Tag: writing

Fair Harborside (1)

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It was dingy as hell, not recognizable as the city everyone saw in the postcards: moss and algae crept down the walls; the side streets were lined with open sewers; the factories ran all hours of the day, belching out waste and haze. Soot streaked down the faces of the workers whose hands were cracked and brown with exposure. What little they had they called home, whether roof or coat, they took what they could. They struggled through narrow congested streets, seemingly stuck in the past — a bygone era, that had long since been passed by the rest of the city — an open sore without medicine.

On these congested streets lived all manner of discard: tech no longer current, factory waste, dreams of fame and fortune, the relics of the country people once left, heirlooms of cultures long swallowed. But as the streets turned oceanside they widened and lightened, the haze of smog dropping away the closer one moved to the harbor, the mecca of trade, the jewel of the city, the picture perfect postcard. Harborside was a world of glass and gold that rose high enough that those with bloodshot eyes and wasted dreams believed that maybe it reached heaven.

The city of Harborside was rich, modern, urban, cultured, and only surface deep. Every man, woman, and child that lived in the skyward reaching world was a dreamer, a planner, a story. Their streets were lined with rare plants and their roads paved with exotic shell. Every home was its own, sitting pretty at the height of progress. They would want for nothing and everything.

Such severance was there in the city of Harborside that it was as if a blight, a disease, had been stretching out from the landward outskirts of the city but had abruptly hit a vaccine three quarters of the way toward the harbor. It was as if an immunization had been injected into the sea and had spread to the seafront but had been content to protect the few.

Photo Credit: steemit.com

Life was bobbing at a sea-sickening rate as Frank finally found the city. He had taken every form of transport available to him: car, bus, train, plane, his own two aching feet, bicycle, and finally boat. As the city rose over the bow of the leaky, decades-old fishing boat, the tug behind his gut seemed to loosen. The folded postcard in his breast pocket was a molten brand of hope and childlike optimism on his heart.

Life had ground to an overly warm stagnate existence for Amelia. Trapped above the cloud level – in a glass box – Amelia had the entire world at her fingertips. She was at the height of modern technology, she was as mapped out as the best planned city. There was no one like her, there never had been another like her, nor would there ever be one like her. She was a road map. She was not her own. She was caught, ensnared. Made and unmade.

The Party at the End of the Summer

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It was oppressively hot, but it was worse inside. The idea for the party had been born earlier that month, straight out of the heatwave, full of desperate loneliness and braised, salted wounds. He had thought that the heat had been bad when the party was thought up but it had gotten worse, the end of summer was supposed to bring promise of a cool refreshing fall, but instead the dog days were holding on.

Partygoers were wilting like flowers, falling and rising in dance on a phantom wind born and nursed by too-expensive-booze, and sweat dampened morals, the peace was tenuous. It was just too hot for a party, even the breeze was like licks of fire on his cheeks.

The rail of the balcony scorched his forearms, but it was better than dancing in the heat. He dropped his head back and looked for stars he would not find, but before the search even truly began the click of heels sounded behind him, the echoes of a last ditch S.O.S in consistent and aggressive morse code.

He did not look, she came up to the railing next to him. He still did not look at her, but in his peripheral he could see she was reasonably tall, dressed in unseasonal black, sleek. She inclined her head and stared out into the darkened hedge maze below them, all shadow. He could sense her grace rather than see it, there was something indescribably elegant in her presence, but she was incredibly still. She was pensive in a way that only people dressed in finery and malcontent can be.

She looked on as a couple stumbling their way through the doors below them, tipsy, glittering and very much in love made their way into the maze. Both were dressed in crisp autumn colors, one a in deep burgundy gown that splayed behind her like a trail of fire and the other in a warm burnt orange that fell like water.

Photo Credit: previously.tv via Penny Dreadful

Two leaves dancing in the too warm night, lost to the world and unregistering of the weather outside of their perfect dichotomy.

She glanced sideways up at him through the leaden air, her sharp, slanted eyes caught him off guard, caught him staring at her with the sideways glance of someone interested but unwilling to admit it, but her interest was clear.

He slid his eyes lazily away and turned so his back was to the railing. She turned her head to see his profile, if he glanced at her out of the corner of his eye again he would see almost her whole face, a dangerous temptation. He hadn’t really seen her yet, the tendons in his neck lightly pulled him to look at her, but he resisted, he vowed not to look. He didn’t want to talk to anyone, especially not at this party.

She sighed, a light huff of hot air in the even warmer atmosphere around them, the air around them weighed heavy on him, even the light seemed dragged down. She leaned her narrow gloved hands on the bannister the stem of a champagne flute nestled in her long, lithe fingers.

She was made of long lines like an artist had just drawn out the essential curves in stark black strokes, she flowed like fine ink.

She swirled the champagne in her glass, light winked off it catching the light like a star on earth.

“This is the expensive stuff and what a glass to put it in.” Her voice was low and rolling over him, lulling him into a stupor, “The cost of the wine almost justifies the dressing up, but this glass, the glass definitely justifies the dressing up.”

A sudden shattering caused his trance to break, his vow forgotten his head snapped to look at her.

From her elegant and bewitching fingers the glass had fallen, no, he realized as he looked at her small smirk in profile, the fine crystal glass had been dropped, on purpose.

A galaxy now lay on the stones beneath them, the leaves in the maze had also turned suddenly at the clear cold noise cutting through the heat, but they were once again lost to themselves within moments.

He was now staring into her eyes, unable to look away, pinned like an insect to a scientist’s board, her dark brown eyes looked almost black under shadow and tapered lids.

He spoke one word, his voice rusty and thick with the overly warm air, “Why?”

She glanced down and turned on her heel, her sharp cheekbones and nose flashed in the light of the windowed doors she was headed toward, now that he had looked at her he could not look away. Those inky outlines were nothing on the amorphous night she was truly made of.

“So you would look at me,” she walked through the doors then, the promise of a cool fall night disappearing into the light of a too hot summer party.

The Summertime Blues

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The summertime blues whisper to me,

they caress and seduce,

they ask

Am I going to regret that?

Photo Credit: Chicago Blues Bar

 

Not taking them up on that offer.

Am I going to regret what I’m doing to myself?

Am I doing it to myself?

Is there something wrong with me?

Why am I no good at conversation?

why are you boring?

Why do I feel that when I open my mouth everyone is just waiting for me to shut it?

Why do I think a helping hand is offered in pity, forced on by “good will”?

because it is.

I tag along on other people’s words.

Photo Credit: Forensic Medicine for Medical Students

how annoying can she get?

I can’t meet people’s eyes.

what if they actually see me.

no, I want them too see me.

do I?

so, eyes flit away.

Do my hands shake or do I imagine that?

Why does it seem easier to go it alone than to give people the chance to push me out?

Why does it feel like everybody stares?

Photo Credit: Harvard Business Review

All eyes on me.

no eyes on me.

no eyes on me.

delusion to assume you took center stage, the spotlight’s not on you it’s on the person next to you, Narcissus. 

No words left.

Their eyes and hearts and minds wait, full of pity.

But what if I didn’t give them the chance?

But what if I didn’t give them the chance?

A Montage

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I suppose this is the end. My last blog. The last post I write, and the last one I publish. The last piece of writing I do for Ojai Valley School – the place that has taught me how to write.

I came to school my freshman year having written essays before, but only formal, structured pieces for English class. I’ve always been one to write down my thoughts – I carry around a journal and have always documented my raw emotions. But before coming to OVS, I had never shared my writing with others.

Freshman year, I sat down in my first Humanities class, unaware of the flood of writing to come. Reading journals galore, I had little blurbs of writing due once or twice a week. Those reading journals were analytical, but they allowed me to delve into my thoughts and share my own interpretation of the material – something I had never done for school before.

And I think those reading journals, back in freshman year Humanities, bridged the gap between writing for myself and writing for school. And that allowed me to delve into Journalism, which introduced me to writing for others.

Fast forward four years. Here I am, at the end of senior year. Freshman year, I learned the value of my own thoughts in writing. And sophomore year, when I started taking Journalism, I truly learned the wonder of writing. I found my voice, and learned how to tell stories. I learned how to paint pictures of other people’s accomplishments and what goes on around campus. I learned to blog – to write metaphorically, and to eloquently share my deepest, most honest emotions. I truly learned to put my thoughts into words, and to fearlessly share them with the world.

So, again, here I am, writing my last blog post. I have written all sorts of blog posts over the past three years – ones that are funny, sad, sarcastic and honest. And now I have to wrap it up. This is the last thing I will write this year, for any class. The last bit of work I do before I graduate, the last bit of work I do in high school.

That’s pretty crazy.

Today is Wednesday, May 31st. On Friday, June 2nd, I graduate. I’m beyond excited, but also terrified. It doesn’t feel real. I always knew I’d get to this point, but now that I’m here it’s hard to grasp. It’s hard to believe that it’s me. I’m about to graduate high school. I’m about to be in college.

I can’t believe I made it. I know that’s a cliché thing to say, but I really mean it. These past four years have been pretty hectic. But here I am. T minus two days and I’ll be walking across the stage.

And I can’t wait.

I’m sad to be leaving – OVS has done so much for me and I’m going to miss it. All my friends, all my teachers, they’re going to be hard to leave. But OVS has prepared me well for college, and now I’m ready to move forward.

So goodbye and thank you to OVS, to Journalism, and all the writing I’ve done here. It’s the end of an era, and a great one too.

T minus two days.

Photo Credit: i.huffpost.com

In the Dungeon

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She was rotting away. She could feel it.

Erasmus had left her there to rot. After everything.

She was following what she believed to be best. He was the one who had taught her to do that.

Photo Credit: Pinterest

Her eyes were closed but she knew, she knew that he was in her cell. Watching her. Waiting for something. Something that wouldn’t come. He wanted an explanation, but she didn’t have one.

She couldn’t explain to him that there was some deep tether in her gut that his plan would go wrong. He was too proud for her to say anything like that. She couldn’t explain to him that she threw away what he saw as his future on a “gut instinct.”

So he continued to stare and she continued pretending to sleep.

She could hear him shift, she could hear him breathing. It was making her nervous. She wanted to tell him but she couldn’t.

She just couldn’t.

Am I a Bonafide Hipster?

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Am I a living stereotype?

This question occurred to me last night as I leaned against my kitchen counter. I had a bent copy of The Great Gatsby held lazily in my left hand, an uncapped, drying, pink highlighter in my right, and a black pen tucked in my shorts pocket. There was a weather-beaten espresso percolator heating on the stove, I was wearing a second-hand cardigan and hand-knit socks. A Portuguese cover album of David Bowie, from a Wes Anderson film, was playing softly in the background.

Photo Credit: Wikipedia

I am actually a tangible version Andrew McMahon’s Art School Girlfriend.

Am I an actual un-ironic indie hipster?

I wear oversized cardigans, I have a collection of vintage Classic books, I have a pocket copy of War and Peace, I have a cracked 5 versions late phone, I embroider, I knit, and I drink my coffee black.

How has this happened? Has my own psyche sabotaged me and turned me into a poster child?

That Night

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Steam clouds the windows. A flame wavers under the bulk of a teapot slowly growing discolored from the brewing tea.

Photo Credit: Davidson’s Tea

Jars of rice and pasta sit stoic behind the tea against the foggy window. The white tiles alight in a ring of orange and flickering yellow.

Cinnamon candles burn in another room, the smell wafting and drifting and dancing with the scent of a spiced green chai.

Rain patters lightly on a recently resealed roof. The faint sound of parents discussing upcoming weather reaches the small slanted kitchen.

A cold breeze blows under the door, bringing with it the smell of rain, fresh from clouds not seen for months.

Cold, stiff, paint-splattered hands rest near the candle, bathed in the warmth provided by the slow destruction of the candle.

Photo Credit: http://www.pinterest.com

Faces lit from below glance out through the milky window at something unseen soaked with rain.

The Cupcakes (3)

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Not a single tear escapes my eyes as I sit back up and slowly gain footing. “Is that all you need for now Madame Clarisse?” I ask, the pain becoming a cold and unwavering part of my voice.

Madame Clarisse’s lips curl into a snarl, her eyes glowing with disgust at the fact that I have the strength left in me to stand up. At this point, Magnum Damarion’s resolve against killing the rabbit has completely fled, he has given into society’s cruelness.

Photo Credit: New Mark Hotels

I suppose it is easier that way, is it not Magnum? I think bitterly. I stand there, my heart beating faster as he gets closer. I know that if I move to defend myself nothing good will come of it, so I stand there and take it as he slowly moves toward me. I refuse to let myself shake, the only evidence of my pain and panic is my unsteady breathing.

Once he is within breathing distance, he stops and Madame Clarisse makes a repulsed noise in the back of her throat at the thought of someone of his status being this close to a servi. He looks back at her with ice in his eyes. One look from the mighty lion and the hyena is silenced, humiliated, unable to finish off one pitiful rabbit.

“Tell me, are you so daftly-idiotic as to mess up one small order?” He asks plaintively, as if this is not a kill shot.

Defiance rears its ugly head inside me. My mouth moves to say no and that I meant every gram of sugar I put in there, but my mind slams my lips shut and reworks them, “Yes, I am.”

He nods as if feigning understanding. His feet make little noise as he steps back, dragging his feet over the carpet, and as swift as a bullet he drives his steel-toed boot into my side exactly where Madame Clarisse’s heel push through my skin. I do not hear the impact but I sure as hell feel it. A cry escapes my lips as my head hits the side table, splitting the skin near my eyebrow. I hold my breath and let myself sag. I have failed myself more than once tonight, and I do not have the strength to face anymore failure.

I pull myself up and support myself on the side table slouched over, “Is there anything else you will be needing, Magnum, Madame?”

Clarisse takes a deep breathe, the hyena is too proud to let the lion have the final blow. Her fist zeros in on my nose, and with blinding pain her fist connects to the bridge of my nose, sending me careening out of control and into the side-table I was previously in alliance with.

I open my eyes a few seconds after the waves of nauseating pain pass. I can feel the blood on my mouth and dripping down my chin, creating rivers of deep red on my blouse. I look down at myself. This is what I would be in for, if I escape, if I make it to the next future, the next fate – one hell of a beating.

I crack my neck and swing my gaze between the Magnum and my Madame, “Is there anything else you will be needing? Madame, Magnum?”

I can see the vein in Madame Clarisse’s forehead pop out like a river in a smooth desert. I glance over at Magnum Damarion, he is looking mildly horrified at what he has helped do. His eyes linger on the blood stains dripping from my eyebrow and nose. Too late asshole. His eyes then stray to blossom of blood that is forming on my side as well.

Photo Credit: Free Images

This will go well tomorrow: Female Runaway Servi Found: Beaten Badly, To Be Executed. What a nice headline, yeah? But somehow I still cannot bring myself to stay here in this damned house.

“No I’m no longer in need your services.” I am surprised Madame Clarisse managed to grind even that out.

I bow my head a sign of respect, but in truth I can barely keep myself upright. I take a shallow breath as I prepare to attempt to walk. I slowly tell my legs to move, and as if by some sort of disconnect they start moving moments after I tell them to. I can feel the heel of my shoes catch in the threading of the carpet, and the other foot continues to shuffle forward, missing its ever-important counterpart. I can feel my mind slowly winding down to a complete standstill, like eyes that are slowly closing for longer than the last time. I hear, more than feel myself falling. The air creates a tunnel and everything sounds like static.

All of a sudden the sound stops. I let my knees buckle and I hear a thud as another pair of knees hit the ground with mine. The Magnum.

The Cupcakes (2)

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My knees sting. And my face feels as if it is about to burst.

“Get up you worthless, idiotic oaf.” Now Clarisse is shouting, but it only registers as a faint ringing.

I slowly get to my feet. Biting back a snide retort, I grit my teeth again, ignoring the pain that shoots through my jaw. Survive this and you will not suffer the noose unless you are found out to be a runaway. Snap now and you will be sent to the noose with no chance to live. I play this on repeat in my head knowing in my heart that I cannot crack.

“Does it taste like a sugar-free cupcake?” She shouts, causing my head to ring even more.

Well seeing as it hit my face I did not really get to taste it, now did I?

“Does it?” Mangum Damarion’s deep cold voice rings in for the first time.

Photo Credit: Pinterest

I can feel him slowly creeping closer like a dangerous and powerful dark lion. His money-bred arrogance and inhuman power is painted across his face in wide bloody slashes. He does not dare getting close enough to touch me, for even a jealous hyena can take down an ignoble lion.

He throws his cupcake and it hits me just below the collarbone with enough force to push me back a bit. The pastel frosting flies up hitting my neck and chin, but also outward hitting him, and an already frosting-splattered Magnus Madame Clarisse. I clench my teeth harder, knowing it will be hell for whatever servi is tasked with getting the purple color out of the expensive fabric, and even worse to get it out of the priceless rugs and tapestries in the private dining room. I send a silent apology like a prayer to that servi.

Magnus Madame Clarisse’s eyes show with livid blood-lust. “Is. That. Sugar. Free?” She asks quietly, a stark change to the headache inducing shriek from a few moments ago.

She raises her hand to strike me again and I cannot help but cower, my body telling me my head cannot take more abuse.

“No – they are not.” I whisper, my throat rasping. I clumsily try to push my dark hair out of my eyes.

“They are not.” I repeat, knowing that I have cracked and with that realization I stop trying to stay standing, I let myself fall to my knees. I take a rattling breath, knowing that I failed myself.

“You. Brainless. Disgusting. Impudent. Daft. Worthless. Servi.” Her voice gains momentum and crescendos, “Can. You. Not. Follow. Simple. Orders?”

I can feel it. The lion is staring from his throne and his eyes. It feels like I am in the roman coliseum, thumbs are pointing down, but there is a small glimmer of possible guilt and shame in what he is doing in his eyes. But before that glimmer of guilt can take over, his eyes are back to guiling the hyena: impress me, hyena, and you will be a lion; and then there is the hyena, all too ready to comply. The white rabbit has been stained red and the hyena is ready to rip its heart out to give, still beating faintly, to the lion.

Photo Credit: Oriental Rug Bazaar

I feel the pointy stiletto drive itself into my side before my brain registers that she even moved to kick me. Her stiletto breaks through my uniform and my skin, sending searing pain between my ribs. I topple from my kneeling position to curl up in a fetal position looking at the fine threads, red threads, of the ungodly expensive Persian rugs.

The Cupcakes (1)

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“Is there anything else I can get you Madame Clarisse, Magnum Damarion?” I curtsey as she stares critically at the cupcakes.

She frowns down at the cupcakes and asks in an eerily silent voice, “Are they the sugar-free, I asked for –”

Panic and terror settle in my gut, I had not remembered that, I had been distracted all day wondering if I should escape or not.  

“– well they don’t seem like it. Are they?” She demands after a bite.

I can feel myself ripping in half, if I do not say anything who will get hurt? If I say yes who will get hurt? I lock my jaw and refuse to even breathe.

Photo Credit: Flikr

“Well are they?” She asks in a voice that promises blood.

My blood begins to heat as I go numb with panic. I wince. Confirmation enough.

This is not about the cupcakes. This is a show of power from the hyena to impress the lion, and I am the rabbit about to get its throat ripped out.

She hands a cupcake to the Magnum, giving the lion a taste of the prize that could come of this. A fleeting look of conflict crosses his face but just as soon as it is gone he takes a bite and the haze of bloodlust crosses his face.

“No, they don’t taste sugar-free now do they.” He chuckles at me, and frost shoots through my veins. The noble lion has joined the ignoble hyena to tear apart the rabbit.

He asks, his honey-like voice becoming the steel of a Magnum blade, “Are they the sugar-free she ordered?”

He asks, the shadows on his face becoming darker and sharper. The laughing purple in his eyes turns to a dark hardened grey. I stare at the candles on the table knowing that the two of them will not be nice enough to go straight for the throat. They will take their time, they will start with small bites and continue until I bleed dry.

I know that if I were to open my mouth to confess now it would only make it worse.

“Do you want to try one? Maybe you could really tell us if the baker of these followed my instructions.” Magnus Madame Clarisse says with venom boiling through her words.

I struggle for breath. She knows it was me, and now she is going to humiliate me. I suppose the hyena and rabbit scenario is not uncommon, seeing the number of servi suicides there are.

She picks up a cupcake and saunters toward me, but instead of handing me the cupcake she daintily unwraps it. “Open up,” she says in a cloyingly syrupy voice. “Come on, it’s not like it’s a command.”

Photo Credit: Pinterest

I clench my jaw trying to keep my pride, but I know that I will be put to death if I do not obey. I rigidly unhinge my jaw.

Her perfectly sculpted pink lips pout in a demeaning manner, “Oh come on, don’t be so stiff.”

The words drip from her mouth like the blood of some other poor rabbit she already killed. The lion remains stoic in the corner, his eyes glazed over, unfeeling. The arrogant-rich-boy is back.

“Well loosen up!” She shrieks.

Magnus Madame Clarisse shoves the cupcake into my already bruised cheek with the force of a punch. I watch as purple and white frosting mars my vision and sticks to my eyelashes. I am struck by how much the frosting looks like thick fat snowflakes.

Ha how different the situations are.