Crushes

I'm taking a slightly different approach to it all...or plan to. I'm aiming to make this into a series of stories about the same group of people/in the same world. 

This one's a bit awkward in my opinion...but it definitely introduces you to some of the main characters I'll be using from here on out. I should probably entitle it properly too...

Words: Fedora and Tutu
Date: Feb 2017

She was perfect.

She was amazing.

She was off limits.

It’s not fair that in a world full of hate and fear that the one thing that would make him happy was off limits, but that’s just the way the world works.

He had met Ariana when they were five. She was in a tutu and he was in his Han Solo costume and they had passed each other while trick-or-treating. He doesn’t even know what drew him to her to begin with, but he couldn’t get her face out of his head.

He saw her again at school the next day and it had been as though the world suddenly snapped into place. He must have passed her millions of times over the school year and just hadn’t registered her until after Halloween. In his defence, there were a lot of students in his class, but after seeing her that one time, he couldn’t stop seeing her.

They had become friends, and his attraction to her didn’t really become something tangible (or nameable) until they were significantly older. He first registered it when she kissed their mutual best friend, James, in the back of the library.

It was when he identified the feeling as jealousy that he finally realised that maybe he was in love with her.

But then James and Ariana had started dating and he was too much of a friend to ever consider compromising that. Her happiness was more important. Their happiness was important.

The day they broke up had been his best and worst day. Best because he suddenly felt like he might have a chance, and worst because their trio had somehow been destroyed in his eyes. Then propriety said that he couldn’t date her for a while, not until the pain had faded in both of his best friend’s eyes.

By the time they managed to all hang out together without any awkwardness school had finished and they’d all gone their separate ways in university. All of them studying different things. They’d been good at the start, managing to keep in contact and see each other every other week, but then studying and life got in the way.

                                                                          

Maybe it was for the best though. Time dulled his feelings enough that he could stop thinking of her and feeling the loss of what they’d never had. He never really bothered to look for anyone else though, preferring his solitude more often than not.

So it was more than a surprise when he’d walked out of a class to see her leaning against the wall outside the lecture theatre. He almost didn’t recognise her, she was dressed in corporate wear you’d expect to see on a business woman going to a conference, not a university student. She exuded a confidence that was a far cry from the little girl in a tutu.

“What brings you here?” he asked, sliding in next to her. He left a respectful inch between their bodies – ever the gentleman.

“Alec?” she’d said, looking surprised.

He tried not to let her surprise bring him down but his heart definitely felt a jab. She hadn’t been here to see him then. Hadn’t even known he was here if her reaction was anything to go by.

“Ariana,” a girl in his class called out. He’d noticed her before of course. Not many female engineers in their course. She wore a fedora dipped on her head to make her look mysterious enough to have people second glancing as they passed her by. He hadn’t been as enraptured by her though, she was nothing compared to Ariana.

Ariana’s beaming smile when she saw the other girl was enough to let him know that this was who she’d come to see though.

“Mel,” she greeted. “Alec, this is Mel, my girlfriend. Mel, this is Alec, one of my best friends since primary school.”

Alec and Mel exchanged pleasantries. There was a look in Mel’s eye which definitely felt like pity, but he refused to acknowledge it.

He was bigger than this.

He had to be bigger than this.

“If you ladies will excuse me,” he said. Tipping his head slightly as stylishly as he could, all the while feeling like maybe he’d been left behind long ago and just didn’t realise it.

“We should catch up Alec,” Ariana called out. He nodded noncommittally and hoped that he came across as suave instead of wounded.

He managed to hold everything in until he got back to his apartment. The apartment he shared with James’ sister, Dani, because she was somehow at the same university as him while James was off in another country “doing his thing”.

His first sob sounded like a wounded animal. The second and third just reconfirmed it. He hadn’t even managed to get past the entry hall. He leaned back against the front door and let his feelings overwhelm him.

One more minute.

One more minute and then he’d let this go and be the bigger man. He just needed one more minute to let the pain he’d been carrying with him go. Ariana had never even considered him as a possibility.

“Alec?”

Alec opened his eyes. He hadn’t even realised he’d closed them. James’ sister stood an arm’s length away, looking like she had no idea what to do. James’ sister had definitely taken all the better genes from their parents. He’d always noted, somewhat offhandedly, that she was a very beautiful woman. He’d also quickly dismissed all notions of ever making it into anything more than just a passing comment. For one, James would kill him. For two, he’d always somehow held some kind of hope that he’d get with Ariana.

“Alec, what happened” she asked.

Had he not responded? He’d meant to. He tried opening his mouth to, but all that came out was another sob.

He snapped his mouth shut and tried to keep the next one in. His eyes closing as he concentrated on controlling his body.

Arms wrapped around him just as he took a deep breath and he could almost taste the cinnamon that she had in her perfume. Or was that her natural smell?

He breathed deeper. Her scent, or maybe her arms, calming him down faster than his useless attempts to control himself. He was down to sniffling when she spoke next.

“What happened?” she whispered. It was as though she was terrified that he’d break down again if she asked him any louder.

“The end of a childhood crush,” he’d replied. He had been aiming for strong but his voice sounded hoarse and a little broken.

She nodded and stroked his back. He could feel himself calming down faster than any hugs from Ariana ever calmed him. Which was when he’d had his epiphany.

Dani was perfect.

All the little things she always did for him, like make sure his cereal was well stocked because he threw tantrums whenever they ran out. She watched stupid television shows with him so that they could gripe about it together. And to make matters worse, she was absolutely stunning.

Dani was amazing.

She would make sure there was enough food in the fridge, ready for him to eat, whenever exams rolled around. She would make sure that the coffee was on in the morning before he woke up because he wasn’t all that functional without it. And somehow, she always knew when he was in a bad mood or had a shit day, tossing him the remote so that he could pick out something to watch while she grabbed junk food.

Dani was off limits.

Because let’s face it. She was still James’ little sister. And Alec, ever the gentleman, had promised James that he’d protect her from any douches who would try and date her.

He’d done a pretty good job of that too, most boys didn’t last the second date. He’d perfected his glare to the point where the last boy had practically run away after Dani had opened the door to their first date. She’d turned around to face him and she’d shrugged with a look of pure innocence and confusion. He really didn’t have any idea why he’d run away like that.

It was a shame though, she’d looked absolutely stunning in the dress she’d chosen for the date. Could anyone really blame him if he’d suggested that since she was already dressed for a night out that they grab something to eat together since he was hungry anyway?

Though…does that mean they were dating already?

He tried to think back on the last week. They’d spent most of it together, either on the couch or out for dinner (classes notwithstanding). Then he tried to think back further, when had they stopped hiding out in their rooms and instead had been hanging out with each other instead?

It’d had to be months. He’d been dating her for months and he didn’t even realise. Or practically dating anyway, it’s not like they’d kissed before.

James was going to kill him.

He pulled back abruptly and only managed to pull her on top of him as he crashed to the floor, his head banging against the door.

“Alec?” she asked. Looking way more concerned that he’d bumped his head than acknowledging their potentially dating status.

“I umm…” he trailed off. What was he meant to even say? Sorry, but I just realised we’d practically been dating and wasn’t sure if letting you hug me was a good idea?

“Alec, she’s a fool if she didn’t let you in,” Dani said. He blinked at her. Who were they talking about? He was in the middle of processing his revelation!

“Time to go,” he said.

Before she could even really react, he’d rolled her off him and ran to his room, slamming it closed as he hyperventilated.

And for the first time in years, he put his hand on a small tattoo he had on the inside of his wrist.

Running away may not have been the solution, but it was seriously starting to feel like a solution. He picked up his phone and was calling James before he could second guess what he was doing.

“What’s up Alec?” he asked.

“Any chance you could do with a second person on your mission?”

“I thought you’d quit the business.”

“I’ve reconsidered.”

Alec was tossing clothes into a small duffel as James gave him instructions on where to go and how to join the mission. A full debrief could wait until he got on the plane.

“Seriously though, is everything okay?” James finally asked.

“Just need a few days to work something out,” Alec replied. He zipped up his duffel and stared at his bedroom door.

“Are you running away from something?” James asked.

“Not really, more like I had an epiphany and need some time to process it,” Alec replied.

“Alright then, see you tomorrow morning then. I’ll get everything arranged,” James said.

“Until tomorrow,” Alec promised. He hung up quickly and then hesitated. Was he meant to say bye to his kind of girlfriend?

Deciding that he was emotionally too stunted to handle this right now, he turned to his bedroom window and climbed out. Climbing down the side of a five storey building to avoid the awkwardness of talking to the girl who you’re potentially dating was probably a little drastic, but he’d climbed out windows for worse reasons in his life.

I Miss You

So, my friend and I are planning on getting back into drawing/writing, respectively. We randomly generated two nouns and have about a month to draw/write something appropriate to cover both words.

Here's my first attempt.

Words: Estate and Piano
Date: Jan 2017

I looked up. The house stared back at me. It was one of those typical period piece houses, complete with the rolling green hills and the creepy empty windows.

I wanted to run away as fast as I could. This was the start of a horror movie. I could feel it.

Before I could convince myself to turn around, the front door opened and a kind old lady looked at me expectantly. The cynical part of me half expected her to do a creepy grin or something else vaguely horror-movie-esque but all she did was smile genially at me.

I sighed and tried to smile back as pleasingly as I could. Her smile hesitated and I wondered if I should practice my smiles more in future, but she’d already changed her smile to a full blown “welcome” smile so I mentally shrugged and walked up the stairs.

“Did you have a good ride in then?” she asked. Even her voice was sweet. I’ll admit that I had expected some kind of husky or gravelly voice but it was all just pleasant. I really need to stop watching horror movies.

“It was very comfortable,” I replied. Well, the seats were anyway. The driver was probably the reason I’d started assuming I was stuck in some kind of horror story.

She nodded amiably as though she wanted me to elaborate but before she could say words to the effect, the husky and gravelly voice I’d expected her to have cut in from behind me and I grit my teeth to stop myself from jumping.

“Take our guest to the third East wing guest bedroom,” said the commanding voice. The sweet old lady in front of me nodded, the smile practically ripped from her face before she shuffled towards the stairs, waving me along behind her.

I risked a glance back and noticed a much younger looking woman still standing by the door. Her eyes were boring into me and I had to whip my head back around to face the stairs and the little old lady before she could see the fear in my eyes. If she was part of those old school horror stories, she could probably smell it already though.

This was a great start. A kind old lady who is old enough to be my grandmother and a scary young lady around my age. What could possibly go wrong with this entire scenario?

The climb up the stairs was longer than I’d originally anticipated. By the time we started walking along corridors, I was tired and by the third turn down another identical corridor, I was thoroughly lost. I didn’t even bother to try and work out where I was anymore. If I was going to die here, I could cross “being in a horror movie” off my list.

“I apologise for the lady of the house,” said the old lady.

The smile had returned to her face, though with significantly less ease as before.

I shrugged slightly and gave a half grin in reply. “It could have been worse,” I replied.

I mentally banged my head against a wall. How on earth could that meeting have been any worse than it already was?

The old lady seemed to take it at face value though and her smile returned to its former glory. A few more turns down various corridors and she stopped at a door…identical to every other door we had walked past.

“I’ll come back to fetch you for dinner later,” she said. “You just get comfortable in here. This house is a maze when you first arrive.”

I nodded and turned the door handle as she shuffled back down the corridor and disappeared around the corner. I took a deep breath. If I was going to die, or get the scare of my life, this is probably where it would happen.

I flung the door open and clenched my hands into fists. If a ghost came at me, I would probably die, if anything else did…I would still probably die, but I’d look cool in the process.

The room was empty.

Well, it had the bed and other various furniture pieces but no ghosts, no monsters and nothing else that looked like it could kill me. I poked my head in and took a quick survey just in case I’d missed something around the side but it stayed nice and empty.

“Is it to your liking?”

I screamed. A little. I definitely died on the inside. I also twirled around like in one of those awesome fighting movies, fists raised and everything. I probably looked like an idiot; I’m strong enough to admit that.

The younger lady from the front door raised an amused eyebrow but said nothing else.

“It’s perfect,” I replied, my voice sounded only slightly strangled. I was so proud of myself. She seemed to want to say something but settled on just looking at me with a part amused and part sceptical look.

“Your luggage has arrived and will be delivered shortly,” she informed me. I nodded and opened my mouth to reply but she’d already turned and was walking back down the corridor.

I felt my heart rate return to something more normal.

This was going to be a long night.

***

I am a pianist.

Or I was. A long time ago. I’d given it up around the time that my brother had passed away.

That was probably five years ago now in real world terms. It feels like centuries though.

Don’t get me wrong. We didn’t get along all the time. He was an absolute jerk and I was an absolute jackass, but he was still my brother. I would give anything to have him back in my life again.

In the first year, my family and friends were obviously concerned and did everything they could to avoid talking about him. By the second year, the therapist told them to start talking to me about him, I refused to engage. The next three years after that was full of silence and awkwardness and people slowly but surely giving up.

I had a day job. It was a great day job even. At least it paid decently well, but piano? Piano was what I came home to. It was what took me to other worlds and gave me a purpose. So it was understandable that everyone had hoped that I would get back to playing to grieve. It probably would have helped too. One small problem though:

I refused to touch a piano.

They didn’t know why, and I refused to tell them. It sounds dramatic, and don’t get me wrong, I can see that it probably would have helped if I’d explained it to them, but they would never understand. They’d try to placate me and at the end of the day, nothing was going to bring him back and no amount of playing was going to fix this.

See, my brother couldn’t play a piano to save his life. He tried, but as much as he appreciated music, he just couldn’t get the notes to play what he wanted them to. Hand me a piano and I’d just make up something on the spot, hand it to him and he’d press a few keys and make decent music but he always felt inferior.

It was okay though, because what I could do with a piano, he could do with a violin. So whenever we met up, we’d do duets.

The day he died, he was meant to be meeting me for a duet. We were going to record our first song in an actual studio. It was going to be epic. We’d practiced it so many time, we could practically play it in our sleep. It would never sell any copies, but it was on both of our bucket lists and it would have been the best day ever. Something to keep and remember each other by for the rest of our lives.

Except he was late.

He was always late to things though, so it wasn’t a big deal. I’d cursed him a few thousand times in my head whilst I was apologising to the recording studio guy and trying to argue that surely I don’t have to pay the overpriced fee if we aren’t actually in the studio yet.

Our recording time went from 8 hours to 4 hours left. I sent him thousands of voicemails; each of them swearing at him. Telling him how expensive this whole thing is; complaining that it’s not easy taking time off work to do this when I’m 80% sure the boss wants to fire me. Telling him that if he doesn’t show in the next two hours, there was no way we’d have enough time to record anything other than rushed sound bites.

By the time there was two hours left, I’d paid the recording manager for the day wasted and gone home. I left him a final voicemail that he’d better be dead because nothing else was going to make me forgive him.

I forgave him.

***

The night air was cool on my skin.

This was the last resort. My family had decided that pretending to eat and pretending to live was a terrible way to go about life. I’d been fired because I was subpar to begin with and just went to absolutely horrendous after my brother’s death. I also didn’t put massive amounts of effort into looking for another job. Even the therapist seemed ready to give up on me.

So here I was. In an estate in the middle of nowhere. A last ditch “reboot” apparently. Whatever that means.

Before prescribing it though, the therapist and I had the weirdest conversation.

She’d asked if meeting my brother again would fix anything. I had shrugged, because really, even I’m not sure what’s wrong with me. She’d asked me if playing a duet with him would make me feel some kind of closure. I’d shrugged again because, sure…the whole recording studio debacle had happened but the duet wasn’t exactly something I’d hold him to in the afterlife.

She’d eventually just said that maybe the only person who could give me closure now was my brother. Part of me had wanted to laugh at her, because seriously? That’s the amazing news she had after ripping hundreds of dollars from my family? Even I could guess that but the dead don’t answer to the living…no matter how much you plead for them to.

The sound of a violin on the wind caught my attention.

At first I thought maybe someone else in the estate was awake and playing, but then I realised that I recognised the song. I recognised it because it was the same song I’d written with my brother for the recording studio.

I had to be dreaming. I hadn’t slept properly in five years, it wasn’t exactly the first time I’d heard the sounds of his violin mixing with my piano like all the times we’d practised.

But there was no piano.

I grit my teeth and shivered as a particularly strong gust of wind chilled me to the bone. “The Estate” was apparently a place for wayward souls to reconnect out in the countryside. That’s what the brochure had said. Nowhere in that glossy piece of paper did it say that ghosts were real and would scare the living crap out of you.

But if it was my brother…if it was him…

I turned towards the sound of the violin. It seemed to be coming from a floor further up. I slipped back into the room and went into the corridors of the house. It was way past bedtime. Dinner had been a quiet, albeit awkward affair. I’d met the other inhabitants, all 23 other wayward souls, and watched as the kind/stern contrast of the two ladies seemed to keep them all in line.

We’d then all departed for our rooms to stay there the rest of the night. I must have stood on that balcony longer than I’d realised if even the corridor lights had been turned down. According to the fact sheet that had come with my luggage, they would only dim at midnight to conserve electricity but still let you wander out without it being pitch black should you need to.

I took advantage of that now and wandered through the corridors. If my guess was right, I’d need to turn left at the next corridor and then turn right again. I could hear a very faint hum of the violin and it seemed to approve of my path because it grew louder as I walked.

I finally reached a stairway and climbed up a few more floors before reaching a small landing. And on the top of that landing? My brother.

I froze. Because seriously…dead looks good on him. I’d always been jealous of how good looking he was, especially when it came to getting things his way.

He put the violin down and stood, watching, waiting. It was almost like he wanted me to make the first move.

“Hi,” I said.

Yes. I spent years thinking of what I’d say to my brother if I ever saw him again, and I settled on “hi”, colour me old fashioned.

He smirked at me as though he knew exactly what I had been thinking, as though he knew how much thought had gone into the word, as though he knew just how important this moment was to me.

“Hi,” he replied.

His voice was the same as before. It was the same slightly arrogant and slightly annoying voice my brother always had when he was talking to me. As though he knew better; knew best.

“You’re dead,” I said. Okay. I’ve deviated from my carefully constructed script. Though to be fair, his reply had completely ruined it already anyway. Somehow my thought processes had always assumed he’d be unable to reply. Probably because I watch too many horror movies and ghosts don’t seem to speak properly in those things.

“And you’re alive,” he replied. See? Jerk.

I reached out to touch him. His skin was warm, as though he was still alive, as though he was actually standing in front of me. I didn’t hesitate; I just threw my arms around him. He seemed to sense how important this was to me because a split second later, his arms were around me and squeezing me just as hard. I felt the tears fall before I could even form the thoughts required to stop them.

My brother was here. Nothing else seemed to matter.

“I’m sorry,” he said. I pulled back and looked at him. If anyone should be apologising, it should be me.

“No,” he said. See? Mind-reading.

“What do you mean?” I finally asked. Just in case mind-reading was a lie.

“I’m dead. I know everything,” he said, slight laugh in his voice. Again…jerk.

“I’m sorry because dying is easy. Living is hard,” he said. His voice was solemn now. His face serious, and I had to clench my jaw because it wasn’t fair.

This was why I’d stopped playing. This was why I couldn’t get over it. Because he’d left me behind.

We were meant to spend the rest of our lives annoying the crap out of each other. We were meant to have that stupid recorded song to remind ourselves after one of us had passed. We were meant to remember everything forever and here he’d left me behind. He’d left me behind to live without him, without anything to remember him by.

Photos and home videos weren’t what tied us together. Music was, and we’d never recorded anything. We’d never bothered. What was the point of recording our practises when we have them every week? That recording session was meant to be our first and last recording. Music didn’t make sense without him.

“You need to try though,” he said.

I scoffed. I couldn’t help it. He’d been the laziest person in the family, what would he know about trying.

“I never had to try because you’d do the work for me,” he explained. I was really starting to hate this mind-reading shit.

“I never had to try because everything I wanted, you’d help me get. So this is me, telling you to do this for me, because you’ll obviously never do it for yourself.”

I glared at him. I was starting to remember why I would have wanted him dead. He always seemed to tell me how to live my life.

“Because you were always going to have a better life than me!” he exclaimed. I frowned in confusion.

“You were the smarter one; you were the friendlier one. I lived in your shadow for so long I’d forgotten that I could make one for myself and by the time I realised, it was so hard. But you helped me pick myself out of my self-imposed gutter and you helped me get a job. You kept me sane. Every single one of our practise sessions made me feel like I belonged. You saved me,” he explained.

“So it’s my turn to save you,” he continued. Ignoring my continued confusion.

“You have to play. You have to play because it will help you remember. You have to play because when you play, the world will make more sense, I promise.”

While I didn’t fully understand, I nodded and he gave me a half grin.

“You’ll get it. Just play,” he said. I sighed.

He pulled me into another hug and then took a long look at me at arm’s length.

“Thank you,” he said. It was probably the most sincere I’d ever heard him.

A loud clang sounded from somewhere nearby and he let me go.

“Time’s up,” he said. “Promise you’ll play for me?”

I nodded again. The words stuck in my throat as I realised I may actually never see him again.

***

I woke up in my bed.

I frowned in confusion with a healthy dash of trepidation. Last night, or my dream, or whatever the hell it was, felt real. Real enough that for the first time in five years I could feel a song in my fingertips.

Real enough that I realised that all this time, I’d forgiven my brother for dying but I’d never forgiven him for leaving me behind.

Real enough that I could see the kind old lady standing at the end of my bed…wait, what?