Chamber 6 CH. 7

A bead of sweat trailed down face to the corner of my mouth. I awoke one morning to the fragrant aroma of pancakes, butter, and bacon. The bacon smell had caused my stomach to growl and my eyes to pop open. It was so dark. My mouth had the texture of felt lining. I coughed to clear my itchy throat and squinted in the darkness. Cold glass leaned against my bare feet and something was stuck to my left hand. I tried to brace myself to get up from resting space but I inadvertently slid my arm with a hard thud as my knuckles collided with a hard wall. This time I tried using what was left of my abdominal muscles to sit up instead. As I raised my upper half off the carpeted floor, my head collided with what felt like a ton of hanging fabric. Realization finally hit me square in the mind's eye. I spent another bender in the closet again. "Please don't let there be vomit like last time..." I begged to an unseen entity. I wiped the slobber away from my parched lips. I could feel the skin of my lips peeling like worn out wallpaper. Rubbing the corners of both eyes to release the sandman residue, I inhaled the breakfast scents to arouse my senses. I yawn and peel myself off the carpeted floor and crawl out of my walk-in closet shaking my wedding dress off my  right foot and sliding over all the scattered wedding photos while avoiding empty bottles of wine coolers and mini bar bottles that scattered the closet and my room. I straightened my pajamas before following my nose down the hall to the kitchen. I was glad to not have stairs in this floor plan or my klutzy drunken self would have died. My mother was standing in the kitchen in her night gown with her auburn locks of hair pulled gently back by a hair clip. She was dancing and singing while flipping strips of bacon in the cast iron skillet with her trusty stainless steel spatula with engraved wooden handle that said 'World's Greatest Mom' on it. "Mother..." I started off saying in her direction. "Good morning sleepy head. Feel like some breakfast?" she smiled back. "I think it's time for you to go back home. I appreciate you being here with me while Johnathon is at the hospital and with all the stress of the lawyers bickering. Since you've moved in with me I have gained so much wait that I can't fit my wedding dress anymore. It won't even go past my knees..." I whined at her. "No one forced you to shovel all that food into your mouth. When I make you a plate why don't you try eating only half of it now and save the other half for later like tomorrow?" she crooned back. Then gave a hearty laugh when she saw the look of disappointment on my face. She danced over to me and buried my face in a bear hug that suffocated my breathing. When she finally let go I gasped for air as she laughed and went back to cooking. Seconds later I had a plate of pancakes and plate of bacon with cheesy scrambled eggs. A mother's love. She knows I don't like my eggs touching the syrup. I smiled warmly and jumped up to squeeze her and peck at her cheeks until she became frustrated and ordered "Get off me!" annoyed to the point of smoking. If I reached her limit she would turn to her cigarettes and smoke one or two outside depending on her mood and the given weather. I smiled happily while consuming mother's love on a plate. When I finished I could feel my belly pouch pushing out. I let out a satisfied burp and waddled my full belly to the nearby fabric couch. Too lazy to walk around, I leaned over the back rest and tossed my body into the plush seating for a nap. I watched her finishing her smoke break through the glass door to the backyard until I drifted to sleep again.

Dark Thoughts within the Dark

I'm broken and I know it
So broken don't show it
It's hard to believe
My perspective it deems
all my wishes are dreams
I belong on my knees
and my life no one needs.
It whispers and screams
Awake and asleep
in the back of my mind
Feels heavy but really light.
My thoughts are consumed
by my past and present
my future's irrelevant
when I'm blinded by
this dark cloud of resemblance
my heart trembles resilience.

Happy Nanowrimo (National Novel Writing Month)! Here's a brief for this year's story...

So I've tried this awesome competition multiple times and I even participated in a local write in one year at Irving Library but I always failed to meet the word count. Something was always distracting me or stressing me out. As you can tell I also get bad bouts of writer's block. I'm also pretty lazy not gonna lie. But alas I am still a glutton for punishment and will once again commence the literacy torment upon myself as I struggle to complete a novel this month in good spirit of the literacy program. If I fail, I know the risks of internal damnation and self loathing will haunt my sleep for many nights before the depression sets in again. Knowing this all too well I will still muster the courage to try again and again until I've finally completed a novel and manage to publish for pennies on the dollar. I hope to one day live solely off my writing one day but until that day I will not give up and I shall continue supporting myself with my lowly full time job during the dead of night. Upon doing research on other fellow Nanowrimos I have decided the easiest thing to do to get this novel completed in a timely manner is to 1) write everyday and 2) base the novel on a collection of short stories that may or may not tie together. I think I will base the genre on horror with American Horror Story as my muse. It would be nice if I managed to come out with something as halfway decent as Stephen King but not getting my hopes up for that superb level. Recently listened to the audio book of his novel Doctor Sleep. It was so good and inspiring and gut wrenching; sometimes I even felt disgusted. He definitely has a way with words...

Here's a preview of my new novel:

Tomorrow's Not Ours to See: A recollection of their memories

Suzy

I'm not like most girls. I don't share the same interests. I can't fake their smiles and join in their reindeer games so I keep to myself. I prefer to be alone with my books. The neighbor boy in the blue house next door seems to consider me a friend. I played with him as a child because my mother made me. Our mothers would shop together, drink coffee and gossip every day. Smiling at each other with porcelain teeth, red smiles and curled hair. We would sometimes eavesdrop on our mothers, the neighbor boy and I, when the weather was bad and we were expected to play indoors. As they whispered excitedly, our mothers sounded just like girls at my school. The frivolous conversation bored me to tears. I'm a little older now since I first started associating with the neighbors but not by much.
Old enough to understand most of their conversations. Whenever I heard them use unfamiliar words and phrases I would look them up in my father's study. My father's study had many versions of dictionaries and encyclopedias. I liked to sneak into the room to learn things by myself. I could easily memorize whatever I read but for some reason I had trouble remembering certain things like a person's name once they told me. If I didn't read the name then I would likely forget it. My parents' names were mother and father. I didn't need to know the names they scribbled so carelessly on sheets of paper deemed too important for me to bother with. Today was an especially rainy day. You could barely see anything in front of you if you watched it fall from my porch step.
 The shower of rain was so thick and cloudy white instead of the normal clarity I was accustomed to seeing. The neighbor boy sat beside me in silence as we listened intently to our mothers' conversation. He taps me hard on my exposed shoulder with his bony pale index finger. I break my concentration and turn to look at him absentmindedly and mildly curious at his unspoken request. He breathed so hard from his mouth I could feel his hot breath against my olive skin. I raised an eyebrow at him waiting for an explanation.
"Have you noticed anything different Suzy?" he asked suddenly. "Maybe I would if I could hear our mothers over the sound of your heavy breathing." I responded nonchalantly. "No, that's not what I mean Suzy. Do you notice anything different about me specifically?" he responded while staring intently at me. I noticed his hands were tightening around his kneecaps as he knelt down closely to me on his knees. I stared at him for a moment and then shook my head. "I've finally grown out a mustache Suzy. Father says I am to be a man now. He is encouraging me to work at Paul's Pharmacy on Galloway. School is almost over and I might be a real pharmacist one day. And Suzy..." he belted out hesitantly. The realization of his nervous behavior helped me to catch on to his obvious and meandering request.
 I breathed in slowly prepared for the inevitable. Unexpectedly I felt my body leaning back as he pushed me to the floor. I could feel his heavy body on top of mine as his face hovered over mine. I didn't look away or tried to push him. I just waited silently for the moment to be over. He touched my neck with his finger tips and trailed his left hand from my face,down my neck, across my shoulder, along the crook of my arm until his hand found mine. He gently and slowly brought my hand to his lips and kissed my bare knuckles and the mid section of my ring finger. Then in one gliding motion he stood and lifted me up from the ground. My body spun around in his arms until I could feel him pressed against my backside. He slowly dipped me to the side as if ending a romantic evening of tango.
He whispered confidently into my ear, "Suzy, I want you more and more every day I see you. Sometimes I feel like I can't control myself. I'm sorry if I startled you but I don't want to let you go. Not now, not ever." A sudden chill I have never felt before started from my neck and trickled down my newly found curves to my spine."I'm not afraid of you Jim." I whispered back carelessly. I honestly couldn't remember his name nor did I care to even try to remember it. "Damn it Suzy Q! Why can't you ever say my name? You've called me every name in the damn book. Just say it already. Say my name." he blurted out through gritted teeth as he cupped my chin in his palm with his tight grip. I don't scare easily. His emotional outburst was laughable at best.
I stared blankly at him for a moment. I reacted to his outburst with a taunting smile. "How the hell hard is it for you to remember my name is Jerry?! Jerry. Just say it please?" he begged with an anxious expression on his face. " Will that really suffice if I said your name? You would be easy to please then if it were so. But I know you. You will always want more of me. Even after taking my name from me replacing it with your own. I am not yours and I belong to no one." I retorted with a smirk and hands on my ample hips. I readjusted my plain grey dress and walked back to the parlor table to finish my English homework.
Jerry balled his fists and crackled his knuckles out of frustration. He followed me to the table to return to his own homework as well. "You know our mothers are planning our engagement right? I'm not giving up on you Suzy. I love you." he whispered. I rolled my eyes and sighed. "What do either of us know of love? You are merely 16. You have had as many crushes on girls as your Dad's pharmacy ice cream selection. I am just another flavor of the week to you." I replied with little interest in the conversation as I read the poetry in front of me diligently.
"Suzy, I only told you about those girls to make you jealous but you never reflected my expectation. Do you really feel nothing for me at all not even friendship when we've spent most of our childhood together in this room?" he pleaded with tears filling his regretful eyes. "I feel nothing for you nor anyone else in the world. Not even my own family has received my affections so what would make you think you are so special? You are spoiled and vain. The world does not revolve around you and your needs despite your parent's best efforts.You could die today and I would feel no remorse. I'm incapable of feeling anything at all. Now shut up so I can finish this homework. Maybe if you spent all that unnecessary energy on your studies then you wouldn't need tutoring and could go to college instead of running the family business chain."

Yearning

I'm sipping on this wine
Wondering if you have the time
To show me your devine meaning
Under covered darkness and whispered faith
Until a new dawn breaks and shakes my reality
My youthful spirituality shaped by the curvature of your ambition
Your testament, my sworn dedication
Swollen by our inhibitions.

Reflective Reflex

Random tandem lyrical prose
How I wonder what you wrote
If I shall fall before you break
How many doctors will it take
To mend the hearts in our wake?
1, 2, 3, 4
Life is knocking at your door
5, 6, 7, 8
Just how long will you wait?
9, 10
Think again

Henrietta lost her fella
Went downtown and kissed a fella
Made a mistake and met a snake
What kind of life did she take?
Rich, poor, beautiful, ugly?

Yolo

I don't want to get old
I don't want to grow cold
I don't want to be yours
I don't want to be hers
I don't want to be his
I just want to be missed
Getting lit tonight
Maybe see a fight
DOA number five
Nerd hive gotta stay alive
Yolo with me tonight
I'll show you the sights
When it's dark and no one's awake
I stay up and contemplate
Will I think of better days when I'm weak and grey? 

Or feel like I've left my mark in this day and age.

Modern Writer's Block

It's so hard to write each day
Stuck in a mechanical loop
A film of what I see
Everyday day on the same old screen
Random nothings and sudden alerts
News of news and news that ain't news
An ever lasting plane of digital girth
A land of confusion lost in boredom and intrigue
Will I drown within it's sea?
I crave the unique
But still I seek depth and mystique
From every corner and every side
Hoping to find a self that exists
Beyond the realist and above the plain
Right behind the original strain

L

Lock me up
Lock me tight
So that I can't
Go out tonight.
I'll lose my soul
I'll lose my mind
Somewhere in
The dark of night
Where liquor flows
And spirits dwindle
A passion may soon to kindle.