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The College Years (Chapter 26)
By Vader
THE COLLEGE YEARS
Entry III: Time of Conclusion
Continued from Chapter 25 . . .
CHAPTER 26
It starts with one thing, I don’t know why
It doesn’t even matter how hard you try, keep that in mind
I designed this rhyme to explain in due time
All I know, time is a valuable thing
Watch it fly by as the pendulum swings
Watch it count down to the end of the day
The clock ticks life away it’s so unreal
Didn’t look out below, watch the time go right out the window
Trying to hold on, but didn’t even know
Wasted it all just to watch you go
I kept everything inside and even though I tried it all fell apart
What it meant to me will eventually be a memory
I tried so hard and got so far
But in the end it doesn’t even matter
I had to fall to lose it all
But in the end it doesn’t even matter
One thing, I don’t know why
It doesn’t even matter how hard you try, keep that in mind
I designed this rhyme to remind myslef how
I tried so hard
In spite of the way you were mocking me
Acting like I was part of your property
Remembering all the times you fought with me
I’m surprised it got so far
Things aren’t the way they were before
You wouldn’t even recognize me anymore
Not that you knew me back then
But it all comes back to me in the end
You kept everything inside and even though I tried, it all fell apart
What it meant to me will eventually be a memory of a time when I
I tried so hard and got so far
But in the end it doesn’t even matter
I had to fall to lose it all
But in the end it doesn’t even matter
Light faded into the slowly widening crevice in between my two eyelids, the heaviness and aching pain in my forehead increasing as my scope of vision grew. All I saw were blurry outlines of intermeshed objects, overexposed colors that blended together to impair my ability to distinguish what was what. Sharp pain hit my head like a brick, and I snapped my eyes closed once more, groaning, lifting my sore hands up to cover them.
A low shudder rattled through my eardrums, slow and foreboding, what actually caused it unclear. The sound repeated, sounding slightly higher in inflection, prompting me to try opening my eyes once more to see what it was. I fluttered my lids again, my pupils taking the glaring light more easily after having already been exposed to it once. The blurry shapes became sharper the longer I stared, and formed something I wish I’d never realized – my parents, both sitting over me, in front of the light bulb that hung from the top of a ceiling. “Jack . . .” the ominous tone of my father boomed across the room, whatever room I was in.
All I could do was glare at them, unsure of absolutely everything. I stopped my brain’s wandering, trying to focus on what exactly had happened before I awoke. Within a few moments, it all came back to me . . . the confession . . . the fight . . . the thud . . . the car engine . . . and then . . . nothing. Somehow, someway, during my period of darkness, I’d ended up with my parents. Questions began to pop into my spinning mind, dozens at a time.
For the first time, I panned my eyes across to actually figure out what room I was in. All I needed was a glimpse at the photos of me and my friends from days long gone to realize I was in my own living space. “Jack!” my father spoke again with a raising voice, breaking into my thought process. I moved my face up to them, a strained expression evident.
“How . . . how did I get here?” I whispered quizzically.
“Erin called, and then dropped you off,” my mother spoke, strangely dark in tone and out-of-character. The very mention of Erin’s name resurrected all the sadness I’d felt before blacking out, bringing a sickness to my stomach – all under the scrutiny of my parents. I wished I could’ve just slipped back into the dark world I’d come out of, and leave my pain behind. “What happened?” she demanded sternly. I closed my eyes, gulping, wishing none of this had ever occured. “Tell us,” she stated without budging.
“Please . . . just leave me alone,” I barely whispered, feeling my eyes water as turmoil seeped through my system.
“Tell us now!” my father raised his voice like an irritating barrage of iron hitting my ears. I clenched my fists, my jaw tightening.
“I can’t now,” I struggled.
“Jack, if you don’t tell us what happened, you’ll regret it,” he threatened, only heightening my level of utter frustration and anger to soak my depression.
“Just . . . leave . . . me . . . alone . . . you . . . f**k!” I cried, digging my head into the pillow I lay on, for the first time in my life having strongly cursed at those who’d raised me. I felt a strong arm pull me on the shoulder and shove me against the wall, forcing a gaze into mine. I saw harsh, tormented, questioning eyes that blazed with tears, followed by a smack to the cheek.
“What on earth have you become?” my father questioned, hardly audible, emotion charging through him, his grip on my arm tightening. My mother was in the corner of my eye, her hands raised over her mouth in a shocked gesture. That moment froze, and suddenly impacted me. Here I was, in a room filled with things that should’ve defined who I was: lithographs from the films I grew up with, now barely noticed; artwork from the time when I was a child in a neglected and forgotten binder; books I wrote that had once been looked upon with pride and satisfaction, now forgotten; pictures of me with my friends, a smile on my face, enjoying life. They should have defined who I was . . . they used to. But now, they didn’t.
Without realizing it, I’d become a different person. A person that now spent almost all his time in solitude, and person that separated himself from those he used to love, a person who lied and hurt the woman he cared about, a person that did nothing but dwell in the pit of despair, a person with no hope – being looked upon with fear and bitter remorse by the two people that had given birth to him.
What on earth had I become?
It all unfroze, and it seemed that time had elapsed, and my father was now on his knees, sobbing, my mom at his side.
What on earth had I become?
What on earth had I done?
I moved off of my bed, edging toward the hunched figures that were centered in the middle of my floor. I spread my arms wide reaching around their rapidly rising and falling backs, and rested my chin on my fathers, feeling his teardrops on my hand. I became just like them, bent over, unable to speak, weeping. In that one second, I felt a flashback . . . as if I were a little boy again, wrapping his arms around his dad, feeling secure, sheltered from everything else. It came and it went . . .
“I’m so sorry,” I intensely expressed with mourning. And there we stayed for I don’t know how long, all three of us, in that one room I’d grown up in, the wind howling through the windows, raising the curtains as the gust swept around us.
(More to come)
3/20/2003 8:28:41 PM
(Updated: 3/20/2003 8:58:48 PM)
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