was always giving him books to read. he loved to read. he kept his own hoard of
books in the bottom drawer of his dresser. he hid these books as well as any child who hid sweets.
he knew if she found them she'd ask accusing questions. he had always been a smart boy. quiet,
and polite. he didn't have many friends. he didn't understand why, nor did he question. he
believed it was just in his cards
as he grew older, he grew out of his street, and started to roam the city. the further he distanced
himself from his apartment, the more at rest he felt. But he knew that at the end of the day, he would always have to return to the dismal 2 bedroom apartment he shared with his "mother". He'd come in as quietly as he could, doing his best to keep himself from being noticed by her, but sometimes to no avail. a squeaky floorboard would give him up.
"where’re you been all day? roaming the streets again? you're nothing but trouble, just like
your father, and his before him. none of you could stay in the same place for too long. your
father left us, he did, and you'll leave me the same as him! I know it!"
He'd ignore the shouting and continue to his bedroom. He grew used to his "mother's"
drunken tirades about how all the males in his family had been good-for-nothing b******s
who'd never amount to anything, and how he was sure to turn out just like the rest of them.
It was all apart of his hand of cards.
He continued onto high school. English was his favorite.
he wrote as often, and as much as he could. he dreamed of one of his stories being hidden in
between the clothing of another curious child. he usually scribbled down thoughts and ideas on
any scrap of paper he could find. but late at night he would piece all those bits of papers
together to create something that he believed was beautiful. which they were. all of his stories
were beautiful. his characters were perfectly flawed and their actions were perfectly orchestrated.
his teacher's praised his work and congratulated him for his achievements. he was still quiet.
he was still polite. he still watched people. he still kept his books hidden. it was harder to
read. he had to work. his "mother" spent the government checks on booze, and he still needed to
eat. he worked at a used bookstore. he mad enough to buy food, and saved a little for himself.
and plus, he sometimes was able to keep any of the books that people returned or donated that were too
tattered to resell.
he went to college. he received a large scholarship to an ok school and left. he told himself
that he would return to that dismal apartment at thanksgiving, but barely believed himself.
he met a girl. she was pretty, and smart. she believed in love, and all things quixotic. they would
walk together. he would hold her hand, and she would accept it. she didn't leave him. and she didn't let him down. he would hold her
close to him so to prove to himself that she was there, that she was a warm, breathing body.
he revered her. he wrote countless stories and poems professing her beauty, and his love. some
of them were the best things he'd ever written, his professors told him so. he submitted a story
to a popular literary magazine, they published it and sent him a check in the mail. a man
across the country read it, and contacted him. he owned a small publishing company. he
wanted the world to see that boy's stories. he wanted a curious child to hide them in his dresser
drawer. the boy agreed. so he wrote. he wrote more than ever before. his characters were more
perfectly flawed than ever. he wrote about love. he wrote destiny, he wrote about emotion. he
wrote. he was catapulted to fame. he was a bestseller. and he brought her with him. the
inspiration for his best accomplishments. he loved that girl, and she loved him. he received a
letter in the mail. his "mother" was dead. she had died alone because in her efforts to keep
anyone with her, she had pushed everyone away. he went to her funeral. a man was there. a man
with his brown eyes, and his sandy hair. he nodded in recognition of the man who was never
there to set an example for him.
he kept writing. his books kept selling, and she kept staying. he married her, and swore to never
leave her, and to stay by her side throughout any troubles they might meet. he still held her close
to himself, he still didn't believe in her, in himself. he believed in his notebooks, in his words,
in his characters, in his pen. she told him that she was real, and that she loved him. he watched
people. all people. any people. he watched how they moved, how the acted, and reacted. he watched
how they expressed different emotions. sometimes he would watch himself. he would have out-of-body
experiences where he saw himself as everyone else saw himself. quiet, and polite.
she became sick. he would hold her to himself, and she would become colder and colder with each passing
day. he still wrote. the side table in her hospital room was littered with papers. the armchair became
his new bed, and he never left her side. he was there everyday until she left him forever. he stopped
writing. he disappeared from public view. his muse was gone. his love was gone. he was gone.
he ignored each day. his house became that dismal apartment again, the place he worked so hard to
escape. He smelled of alcohol, and yelled at children who played in the streets. he burned all of
his papers and journals. he buried his past underneath a blanket of bitterness and anger. he became
his "mother" and forgot his younger self.
he also died alone. there was a man at his funeral with his brown eyes, and what would've been his
pepper gray hair. there was no one to nod at the man who wished he would've been there to set an
example. and there was no one to console the man for the loss of a son he didn't know.
his stories live on. they live in the drawers of curious children, and on the bookshelves of
used book stores.
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