Picture Perfect #2

We will fight back, we will prevail. The words were on replay in my head as I sat complacent in my bus seat. My cheek against the cool smooth surface of the window. The bus rolled along the deserted country road, on its merry way to the next treatment facility. We were the creatures of the night, free to haunt the afraid. We were the shadows of the day, caught only in glimpses. We were not cruel, but we were not kind, we were simply bored and self-assured. Feigning invisibility, it was all we could do in this sad little corner of the U.S. We had to be the blind eye, we had to forget what our world was like and throw caution to the wind; it was the only way to keep our dreams of freedom alive.

We had to fight back, we would have prevailed. But someone turned on a light in our dark room and cast a light over our shadows. You’d know that someone, does the President of the Grand ‘Ole United States of America ring a bell? Should be ringin’ that liberty bell, calling to all the lost souls of the world to come and follow the American dream. But ever since the epidemic, ever since our over-drugged populous had somewhat of a “mental shutdown,” the big guy upstairs has been shipping us by the bus load to be reset. Like flipping a big switch, every memory of who we were before 25, vanishes. We are given a polished new history, a shiny new life and set of characteristics. Of course, nothing they wouldn’t approve of. Everyone is compliant, quiet, and overly cordial – something I find particularly nauseating. I escaped it all, my people of the earth parents let their natural remedies fix themselves and me. Not relying on doctors and the pharmaceuticals that took our nation down. Still, I watched as my peers spiraled into self-hatred. Or as their personalities split, their alter egos turning on them, tormenting their every thought. I watched as buses pulled into our small town, shipping them out in droves. I ran (natural instinct) until I found my purpose. Well, I suppose the rebellion found me.

                But now we sit in our bus seats, with only memories of our past to cling to for the next 24 hours. Being transported to our new contemporary lives. “Civilized” Is what they told us we’d be, “Like the rest” is what we’re supposed to hope for. But we know our creative sparks will be erased, we will lose our will to fight. I blink back tears, thinking of losing everything I’ve known. It cannot come to that, it won’t. The shadows will fall on us once again, and we will be hidden. We will torment the powerful, deceive the “Genius”, save the fallen. My tears stop, and I can feel my adrenaline pumping through my veins as the bus rolls to a stop. I look up, seeing the red octagon signaling our arrival at redemption. My lips curve into a devious sneer. I look quickly at my fellow trouble makers, and their faces seem to hold the same expression. I turn my face towards the roof, and laugh. I sniff a little, an inside joke, and say “Smells Like Teen Spirit”, the doctors ignore my comment, mumbling something about the sickness, but we know the meaning. I rise from my seat like the others around me, and with this we charge our captors. Fighting back; prevailing. 

Picture Perfect #1

“That looks dope!”

I opened my eyes slightly, peaking through my eyelashes. My friend’s faces were turned upwards toward the sky. Their eyes following Jake’s extended arm as he pointed his finger towards the tree line, drawing my attention to the fiery glow emanating from the horizon. The sunset had dyed the sky a cotton candy pink, drizzled with the purple of the night ahead. The sun created a warm orange crescent above the trees; fading down from the purple, as if it was draining the color from the sky as it set. I dared to open my eyes completely, pulling myself out from my sleepy haze. I yawned, stretching my arms out to my sides as I did so. Everyone was quiet except for Kid Rock singing Cowboy ba-byyy through the radio. I could see Joe bobbing along with the music, mouthing the lyrics. Well sort of, he was exceptionally horrid at lip-syncing. I giggled at this thought, which provoked a moody “What are you laughing at?” from Bostrom. His eyes glinted with a hint of sarcasm, nothing his voice didn’t already betray, which made me laugh even harder as I nodded in Joe’s direction. Turning towards Joe, he chuckled a bit and sighed; shaking his head with an expression that read Typical Joe. Mason looked up curiously, with a questioning gaze he looked from me to Bostrom and back again, until Joe’s sudden dance movements caught his attention. Content that he was in on the secret, he went back to his phone. The boat turned in circles as Jake, Drew, and Dave cast their lines out. They poked fun at Dave, saying he’d never fished before. Then they’d laugh, all three of them reeling their lines in empty-handed. They’d complain and cast them out again until finally Joe jumped to his feet and grabbed his own pole. With a single cast he caught a bass, and the other boys crowded around him as I stayed complacent in my chair.

“Joe, the master fisherman!” Drew exclaimed as he patted Joe on the back. Laughing as they released the fish back into the water, they put their poles down and pulling up the anchor, they congregated around the small table in the back of the boat. Joe squeezed into the bench with me, snaking one arm around my waist as he tried to pull me closer. I let him, and put my head on his shoulder, breathing him in.  Jake took up residence in the captain’s chair, relegating the others to the bench in the back. The motor roared to life and pushed the pontoon boat out of the small lagoon we were fishing in. We set our destination for the center of the lake, singing as we sailed. Jake occasionally snapped at us to “sit the f#@& down” so we didn’t disturb the course of our carrier.

“Whatever floats your boat.” I’d say, and chuckle to myself for my clever joke. As we neared the center, we threw down the anchor again. Laying back, we were all intent on relaxing when the boat suddenly jolted from Drew springing to his feet.

“How much will you guys give me to jump in right now?” He looked at all of us intently, determined to weasel one of us out of a decent chunk of change. “Give me two dollars and I’ll jump in.” Dumbfounded, a majority of us just laughed in his face. Jake pulled a crumpled dollar out of his pocket and offered it forward.

“I mean… I have a dollar.” Snatching it from him, Drew did a little dance; spinning around to the rest of us.

“Come on, somebody’s gotta have another dollar!” Drew looked pleadingly at the rest of us, we averted his gaze by looking at the boat floor. Or we’d just shrug and shake our heads at his request. Feeling the tension, and wanting to see Drew shiver in the ice water, Mason finally offered up a dollar. A smile crept across Drew’s face as we told him how he was going to regret jumping in. The water was just barely warm enough to stick your toes in, not nearly warm enough for an intoxicated teen to submerge their whole body. Still, our warnings did not resonate in that cavernous space within his skull.

With a running leap, he jumped from the boat. I shook my head and laughed, these were my friends, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. As I heard the splash of Drew hitting the lake water, I closed my eyes and again rested my head on Joe’s shoulder. Everyone erupted in to fits of laughter as he came to the side of the boat, panting and shivering. He pulled himself up and violently shook out his hair, like a dog shedding itself of water. Laughing to myself as drops of water bounced off the bridge of my nose; puddling into a small reservoir at the base of Drew’s feet. Basking in the light from the setting sun, I smiled and sparked up a cigarette. Thinking silently to myself that this is all I’ll ever need.

System Of A Downstairs Suicide

I wake up late, every day, trying to hide from the world. My mother, as she does every morning, was banging wildly on my bedroom door,

Yelling her usual, “Get up! Grab a brush and put on a little make up!”

I groan, my mother and her obsession with appearances was getting out of control.

I didn’t want to leave my room to meet her judging gaze, because once I did it was always the same.

I do as she says, however, for if I did not I was at risk of any number of her various punishment methods. A push down the stairs, a hand on the stove, a back hand to the face, whatever she can get away with when she catches me off guard.

I run the brush through my snarled and hair and cover my skin with cover up a shade too dark, in hope that maybe, just maybe, it’ll help cover my scars; help fade away the shakeup.

After being content with what I saw in the mirror, I undid the three locks on my bedroom door and met my mother’s irritated face. When she first came to my door in the mornings she was sweet, friendly almost as she cooed her good mornings, but as I opened the door it was like a switch flipped and all the hatred she harbors is hurled towards me. She suffers from bi-polar disorder, if you couldn’t tell, and as a result when she finds herself in one of those dark spaces she often visits, things can go a little awry. Technically, people that suffer from this condition are supposed to have something like euphoric highs to balance out their lows, but I don’t believe that. She must experience those while I’m away at school. I always hear her friends gush about how sweet she is, about how level-headed she is. If only they knew; if only they experienced the hell I went through as stepped through the door every morning, and as I came home every night.

As I look in her eyes I could see her hatred smoldering, she looks at me like she looks at herself, a vision of imperfection. I’ve never been one to care for looks because I am not pretty, I didn’t have satin hair or bronzed skin or eyes that sparkled. But I didn’t mind because I was intelligent and thoughtful, and my paintings could blow anyone out of the water, but she couldn’t see that, she just saw my mistakes.

“Why didn’t you leave the keys upon the table?” She screams, froth flying from the corners of her mouth, you’d swear she was rabid. I started to speak, but was cut off as she got in my face. “Oh here you go, creating yet another fable.” She always thought I was lying, maybe it was a guilty conscience or something, I’ll never know.

Her rant continued and I grew tired, because it was the same thing every day, the same complaints and inquiries. I try my best to cheer her up and bring her back to me but evil has its grasp on her heart. Still, every morning I ask if she wants to do my hair and make-up, try to bring her back to those teenage years she desperately wants to relive, but more often than not it just reminds her of what she is not, and she is plunged into the pool of hatred she drowns in every day. “You just had to take forever and grab a brush and put on make up.”

“But you wanted me to….”

“Shut up Sue, you can’t hide anything, you need more make up that ugliness will shake anyone up.”

“I thought maybe you’d want to.”

“So why didn’t you leave the keys on the table? Because you wanted to? You just looovvveee seeing me struggle every morning in search for them don’t you?”

It was a stupid question, one I’d answered on countless mornings before, the keys were never lost, they were always on the table under a magazine or in plain sight; I think she just enjoys yelling at me. So I just walked past her as she huffed and puffed along after me. I’ve learned that ignoring her and complying is the easiest way to get out injury-free. This morning, however, something else had rubbed her the wrong way and my failure to respond ended in a heavy shove into my side. My mother was a petite woman, but she could be a force of nature. As she collided with my side, I went tumbling down the set of stairs that branch off from the hallway. I cried out as I hit the concrete wall that dictated the end of the stairs, and gasped for breath as sharp pains shot up and down my leg. I tried to pick it up with no luck, it was broken, or at least sprained, much to my dismay.

I heard a cackle from above and watched her slink away, proud of herself. Sometimes I wonder if she birthed me at all, how else could one have such hatred for their child.

No one would ever trust in it, but they still probably wouldn’t miss my plain face if I took myself from this world. And the one that drove me to it, the only person I hope it would effect, would be my once angelic mother; who now deserves no better than six feet under. The worst part of it all is my father has left me here with this. I suspect he unearthed the evil that he had married, and got the hell out of here as fast as he could.

Hell, that’s what I would do.

Except I’d take my infant daughter with me, instead of leaving her in the clutches of satin.

Oh, father, into your hands I would have commended my spirit. But you have forgotten me. Why have you left me here to bask in the wake of her self-hatred? I wonder if he remembers me, remembers my name.

But I know it’s no use wishing.

His eyes are oblivious me.
His thoughts has forgotten me.

And his heart has forsaken me.

I’ve been down here for a few hours now, my leg still broken and my mother still not having returned. I’ve crawled to the run down couch in our basement and prop myself up. I’m done, I’ve been done I just didn’t have a way out. But now I know that I cannot escape her. If I get away, her memory still haunts me, her teachings (more like tellings) will stay with me until death, I’ll forever be scarred.

Or she’ll kill me, if I don’t kill myself first. I begin to cry with this thought. My leg is still bent awkwardly, swelling up around the broken bones. It’s hurt for too long now and I am numb, numb to my physical pain because my mental pain has taken over. I hate myself, the girl she has made me become. Broken and scared in my own home. I crawl to the bathroom, prop myself on the edge of the tub. I turn it on and let it fill. I’m just taking a bath, nothing serious, I want to still be pretty for her, my mother. I take a little blue bottle out of the cabinet and swallow the dozen, or hundreds I don’t really know, baby blue capsules inside. I close my eyes as I sink into the water. And as the warmth begins the take hold, I think to myself that this is right.

My mother drove me to this, my guardian angel.

I trust in my self righteous suicide,

But I cry because some angels deserve to die.

Picture Perfect Assignment

Free Verse: Growing Up

One of you couldn’t make it alone so it was up to the

Two of you to make it together. But

Three in the morning isn’t the time

For you to high-

Five over your wondrous

Six year old dreams that got lost on the days you turned

Seven when things were more simple and

Eight balls were the things you didn’t want to sink in pool and

Nine was the age we longed to be because everyone said the next

Ten years were to make us bitter.

Eleven days would pass in between seeing our friends and
Twelve months started to seem short.
Thirteen times the pain we felt when we were
Fourteen and our hearts were broken by bad grades and boys who were
Fifteen was the worst age, not yet able to escape to
Sixteen miles away from where you grew up,

Lyric Poem: Mother of Mine

Mother of mine, what pushed you away?

Was it his failure to please you;

Was it me begging you to stay?

Mother of mine, you left me broken,

Smoldering with hatred,

My heart you have stolen.

I prayed you’d come around, prayed you stay away,

But no matter what I prayed,

You came first

You stole the show

Battered and broken, my mother I did not desire to know.

Your poison overtook us, my father and I,

We chased your golden promises,

But fell empty with your high;

 So I wrote this to tell you off,

Wrote this to let you know,

That we are better off without you;

We’ll leave you to your snow.

Within Five Miles - 200 word sentence

Five more miles until I reach my dreadful destination, until my week meets its unfortunate demise, until I am forced to be faced with the weariness of Monday morning and the complications of the school week ahead of me - three miles left, three more miles draining away from the gas tank, I’ll have to pay the losses of course, I always do even though Norton is a small town and you can get just about anywhere in under a gallon of gas; 16 miles to the gallon, that’s how much this car gets, and yet the three miles it takes to get to my house still costs me five dollars - one mile left, my night is nearing its end, five minutes until I walk through my front door, the trees zip by, they blend together in the blur of night, their branches stretch out to me like finger tips – one more minute left, I can see my house as we near the street corner, we take the sharp bend in the road with a roll and the cracking sound is deafening; the windows burst outward; the doors snap and bend, the metal crumbles under the pressure of the car's innards and our three mangled bodies; I guess accidents really do happen within five miles of the home.

Distillation

In the passage I read today, the author expressed his feelings towards scientific experiments and dissections. He says how these acts are inhumane and grotesque and do not actually help the students become productive members of society. He also says how these actions are for the feeble minded and that anyone could do it. The authors vocabulary and diction greatly reflects his feelings towards this by exaggerating the horrific details of the experiments and how we need to change these practices and stress more importance of the working class.

Point of view piece: Unreliable Narrator

Identical. One in the same. Two carbon copies of one singular being. Mirror images, that’s what my sister and I are. And although we seem to be xeroxed from the same sheet, she seems so absolute, while I feel like the counterfeit. We were once interchangeable; literally, we switched places all the time. Kendall and I, we thought it was fun to throw off our teachers, plus she was better at presentations, art things, anything the involved confidence really, she thrived in art and English. While I dwelled in the more exact subjects; Math, Science, where I took comfort in the single answer questions. No room for flexibility, no room for surprises. Places where individuality was frowned upon, a place where I could sink into the sea of other students and bury my nose in whatever math equation or book I was into that week. The answers were black and white, plain and simple and no one could tell me I was wrong when I know for a fact that I’m right, not that any teachers ever tried to tell me my answers were wrong anyways; I was always right.

            Individual, that’s what I long to be. Unique, my own person making my own decisions. I’ve never been one to take orders, my teachers said I “marched to my own drummer” but that wasn’t the case, because I preferred guitar players. Gramps got me a guitar once, I played it religiously; strumming out long riffs and solos everywhere I went. Kira would never admit it, she probably doesn’t even remember, but she used to join me in my one woman band, humming along in the back ground or playing the part of the adoring audience. She was my only audience, she was the only who took the time to listen and understand. We used to play together, love one another, but that was before. I couldn’t tell you what happened that changed her so much, whatever it was, it never affected me, not that much did. According to Grams, nothing had ever really affected me and I planned on keeping it that way, I was emotionless, strong, tragedy and heartbreak seemed to just roll off of me. I was concrete.

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            I walked into the kitchen this morning, expecting to find breakfast waiting for me and gramps slumped in his chair with his nose in the paper and his arthritic hand wrapped around his coffee mug. But instead it was Gram’s frail fingers that found me, she grabbed my shoulder, startling me, and turned me to face her. She was standing in the hallway, its dim light catching the wrinkles that carved through her skin. My Grams was an interesting lady, she wasn’t one of those jolly old pudgy ladies that you see in the TV shows, all smiles and fresh cookies. Grams was more of the librarian type. She was petite and thin, with eyes sunken back a bit, framed with silver-rimmed glasses that slid to the tip of her nose. She wore her hair, normally, in a tight bun on top of her head, but at that moment it sat in soft wisps white wisps around her shoulders. Grams was usually a quiet and worrisome lady, she was always fussing over one thing or another, trying to make everything perfect for the family she loved so dearly. Her fingers found mine and laced their way through, I managed a smile; I knew what the issue was because I could read her expression like the pages of a magazine.

            “Gramps is hurtin’….Kira, I…” I held my hand up to stop her and her eyes fell to the floor. Seeing my grandfather that way killed me, and whenever I did see him that way, it stayed with me for the rest of the day, haunting mirages of him wasting away in the sterile solitude of the spare bedroom.

            “Grams you know I can’t, I’ll go get Kendall…” I turned to walk away but she grabbed my arm, stopping me.

            “Kira please, he needs you, stay with me, I know it’s hard for you but stay focused you can do this.” She was begging, I couldn’t say no to a pleading old lady. Reluctantly, I followed her down the stairs to our make shift hospital. Kendall usually handled these issues because I couldn’t stomach them, but she got to stay tucked away for the time being. Of course she did, Kendall always got what she wanted.

            I woke up to the sound of coughing and muffled voices. I knew that sound, Gramps was having one of his usual fits, and why no one came to wake me to lend a helping hand was beyond me. I always helped with my grandfather, Kira couldn’t do it, she barely saw Gramps anymore because she couldn’t stomach the tubes and medication being pumped into him, and she couldn’t stand the sight of the man who raised us slowly withering into a skeleton. It didn’t bother me, he was still my grandfather, when I looked at him I still saw the same towering brick house of a man that taught me how to ride a bike and kick a soccer ball. So I raced to Kira’s side to relieve her of cough rag duty. She didn’t mind moving out of the way to let me handle it, but I knew it bothered Grams that Kira seemed to just step away when it came to my grandfather. It bothered her that Kira wasn’t present for a lot of things that happened around the house, she seemed to shut down when she was around us. Family seemed like a foreign concept to her, I was the only one that saw through it. Not that she would ever actually let me in, no of course not, because letting your twin see who you really are is too risky right?

            After assisting Gramps, I sat with him for a little, telling him about my art projects and Kira’s outstanding test scores. I told him about my theater endeavors, and Kira’s newest track records. Our achievements always seemed so polar opposite. I was never one for sports, not that I wasn’t athletic, I worked out almost every day, but I just wasn’t a team player. I preferred to have my own spotlight and not have to share it with anyone else. Whereas Kira preferred things where her success was certain. She liked the sureness that grades and running a track provided. I preferred the challenge, I liked the uncertainty, the power I felt when I won. That’s what it was mostly about, power.

            The whispers never stop when I get to school. I can’t escape them, that’s why I like to blend. If this place was a painting I’d be a blade of grass in the distant landscape, monotonous and fused with all of the rest. Classes drag on, the clock seems to tick slower today, something’s wrong.

            Kira has been distant all day and it seems to be rubbing off on me, my spirit isn’t what it usually is. I left school today in a hurry, the walls seemed to suffocating. My nose in my phone, scrolling as I walked, I didn’t particularly pay attention to where I was going. Home was where I needed to be, with Grams; my anchor. I walked away from the school and past the small strip of pharmacies and bars towards my house on Sunset St., dipping down a small alleyway for a shortcut home. I stopped when I felt a shoulder collide with my chest and a deep, raspy “Sorry” emerge from the lips of this stranger. I apologized back without much thought when the stranger put his hands on my shoulders with an unyielding grasp. Startled, I looked up.

            For the first time since Kendall could comprehend the situations around her, she was visibly shaken. My protector could no longer protect me, because this time she was the target. I watched as her concrete cracked and crumbled all around her. So I took over for her, gave her time to gather herself. Our father looked into her eyes, his vicious smile creeping across his leathery face. He had been gone for years, and rightfully so, he was the reason our mother was gone and I don’t think either of us could forgive or forget this. Of course, we’re the only ones that know the truth behind this monster. Pushing him away, I tried to get Kendall to walk with me but she seemed cemented in place. I pleaded with her to move her feet, to run with me, but she stayed frozen. I screamed at her to move but she didn’t hear me. How was it that at this moment I was the strong one, her protector? My father just stood there, grimacing wildly, he knew the pain he caused. He feeds off of our brokenness, how when the big bad wolf comes around we seem to turn into little lambs. My father was drunk, as usual, I could smell it on his breath. The liquor swirled and burned in my nostrils. “There’s my girl!” He opened his arms to Kendall, she just stared back in horror. “Tell me, ya still mad as a hatter?” he tried to grasp her but she slithered from his grasp. “Come on cupcake, you can’t run away from your own daddy!” He grabbed her wrists as she tried to pull away, yanking her closer. Latching his hand around her throat, he put his mouth next to her ear, “You know, your mother never struggled this much.”

            All I could feel was his acid breath in my ear, and his vice grip around my throat. This man, this…this monster was the bane of my existence. He took everything away from me, my self-respect, my dignity, my mother. He destroyed Kira, turned her into the empty shell she is today. I wanted to fight back, I wanted to destroy this creature, but all I could was fall limp. Black dots started to cloud my vision as I felt myself fading in and out, my oxygen supply becoming less and less. I felt him whispering in my ear, more vile things about my mother, I heard Kira screaming, but I knew no one was coming. Kira’s voice rang wildly in my head, the sheer terror in her voice broke me. I would die, right here right now, by the hands of this drunken fool, and I didn’t even have the strength to fight back. I would leave my tattered sister to her own devices against a psychopath. The last thing I saw was two little birds fluttering through the air. The sky was deep blue, the sun warm on my cheeks, my vision blurred and the two little birds became one, dipping and diving through the air, leaving my field of vision and away from this hell on earth.

            All I could do was watch as Kendall fell motionless. She went limp in his grasp, but in his drunken stupor he didn’t seem to notice. Instead, he just got increasingly mad at the fact that she wasn’t answering him. He shook her violently, bringing her closer to his face as if that would wake her. I felt the tears falling down my cheeks in droves. My eyes burned, I just wanted to run away but I couldn’t, my feet seemed cemented in place. In fact, no part of me could move. I couldn’t comprehend what was happening, my sister was half dead and all I could manage to make out was my world fading into black and my father’s seething expression. I tried to scream but my vocal chords stayed idle, barren, as if I had never spoken a whisper in my life. I felt trapped, but not in a physical sense, more of a mental bear trap; latching on to my body and refusing to let go. Refusing to let me push out of this haze and into the daylight to save my ailing sister.   

            In a fit of rage, this drunken devil dropped my sister to the ground. Before I faded into black along with her, something struck me as strange. Watching as she fell into a crumpled heap, he narrowed his eyes and glared, spitting on her lifeless body he whispers. “You’ve always been useless, Kira,”

           

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A frail women walked into a sterile white room. Two windows sat on the far side, warm rays of summer light shining through the beige curtains. She lifted a tissue to her eyes, dabbing the corners to catch any tears as she sniffled and shuffled over to the solitary bed underneath the windows. As she got closer her knees began to wobble, finally giving way to the weakness over coming her. She fell at the feet of her loved one, a young girl, lying motionless. The beeping from the monitors and the sobs from the old woman were the only sounds echoing through the room. As she held her head in her hands another man walked in, his white lab jacket swaying behind him. He crept up slowly and quietly, not wanting to startle the old woman. He put a hand on her shoulder and she looked up with wide, hopeful eyes. He looked down at her, grasping her hand to pull her to her feet. As she stood she brushed the wrinkles out of her skirt and adjusted her glasses. She didn’t meet his eyes, almost as if she was afraid to. He sighed, giving her a weak smile, “The bruising will fade but her wind pipe was almost crushed. She’ll have trouble breathing for a little bit, what is mostly worrying us is her mental state, Ms. Robins, your granddaughter is suffering from a mental break.” The old woman looked to her feet, the sobs returned and she struggled to quiet them. The doctor put his hand on her shoulder again for reassurance.

            “Ms. Robins, in her file it says she’s been suffering from schizophrenia for quite some but was never treated for it. We want to help you and your granddaughter but we need all the details, we need you to let us in to help. Kira will be fine if we take the proper steps to…”

            With one frail finger, she silenced the doctor. “Kira will be fine with me, and what happened will forever stay buried. If you were being asked to expose your child to the greatest nightmare you’ve ever known, would you?”

Angry Letter

Dear School,

            Oh, the issues I have with you. I suppose maybe I should address this to specific departments but in the interest of preserving ones feelings, I’ll keep it general. What is wrong with you? What do you think I am, a robot? I have a social life, I have feelings, I have responsibilities that do not pertain to school and, in my point of view, are far more important than the truck loads of work you decide to dump on us. I’ll admit, this year I have it somewhat easy, my classes aren’t as hard as they have been in the past, but you have made me dread the idea of learning. I despise the thought of waking up in the morning to come to this god forsaken place, so much so that I stay up into the late hours of the night, just to put off waking up, how sad. But do you care? No, of course not, this place is designed to feel like a prison, or so you have made it seem. I wake up at 6:45 to rush around my house and get everything in order for my day ahead of me, only to walk outside to watch one of your buses drive right past me, leaving me to inconvenience my step mother and make her drive me to school, all the while getting an ear full the entire ride there. Then I walk in, starving because I didn’t have time to eat breakfast but I, alas, cannot afford your breakfast “sandwiches” and disgusting whole grain poptarts because I need to save my money for your over-priced, under-portioned meals. I owe you $116 for lunch, do you think maybe after $80 you’d ask why? Maybe I can’t afford the lunch, maybe my step mother refuses to go shopping for weeks so we have no good food, but is that any concern to you? No, of course not, because that’s money in your pocket. Then I am forced to carry on through your pointless classes, with teachers who usually have no idea what they’re talking about, and oppress the creative minds of their students. With an exception of about four or five teachers, your school system is a vice, squeezing out individuality and creativity from the minds of these adolescents whom you are supposed to “sculpt”. I’m sick of the favoritism amongst students also. Why is it that the handbook was greatly enforced when I’m getting in trouble, but when a star athlete of yours gets in trouble, there punishment is made less severe. Its absolutely outrageous. And how about you give a little gratitude to the art students for once? Considering we work just as hard, and are able to create masterpieces, but we don’t bring home trophies or banners so our value isn’t as great. Just let us express ourselves throughout the school, that’s all we desire is to leave a little piece of us behind, because teachers like Mrs. Lewicki made us into the artists we are today. But no, you want a “clean” school, so our artwork is pushed to the side and we are left to cling to the shadows and make way for the “sports stars” as always.

            Well I, for one, am sick of it. I want things to change around here. I want more independence, I want more expression and more individuality. I want to go home and not have to force school completely out of my mind in order to stay in a positive state of mind and prevent myself from worrying about all the stresses that this place brings with it. In all honesty, I just want to enjoy learning again.

                                                                                                Thanks for ruining education for me,                                                                                                             Brooklynn Porter

Free-Write

            It was Christmas Eve. Fog stuck to the tarmac at Lindbergh field, casting an eerie glow across the whole park. I sat at the solitary picnic table off to the side, obscured by the bushes and thick mist. I didn’t say anything, I didn’t move, I hardly risked a breath. My eyes felt heavy, but I knew I couldn’t bring myself to sleep. I was cold, because my clothes weren’t exactly name brand. The sleeves were ripped up along with the legs, I wanted to go home, but I felt lost, like I had unfinished business but I hadn’t any clue of what. I just watched, observed as college students stumbled home from their late night excursions, laughing; crying; clinging on to one another. Scrambling to get home before Santa makes his rounds. Their hair a mess, the make up running down their face, making them resemble the animals that they truly are. Even in December, they trot along carelessly in their club dresses and sleeveless tops. Singing, or slurring rather, along with whatever songs they had heard in their evening before. It sickened me, their carelessness for what was around them. But I also envied them, how they were able to be so free.

Lindbergh field was our small hometown park, as old as the school. Years without maintenance caused it to fall apart. The chains holding the swings are rusted, frail from years of rain and snow and fat children. The slide is old and metal, dented and slightly rusted. I don’t think any child has slid down it in years, but it provides a nice perch to loitering teens and to the pigeons that call this park home. It borders the small community college that unfortunately plagues our town. Making the park a common short cut home from the only strip of restaurants and bars for 20 miles. I rise up from my seat, as more and more night owls stumble across the park. I walk, sluggishly, along the small stone wall separating the playground from the picnic area. I loved walking along the smooth rocks, it felt metaphoric in a way. Like one side was life and one side was death, and there I was just stuck in the middle. Barely living but not quite 6 feet under. I tipped a little towards the picnic tables, stumbled and nearly fell, but I quickly regained my balance, like I weighed nothing. Being here always set a sort of cloud-like confusion over me, where was I before? Where am I going? I just wonder aimlessly through the rocking horses and monkey bars, looking for something but I can’t remember what, or maybe, who. I just felt lost and empty, as I walked it felt as though the things around me just seemed to pass through me, like I had no substance. Something felt wrong, like I wasn’t myself anymore. I wondered over to the tree line, almost out of instinct, when I felt something crunch under my feet. Curious, I picked up the wooden cross that had fallen down from the tree to which it was nailed. A name was engraved on the horizontal piece, “Annabelle Highland, R.I.P”. Shock and confusion riddled my body, but how could this be? I felt this sudden pain, as my heart raced and my limbs ached, because in that moment, I realized I was dead.



Unfortunately, my free-write does substantiate Fanny Howe's essay. My stories do seem to be dark and dreary but for me, its simply because I like the word play in stories like that. I like how I can make the reader feel what the character is going through just by the words I use. And I feel as though a sad plot, at least in a short story, catches the readers attention more, it leaves them unsatisfied by the end, and they want to know more, read more. When a story has a happy ending, it gives the reader this sort of closure that makes it easy to forget the piece, and makes it just like a majority of all those other stories. I want my pieces to leave an impact on the reader, I want them to walk away thinking back on the story as an experience, not just another book. Another reason why I like to write these depressing pieces is because that's reality, there aren't any heroes in reality. We are made to believe there are, but they aren't heroic, in the end they do it for their own benefit, a paycheck, the glory, whatever their recompense may be, it is not sincerely because it is what is right. "Because no one is accepting responsibility. There are people in power, to be sure, but they all point the finger at each other"  This quote proves my point even further. We look up to these powerful figures who can't even take responsibility for their own mistakes. One part of the essay I do disagree with, however, is when she says "What's missing here, along with a sense of consequential action(work) and actors of consequence(heroes), is anything more than the most rudimentary sense of cause and effect.." I disagree with this because in my stories, I believe my plot ties together. Yes, this short story I did leave rather open ended, but that was my intention, to maybe do another installment or an epilogue that explains her death. But I wanted to leave the reader pondering, that is why there is no explanation. One last point I will make is I simply just love writing this way. When I'm done, I feel unburdened, like I was able to release any pent up anger or bad intentions into my piece; my artwork. I feel a sense of dismal beauty when I write in this way, it seems poetic to me, not like I'm telling a story but I'm displaying an emotion through out the writing as a whole.

Self-Deprecation Essay

    “ARE YOU EVEN LISTENING TO ME?” I screamed, Joe was a smart kid but it was as if everything I was saying was just going in one ear and out the other. My temper wasn’t even at a human level anymore. You know those glass thermometers? Well at the moment I felt like one, and the mercury inside me was broiling, pushing against the frail glass. Joe nodded at me, he looked scared almost, like he wasn’t looking at me anymore, but instead, a monster of some sort.

            “Please just calm down, I’m sorry I don’t know what to say” he pleaded. I don’t know if it was what he said, or how the words seemed to make it seem like he cared very little for how angry this made me, but at that moment I lost it. The mercury burst over the top and I don’t think even sedatives would have relaxed me.

            “AHHHHHHH!” I screamed, no, roared? Growled? Whatever sound it was, it was loud, involuntary and unhuman. I grabbed the chair I sat on in the mornings to do my make up, and slammed it to the ground. Screaming all the while. The chair hit the ground with a thud, its metal base making a loud ting as it bounced once or twice after its collision with the floor, and I could almost feel Joe’s confusion and dismay with my reactions. At this point, I don’t think I truly knew why I was as angry as I was, if you had asked me I would have gone off on an all too familiar tirade of the disrespect of the agony and the confusion I felt, and how things needed to change and decisions needed to be made. But I was kidding myself, nothing would change, Joe would mess up because we’re human and I would fly off the handle because that’s what I do, that’s how I operate.

            I don’t think that relaxing is in my vocabulary. I don’t know how to unwind or kick back, my life is a constant stream of feelings and most of the time, they’re not pleasant. I laugh at myself, in retrospect of course, when I get as angry as I do, because there is no in between with my emotions. There is no slightly annoyed, kind of frustrated, somewhat distraught, no, there’s calm Brooklynn, then there’s angry Brooklynn. Now just focus on this for a moment, I AM angry Brooklynn and I wouldn’t even want to be presented with that opponent. I probably look ridiculous, like one of those cartoons with the steam pouring out of their ears, all red faced and huffing and puffing. Half of the time I’m crying, because although I try to fight it, my anger tends to release itself with tears for whatever reason. I don’t know why whatever almighty being picked me to be an angry crier, but they certainly picked the wrong person, because nothing makes someone significantly less scary than a flood of tears streaming down their face. And nothing makes me more angry than when people seeing me in such a weak state, especially when I’m infuriated.

            There are some things that we have just learned to be at peace with about ourselves, and something I have come to love about myself is my sarcastic attitude. It gets me in trouble from time to time, but I don’t mind too much, keeps things interesting. Also, to me it adds a little spice to the conversation, gives it a comedic undertone. It’s also one of the only ways I’m going to express my anger with out an uppercut to the jaw. Its better I stick with sarcasm, for you and for me. I’ve come to love that though, part of what makes me, crazy ol’ me.