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Border Community

by Cerpin 

Posted: 29 May 2006
Word Count: 1243
Summary: I wrote this story for a writer's craft project and I would greatly appreciate it if you left any useful comments or suggestions after reading the story. Thank you.


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Content Warning
This piece and/or subsequent comments may contain strong language.


Border Community

Into The Rainbow Vein

I wake up, not wanting to open my eyes, as I am too afraid of what I will see. Too afraid of reality. Too afraid of being alive.
I peel my eyes open, and stare at the ceiling for a few moments as I wait for them to focus. A sharp, piercing scream comes from the other room. It was a scream so loud, it felt like a knife was thrust straight into my ear.
I hastily got up, threw on my tattered blue sweater and headed out of my bedroom door into the hallway. I turn right and walk in the direction of the scream, entering a dull almost depressing room. But I wouldn’t be depressed. There is no point in being depressed, because it just leads to more depression. At first sight, it may seem like I am depressed but that’s just the opposite. I do shitty drugs and listen to shitty music. My life is shit. But I love every minute of it.
I look down at the floor and see my best friend, lying there, sprawled out like a tired cat after having played with a catnip ball. Except replacing the ball is a puddle of puke.
Jen, his girlfriend, is kneeling down beside him crying into her hands. They had been together for a couple months after they met each other at Eclipse, a small downtown nightclub. I wasn’t gonna bother her. She looked like she needed some time alone.
At first glance it appears that he had overdosed on heroine that he does every night before falling asleep. He calls it his midnight smack.
But Jon wasn’t the type of guy that would OD. He was experienced in the ways of Junk, and he knew his stuff. It would be hard for him to overdose too, because of the tolerance he would have built up over the length of his habit.
I guess that he felt it was his time. It was his time to disconnect. But I didn’t care that he was dead. I wasn’t sad, because there wouldn’t be any point in being sad. Jon wouldn’t have wanted me to be sad. He had a good life. He made it last, and he made it worthwhile. He’s the one who taught me that, that’s how life should be lived.
He once said, ’You have to fucking live life man. Just forget about everything else and do whatever you want! What’s the point of working your whole life? Sure, you can make lots of money, but you’ll be too old by the time you can even spend it on anything worthwhile. You gotta live for the moment. Don’t think about what’s gonna happen in five years, two weeks or even one minute. There’s no time for that. All we have time for is having fun then dieing!’

I Get High With A Little Help From My Friends

I wake up, not wanting to open my eyes, as I am too afraid of what I will see. Too afraid of reality. Too afraid of being alive.
I’m lying beside Jon. My eyes are crusted shut from all the tears. I had never cried so much in my life until then. I guess it was because I truly loved him. I could’ve spent the rest of my life with him. And now that he isn’t here, there is no point in living. I’d rather be with him than go on with my life, and the only way to be with him was to disconnect from the so called ’life’ that I was living.
So I get Brad to cook me up a shot. A shot with just a little too much in it. Just enough to send me over the edge. He gets a fresh vein ready and gently pierces it with the needle. First pulling a sample of blood back into the barrel, then firing the deadly concoction straight into me. The feeling is amazing. It’s so fucking amazing. Everything around me slows down and I can’t feel my body, yet I can feel it surging through me. The feeling is so satisfying. It’s like taking your best orgasm, multiplying it by 100, and you’re still nowhere near the feeling. I love it. I can already feel Jon with me. I close my eyes and let him take me.

Darkest Star

I wake up, not wanting to open my eyes, as I am too afraid of what I will see. Too afraid of reality. Too afraid of being alive.
After both of his best friends had died there wasn’t much incentive for Brad to go on with his life. He decided to end his life in the exact same way his friends did. He would do what he loved, and he would have fun doing it. After all, he believed that the meaning of life was to have fun and die, and he would do just that.
Brad preferred to listen to some music when he shot up. He said that not only does heroine give you another outlook on life, but doing it while listening to music creates a whole new dimension inside of that outlook. It enhances the feeling so much, and you just get lost in the music. There is no better feeling.
Brad pulled out a thin vinyl disk out of a flimsy paper sleeve and placed on his turntable. The record reads ’Depeche Mode - Darkest Star (James Holden Dub)’. He gently put the needle on the edge of the record and pressed play.
As the psychedelic and infectious sound blared out of the speakers Brad prepared the hit the same way he prepared Jen’s. He lay on his back; he injected, and let the music take him.

Tarantism

All three went to hell, but for them it seemed like heaven, because they were together again.

Sail To The Moon

I wake up, not wanting to open my eyes, as I am too afraid of what I will see. Too afraid of reality. Too afraid of being alive.
It can’t stop pulsing. I can feel my heart. Thumping, thumping, thumping. It’s getting louder. Beating faster. I’m having trouble breathing. I’m so shaky. I sit up, and look back, only to see myself lying on the floor, face first, in a pool of my own vomit. But how can I see with my eyes firmly shut? I try to open them but it is as if someone has sewed them shut. I start panicking and my heart keeps beating faster and faster. I stand up and try and take one step, but as I go to put my foot down, I don’t feel anything under me. All I feel is the air rushing by me as I plunge into the abyss. Everything around me is spinning round and round. I feel so dizzy. I can’t tell if I’m falling or rising. I’m just floating; gliding through the air. This feeling is becoming more and more comforting. My heart is slowing down and the air is getting warmer. Even though I can’t see, it feels as if it is getting brighter. Then I can hear some faint sound coming from off in the distance. A soothing chord rings. And then another. And then enough to make a beautiful and relaxing melody. My heart slows, slows, slows; then comes to a complete stop as I float off into ecstasy.











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Comments by other Members



Becca at 06:44 on 31 May 2006  Report this post
Hi Greg,
I liked the way each new scene begins with the same lines. The title is good as well. My overall crit would be that although there are repeated words used for the purpose of emphasis, there are too many of them, - 'too', 'scream', 'depressing or depression', 'shitty', - and therefore they lose their power to create extra emphasis.
One typo: '... and placed [it]? on his turntable.'
Becca.

Account Closed at 09:51 on 02 June 2006  Report this post
Hello there. Like Becca, I like the repeated first lines for each character's experience - but think maybe you can make that repetition shorter and more punchy?

And I'd be tempted just to tell the story from their different points of view, without putting the more philosophical statements in the middle. Once their particular tale is told, maybe each character can have a short para on their world views and what the death(s) meant to them at the end of their piece? That way, you'd get an echo of repetition at the end as well as at the beginning.

Very dark and sinister though!

A
xxx


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