Gone Remembrances Part 1/2 (408 hits)
Category: Quotes & StoriesRating: 1 on 2 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by DaBaddestHic <jtight.at.usa.com> (View user info) at 2005-06-01 12:50:08 EDT
The man slowed his car to a stop beside the sidewalk on the quiet street. Abruptly the wind blowing through his open windows slowed down to a gentle breeze. There was nobody in sight to scowl at the blaring music emanating from his car, disturbing the peaceful atmosphere of the neighborhood, which was perfectly fine with him. He was here on a mission, and it didn't involve socializing with any of the local inhabitants.
With a turn of his keys the neighborhood returned to its tranquil state. The man undid his seatbelt and exited the car in a single, fluid motion. After closing the door and letting his keys slip back into their proper place in his right pocket, he took a deep breathe and stretched. It had been a long six and a half hour drive, and he was glad to standing up again.
Somewhere in the back of his head a voice was telling him that he was crazy for coming back. He wasn't going to solve anything by being here; in fact, it was only going to make things worse. He should just turn around now - return to his home where he belonged. Back to where his life was.
If you could call that a life.
He shook the thoughts out of his head and started walking down the sidewalk. Sure, he knew this was a last-ditch effort, but it was all he had. If he didn't do something drastic, find some way to calm the battles that were forever taking place inside of him, he knew that he would soon lose it. And who knew what would happen then. Probably end up at some nuthouse with a bunch of people who couldn't remember what they did past ten minutes, yet had a strange affinity for detailing every aspect of the war they'd been in 40 years ago.
That would be if he was lucky.
As he strolled down the sidewalk memories started to attach themselves with his surroundings. There was the curb that he and his friends had found made a great ramp for popping wheelies on their bikes when they were younger. A few houses down he came across the home of one of his earliest crushes. As he passed he looked to the second floor where he knew the girl's bedroom had been. For a second he thought he saw a dream catcher flash by the window. His third grade class had made such decorations one day in school, but there was no way to be sure of what he saw. Not sure of that, nor much of anything anymore.
Not every memory was a good one, but the vast majority of them were, and that was why he was here.
Things had been going downhill in his life for quite a long time. He was 37 now, and had been living in a semi-state of depression since at least eleventh grade, however old he'd been back then. It had all started with the death of his best friend, at the beginning of their freshman year. He'd had other friends, but none who understood and related to him nearly as well. For the next few years after his friend's departure he'd slowly began to lock himself away from the world, spending more and more time alone.
Then his parents had decided to move away from the neighborhood, hoping to take him away from the bad memories. Without knowing it, it had been the stupidest thing they'd ever done.
The problem was his parents had mistaken his withdrawal from those around him as unhappiness. He had never bothered to correct them because he knew they wouldn't understand. As long as they left him alone to do as he pleased he was content. Miserable in everyone else's eyes, but fine to the only person that mattered.
He had known his deceased friend for almost all their lives. Both had been raised in the same neighborhood, and only lived a few houses apart from each other. They'd shared many things; toys, clothes, homework assignments, a few crushes, and even dreams. Most of their dreams had been typical boyhood fantasies that would never have a chance of becoming reality. One had been tangible, however, and this was to build their own tree house in the nearby woods.
Nobody had ever known about their plan. They'd chosen an old tree in the woods that had plenty of strong branches, but not a whole lot of leaves to interfere with their construction. The tree was conveniently located away from most people who might have noticed what they were doing. Not that they were terribly worried about someone stopping them, but they just didn't want to deal with it.
Construction had started almost immediately after they'd chosen their spot. Things went extremely slow, since neither of them had any idea what the hell they were doing, and they certainly weren't going to ask someone else. Those days spent pounding nails into wood, eating lunch while their legs swung freely from the branches, and singing to help pass the time, had hands-down been the best of his life. Nothing bonded two people together quite like building their collective dream. More than once they had to tear something down and reconstruct it because of their inexperience, but they never got discouraged.
And then his friend had died.
It's hard to describe the thoughts and feelings that had consumed him after the loss of his best friend. For at least a week he had been severely crippled, oblivious to what was going on around him. The funeral came and went, dozens of people stopped him to express their grievances over his loss, and he didn't remember a bit of it. Construction on the tree house stopped as quickly as it had begun, as he was afraid of the feelings that might be stirred up in him if he went back.
Finally he'd decided to try and go back to his life. He was quieter than he'd been before, but his grades didn't suffer and he was able to control the angst that was left inside him. Then one day, a couple months after the death, he was wandering aimlessly through the woods and came across the far-from-finished tree house. Up until that point he'd all but forced himself not to think about much of anything involving his deceased friend. Strangely enough, confronting the memories wasn't the mind-numbing experience that he'd been afraid it would be. After a few minutes of just standing there he'd walked over to the tree and climbed onto one of the branches. Sitting in the tree, remembering all the days he and his friend had spent there, he was able to feel at peace for the first time since his friend's passing.
After that day construction on the tree house started back up again. It was even slower than before, but he didn't care. What mattered was that he was happy when he was working, completing the dream that they'd shared. He began to spend more and more time alone in the woods, and his parents started to worry. They tried asking him what was wrong, but he just insisted everything was fine. Which it was.
It had taken nearly two years before the tree house was completed. Well, almost completed that was. All the wood was up, a stow-away ladder built, and all that remained were a bunch of miscellaneous finishing touches; small things he and his friend had discussed they'd put in the house to add to its appeal. He estimated it might take him another month from the time the last board was nailed in place to the time he completed the finishing touches.
That was when his parents told him about the move, which they'd been preparing for behind his back. They didn't give him much time to pack and wrap things up at school or in other areas, including the tree house. He busted his ass to get it all done, disappearing without warning the day before the move to try and finish. To his horror, however, he found that he had forgotten to buy one of the pieces he'd needed, and by the time he went to the store and purchased the item, it was too late to go back to the woods and finish up.
There wasn't time to finish the tree house the following day either. All he could think about as they left the neighborhood for the last time was that he'd failed. In all truth, he hadn't even planned on going back to their private spot in the woods after the house was completed. To him, finishing the project was a cleansing, a way to pay tribute to his dead friend. It was as if he was saying, "Look, I know you're gone, and you don't have any worldly dreams any longer, but you can live out your eternity in peace knowing that I kept things going."
The fact that he'd never be able to say that killed him.
User Reviews
Submitted by spedmonkey (user info) at 2005-06-22 11:17:58 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
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Submitted by Auron (user info) at 2005-06-02 07:20:34 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
The last phrase confused me.