January 16, 2010
Short Story (Honors English)
All I see is the blood begin to rise. I lie there unable to move from the shock I have given myself. All I can think is “I finally did it.” This moment is what I’ve wanted. I couldn’t wish for anything more. This moment that I take part in has come with the instant satisfaction of the end. I hear the voices on the other side calling out my name, but this time I will not come. As I lay, my mind becomes weaker, the blood becomes thicker, and I take the remaining time envisioning a flashback of how this came to be.
I can faintly remember the days when life had a ray of sunshine on a twenty-four hour consistency, a time when even the saddest things couldn’t bring me down. Life was just good. Awakening to a new blessed day always seemed so magical. Hearing mom and dad calling me down for breakfast and a brief prayer before my day began was my inspiration. Being a little girl were the happiest years of this life, my life.
Then I grew up…
Senior year. Graduation was going to be the most phenomenal highlight that I could ever remember. I had the perfect friends and a career that was going to take me far. Photography was my major. Even the littlest things the lens could capture, filled my heart with joy. The art of what lied within the picture, were the things that would surrogate my mind and soul to crave for more. I connected with those pictures. Able to speak without words, yet saying so much. That’s how I had to explain myself because I knew no other way how.
My parents. I have so many memories that I wish could stay with me when I’m gone. I liked to look at them as perfect, but my heart knows different. I always wanted to see my parents be in love just like the way I had envisioned it, but that was never going to happen. Countless times they would come home and scream and affray at each other over ridiculous subjects that would reflect on me. My father would push my mother and she would do the same. My mother would always say to me, “A women never cries, for her heart is stronger than any trouble received upon it.” I took this saying to heart and will remember it for as long as possible. There would be times during the most silent hours of the night when I would find myself soaking the pillow beneath my head with the tears of emotions that were coming from within. Life had gotten harder and it didn’t seem as if that same ray of sunshine was shining so bright anymore.
Waking up to a new morning always gave me hope for a better day to lie ahead of me, but nothing ever changed. Having a brief prayer before I left in the morning was sweet at the time, but with the life I was living, I felt the God that I so believed in was neglecting me.
High school was and will always be the most obscure time in my life. My time from middle school and up was a living hell. Freshman year would be the year when I thought everything would change, when I thought things were going to be different, but instead of my life manifesting into something that was suppose to be so beautiful, it manifested into something dark, bitter, depressing, and filled with anger.
I just wanted to fit in, to be normal. I wanted people to be able to look at my smile and admire it instead of judging it. I wanted to feel comfortable with my own body. I wanted a boy to look at me and think, “She’s Beautiful.” I wanted my voice to be heard when my heart felt like it needed to scream. I wanted it all, but I just couldn’t have it.
The middle of my first year in high school is where I had begun to see myself change into a horrific person. It was the year when I had let everyone’s thoughts get inside my head. I was tired of being left behind. So I gave in.
I still remember the first time I was introduced to narcotics. A group of friends and I decided to go to a near by park that had been deserted for about four years. It was actually the place where a fellow classmate of the junior class was killed during the summer. We had all come up with idea of throwing a bonfire for sentimental purposes. It was our way of starting off our last few years that we had left to enjoy our young lives. We arrived at the park around 8:30 p.m. that night. Our intensions were completely innocent or at least my mine was. I reached into my pocket for my phone to check the time; the clock struck 10:00 p.m. All of us gathered up all our belongings and started off towards the night lit streets.
What happened next…my memory has completely forgotten.
I woke up to a bright and gloomy morning. Not really sure where I was at the moment. I remember the hearing of what sounded like rush hour traffic at sunrise, except that’s exactly what it was. As I slowly began to raise my heavy head, I remember seeing these beautiful trees of what looked to be something similar to a fur or pine tree. There were birds softly chirping all around me. The grass was moving with the wind. All seemed to look so beautiful until that very second I turned around to look ahead of me and saw something that had terrified my soul deeply. Dead center in front of me was a burnt coal cross that had been lit on fire. The wording upon it read, “ Let those who fall be sacrificed here.” What was going on? Had I died and gone to some place of nightmare? I was sneered and horrified with fear. The only thing I could do was run. Run as if my life depended on it. In fact it probably did. I went to school later that day and found my friends huddled in a group whispering as if telling secrets. When I appeared before them, they looked at me as if I wasn’t suppose to be alive. I asked them what had happened and they told me I was their target to get them to the next level in their rituals that they partake in. When I heard that I immediately ran and told my principal. They next day they were all shipped off to some mental hospital and were never heard from. Letters had been sent to them, but replies were never received upon those who wrote them. Ever since that night I had been tormented with demons that had been cast upon me. That’s when I found myself beginning to wonder what it would be like If I decided to do something that could lead me into an entire different world. A place beyond imagination where you would have to leave this world to enter into the next.
Sophomore year. A time when life was starting to feel like there was no more meaning. Weekends were the nights to get high and do things that no one would ever want to remember. A time when death itself was no longer a fear. A time when fighting with your parents always seemed to be worked into your daily agenda. My mom and dad were getting worse. Not only emotionally but physically as well. My father became more violent and mother began to do drugs. I could feel them slowly but surely beginning to slowly slip away as if wind blowing through my fingers. I ran away multiple times during this forsaken year. I didn’t have anymore to turn to. And in my defense, I was a teenager. Running away was our instinct when life seemed unbearable. That year was also the year when I met Luke. He instantly became my friend. He was the type of person that always had the best advice to offer. His voice was captivating. When he spoke, it gave hope. That year was also the year that I lost him. We were in his car making a documentary on what life would be in the future. We were laughing, having a good time being young. Everything changed within seconds when he lost control of the car and we rapidly down a cliff. He died and I survived. I always remember watching that tape late at night whenever everyone had fallen asleep. The last few words that he said were, “Never take life for granted, because the next few seconds aren’t promised.” I found quite how he worded it. Kinda like he new it was his time.
Junior year Approached vastly. 11:59 p.m. I get a phone call. “To the daughter of Mary-belle Larcomelli, we are sorry to inform you that your parents, Zar and Marcia Larcmelli have past in the act of homicide.” My heart dropped. I knew my life had just taken a complete u-turn in the very direction that I had tried to avoid for so long. I spent weeks and months trying to piece everything together. Why did things have to end up like this? Why would God let this happen to my life when he knew things were already screwed up? Sometimes during the night I would sit in the middle of my house and listen to the walls echo with the arguments of my parents. I could remember when I would be terrified. As I would look around I would realize that I didn’t want this. I didn’t want to live a life or sadness and hurt. I just wanted it all to be over.
May 15. 10:00 p.m. I sit in the dark waiting for my decision. There is a part of me that doesn’t feel right and it was eating at my soul. The party downstairs is raging but I don’t seem to hear it. Everything that should be distracting me has become mute. The gun is pointing towards my face and all I have to do is pull the trigger. The metal shaped weapon feels cold in the palm of my hand. I latch the bullet in place. Ready to take all then suddenly my life flashes before my eyes. Everything is in fast motion, but I can see it all so clearly. I sit there and realize that even though my life has been so heartbreaking, there has always been something there to keep me going. This makes me smile. Something that I haven’t done in quite some time because I had forgotten. When I finish I come back to reality and decide it’s not my time for my life to end. Holding the gun to my face, I lower it slowly being very careful and cautious. I turn the latch to put the bullet back in place.
The gun goes off.
