all blue

The Morning.

“When you've got small words to mould, And you can make 'em your own, Still love it would be much better, Love it would be much better, I'm told,” Devendra Banhart sang to me in his jangle cherub voice from inside my silver and black music maker. A sighing rollover later it was 11:30 A.M. on a Wednesday and I was galloping to my Saab, out my door and to my horses. Late. My speakers were strangely silent the whole way.

Walking through the mud I saw two perfect faces staring at me. Their little pointy tip ears and black flying saucer eyes were screaming in the silence. Late. I hummed them their favorite tune as I fed them.

Lily had her face buried in alfalfa shake, little green and purple flowerettes were sprinkled about her face. Puck instead of eating just hung his head at my hips, nudging my pockets every now and then. Between my broken hums, there were weeps; like malfunctioning hardware. Puck was always very empathetic.

The Afternoon.

“You’re doing our laundry? You hardly ever do your own laundry, whatssup?”

“I dunno, I just you know, didn’t have anything else to do. I slept through class this morning and they don’t need me at work.”

“Uh huh… What? You gotta take everyone’s spare change too?”

“Finders fee, Dad.”

“What the fuck Nicole? I took your car to get the paper this morning and your tank was on empty, I told you to never get a fuel injection that low. You slept in through class again, I don’t even fucking remember the last time you got your ass out of bed and went. Your last year in high school you wouldn’t even skip a class to get lunch with your ol’ man”

“Daddy, jus’ please...”

“Please what? Please what? I’m your father, this is my job. You’re doing laundry to put gas in your tank, I’m not fucking stupid. Eighty fuckin’ cents isn’t going to get you anywhere sweetheart.”

“Dad, I have to feed my horses.”

“So stop skipping work, you never used to be like this. Are you on drugs?”

“Yeah Dad, you should know, I smoke them with you.”

“Shut the fuck up and listen to me, I don’t know why you took such a 180, but GET YOUR FUCKIN’ SHIT TOGETHER.”

“I’ll work on it, Dad.”

Evening.

“Yeah, I’m totally come meet you at the show,” I droned into my new, white, cell phone. White March snow fell and ran up and over my windshield in streaking flight as I spoke with Alex. “I know, I know, your brother will be sad if I don’t make it. I’ll be there for sure. How much is it to get in? ...Oh five? Yeah, no problem.”

I had left my little sister a scribbled note in her pant’s pocket “I will pay you back $10 on payday, Love Cocoa Bean.” Five dollars to the gas tank, five dollars to admission. My horses were good on feed until payday, and if I came up short there was other hay around…to borrow.

I pulled off rubber muck boots while leaning on the silver tail of my car. The mud had cradled them so that my hands have a fine lining of reddish dirt even after being cautious to not get them dirty. I looked over my shoulder, watching my horses eating their dinner while a white glittering dust of snow came down over them. Before I stepped into my car, I buttoned in all my wrenched guts in my big wool trench. I kept them from seeping out, suffocating them, with my white woolen scarf.

The drive from my horses to Alex’s little brother’s show was filled with the quiet conversation between my tires and the sound of the snow slithering around them and splashing under my car. I still couldn’t bring myself to turn on my stereo. I stepped out of my car and softly clapped my way to the auditorium entrance. Above the door, a big black bow was collecting snow. I saw little solemn faces sticking to its dark damp bark and staring back at me. I don’t know how long I stood looking before I felt Alex’s hand grab my arm and pull me inside the doors.

Alex and I giggled before the intermission, but in during the second half his eyes closed and his head cocked to the side of his seat. I looked up to the stage. Phoebe Lamb, the beautiful head girl and president of the Thespian club at Centaurus High School, my high school, was giving her well rehearsed-monologue. She was a sophomore when I graduated, and used to look up to me. Now I was looking up to her on the stage and wondering if she would manage to fuck her life up as fast as I did.

Dues Ex Machina. Night.

“Fuck this fuck this fuck this fuck this I can’t live like this. I CAN’T LIVE LIKE THIS ANYMORE. The clouds are so gray. Gray, gray, gray fucking GRAY, I’m like fucking SWISS cheese and the light is just seeping through me. When you've got small words to mould, And you can make 'em your own, Still love it would be much better, Love it would be much better, I'm told. The lights! The lights they are seeping through me and I am them and FUCK. Holy Fuck!”

The truck driver was a smoke stack. He towered above me and kept asking me if I needed to go to a hospital in plumes of cigarette haze. His Mac was about 500 yards from where he was standing above me next to my parked and running car. His brights had started to blink on and off for some reason, causing him to look up at the road from his comatose state and noticed a two small headlights suddenly swerving into his lane. He heaved his truck over into the shoulder and braked. When he walked back over to the rogue sedan, seeing the driver huddled over in the snowy shoulder, sobbing. He told me he’d be real upset except it seems like I was upset enough for the both of us. He wished me luck after I had calmed down and we both went on our way.

The Drive to Alex’s, Midnight and a Half.

“Calm down. Nicole. Please. Calm down. Please, calm down. What happened?”

“I…I…I drove into oncoming traffic because I…I…it was so quiet and I…I…I think I lost my mind. Oh my god, I saw bright light and then I just threw eww ewww eww my car into park and and and…”

“You did what? You did what? Are you o.k.? Where are you? Do I need to come get you? Where are you?”

“I’m…I’m driving. I might run out of gas. Then you… you… you might have to come get me. I’m coming to your… your…YOUR HOUSE! Is, is that o.k.?”

“Yes. Yes. Yes…Yes. Just get here?”

“I’m ummm, coming.”

Denouement

I buried my face in Alex’s jacket. It was corduroy and beige and the arms of the jacket moved slowly around my shoulders releasing all the wrenched entrails I had kept in with my own. As we walked to his car I saw two black eye marks below his chest pocket.

We drove in almost complete silence up to Chataqua, where we parked Alex’s little blue car and sat on the hood. The Gods were staring back at us with their solemn stone faces; the Flatirons seemed to be glowing in the dark. Frosted pines were frozen in place and lit up by the slits of moonlight seeping through the clouds.

I don’t know how long we sat there before Alex put his hand on my arm releasing everything I had inside me. All the blues, grays, blacks and reds flowed out of me until I was white.