Painful ends (540 hits)
Category: NoneRating: 1.83 on 6 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by Naery (View user info) at 2004-06-26 15:25:08 EDT
"Fine, then just do it!" he screamed, the door slamming in his face. As he turned away from the door and began walking back to the sidewalk, the unshed tears of a dozen months began to leak down the sleek contours of his face. With every step down the walkway, another memory sprang up, unbidden, further shattering his composure.
The first step, the one that dropped down the stair to ground level, brought with it the memory of the 6 week old dog they had bought together charging excitedly head-first into it. As the tears continued unabated, the realization that he would never buy her another pet set in, the realization that this was it, the final straw.
The second step brought the memory of their plans for a family, plans that now had no chance of coming to fruition. He looked left, at the tree where they were going to build a tree house. It would never be built for his children. As he saw his unborn children fade from his mind's eye, a hiccup of pain escaped from behind his lips, a tribute to his promise to name their first-born after one of her parents.
Her parents figured large in his mind as he made the third step, the tears flowing freely, eyelids fluttering uncontrollably. His own parents had never shown him the kind of love and adoration that her parents gave so freely. He had felt almost as if they were his parents, which made this loss even that much more difficult, transforming it from simply losing her to losing his surrogate parents as well.
Four steps away from the door. Four identical muscle contractions. 104 calories back. 4 seconds away and yet lifetimes distant. The memory of that first stunning realization of love, that feeling of wholeness, completion. Another lifetime in itself, as inaccessible as the workings of karma.
Five of his long strides brought him to the gate at the perimeter of the yard, the yard they had spent so long cultivating. As he passed through the gate, he savored the ironic symbolism of a carefully cultivated lawn gone brown by the ravages of an early winter. He turned and shut the gate, latching it securely in place, once again appreciating the irony of his hands latching a gate securely when nothing else in his life was secure.
As he took those first steps away from the gate, heading down the sidewalk, Hope flared bright and painful, the hope that she would come running out of the door and beg him to come home. When he passed the end of the neighbor's yard, that hope died as painfully as it was born, killed by the icy understanding that he would likely never come down this particular street again.
If she hadn't come out yet, she wasn't going to.
User Reviews
Submitted by FilthyAssistant (user info) at 2004-06-27 19:03:22 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I'm sure i already rated this but apparently it must have got lost in the mix. Very well written.
Submitted by munkeypants (user info) at 2004-06-27 18:51:36 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
<clapping and crying>
Submitted by Circe (user info) at 2004-06-27 02:40:36 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Sigh...
Exquisitely well done.
Submitted by Siren (user info) at 2004-06-26 22:29:17 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Mr.Jid (user info) at 2004-06-26 18:46:02 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
Good, but too fuckin melodramtic for a +2
Submitted by Avals (user info) at 2004-06-26 16:18:08 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Damn that was depressing...
Well written.