Could have… Part 2

“我只要旅途愉快,
停哪一站都不算壞”

“A joyful journey is all I ask, The stop isn’t of importance…”

She closed the metal screen door then slid the rusted safety gate over it; She wouldn’t miss the creaky-clanky squeal of either at all. Deciding to run down the 3 flights of stairs rather than wait for the elevator she dashed off – keeping a light, quick pace; not wanting to sink into thought or reasoning – but rather needing to keep the fire of hatred alight in order for things actually get carried out this time around….”No Gloria…stop it! it’s not worth it, you’ll be just fine; there’s so much to live for, please don’t, your grandma will miss you, your puppy is waiting for you to pick her back up, life goes on anyways and-” SHUT UP!!! SHUT THE FUCK UP!!! That voice needed killing off, It’s promises were empty and appeal dulled. She had been fooled by it one too many times and it wasn’t going to get the better of the situation presently.

Pup-pup-pup-pup-crang-pup-pup-pup-crang-pup….. the sound permeated the air as her Sketchers pink minnie mouse sneakers she got as a birthday gift from her grandmother scratched up against the course, uneven concrete stairs. The grey of the concrete, the pink of her shoes, the redness of her eyes, the yellowish tinge to her hand…why were things getting so vivid? Gloria had been semi color blind all her life – shocking pink looked like strawberry milk to her; but now everything was popping out at her….she hadn’t taken the water yet…what could have been happening to her? Thud-thud-thud went her little heart as colors popped, scenes raced, and her body found itself finally out of the estate building and on the busy sidewalk. Doesn’t matter if I am going crazy anyways, it’ll all be over so soon….so soon….the clammy hand reached for the water bottle strapped to her backpack’s right side, she paused only a moment to steady herself and twist the green cap off the bottle. Drink, drink, drink, lick lips, replace cap. There was a pace of 10 blocks in front of her – the other half of the bottle would be saved for the half way mark.

Jog-jog-jog, tick-tick-tick. The world did indeed seem more colorful, lush and vivid but she shut it all out – or at least she tried. The glimpse of a flower, a smiling face, a newspaper, or a plate of food occasionally made it’s way into her registry and might have even touched her, such trifles. Can’t let them get in the way of the mission at hand. Her chest felt clenched – the concoction was taking effect quicker than she thought – the briskness of the walk just upped about 10 times at notice of the condition.
The backpack’s main compartment came unzipped as her iPhone got fished out and she clutched it for all that was dear as she kept running – faster with each pace. She tapped that contact – just as she had thousands of times previously; and put the device to her ear….ring…..”Hi, You’ve reached **&* please leave a message and I’ll call you back”, tapped “End” – called again…..ring…..”Hi, You’ve reached…”…..the process was repeated 4 times more before the following message flashed across her screen:

“Can you stop calling me please? As I won’t take your call regardless, Thank you”

8 blocks to go.

“We need to talk!! I need to talk!! Don’t I matter anymore??! Your strategy of not talking isn’t helping anything!!”

8 blocks and a quarter.

“It’s not a strategy, it’s a feeling. I can’t deal with you”

“And please don’t touch my brother again or we will sue you for sexual harassment”

Full stop with chest booming.

“What are you talking about? I don’t even know your brother! WTF would I touch him?”

Instantly –

“We have proof – it’s on the security cameras”

Instantly again – with chest booming even harder –

“What did I touch him? where did I? how did I? did I just brush against him accidentally?”

Pause. Resumed course, 6 blocks and a half.

“You pinched/hit his butt”

Full stop again – shards of sweat falling off her forehead.

“Get a professional to examine it before you accuse me of shit you fuckhead, and you be careful of what u say”

Instantly –

“Vice versa. I don’t like to take stress and lies. I live in the REAL world – not some fantasy land”

Chest, throat, and head booming and aching. Phone clicks off.

She reached for her bottle and swigged what remained of it. The bottle got thrown into the recycling compactor across from her.

8 blocks and 3/4 to go.

It seems this was truly meant to be – his messages made the anger in her grow even more hotter, bitter, and blinding. Just what she wanted….
Fucking stupid little fool; Who did HE think he was after all? Worthless, stupid, trivial little shitter. Reality? Who was he to decide what that meant?
Who was fucking he to get all high and mighty with her? WHO THE FUCK WAS HE TO TALK DOWN TO HER?!  She wanted to throttle him, tie him down,
have him flogged, throw that dog prong collar around his neck and pull it over and over again, The thought made her salivate and feel warm inside. But no.
What she was doing was the better course – he would live with guilt everyday of his life afterwards, he would live with the horrible, acidic guilt of her life ending
because of his DIRECT inaction, all because of HIM. That made her feel even warmer inside.

7 and a half blocks to go.

It wouldn’t be her in turmoil anymore, no suffering, no more tears, no more mistakes. No more anything – just eternal bliss with him stringing on in guilt, shame, and horror….
how ideal, how perfect! Yes, the stupid little boy would know the extent of hurt he caused, this maiden he laid wasted to, would be his undoing….Yes, it felt right. It felt good!
everything was coming together and it wouldn’t fail her for once!

7 blocks to go

Her heart raced, she got nervous, clammy – that butterflies in the stomach feel that she always had before she saw him, before he said he was going to call, whenever his texts lit her screens up like fireworks on the bay…….

BOOM…..her body crashed onto the pavement; her eyelids got heavy and she couldn’t breathe. She had taken her potion all too soon and was succumbing before she even reached the destination. She was sad and angry but wasn’t surprised – the last act of her life, thwarted, as was every other action. A crowd of onlookers gathered; she didn’t care – she tried to make herself comfortable as the cyanide ate away at the threads of her tender life and body….the smell of fishballs from the street carts, sound of people clamoring about the innocent passed out young girl before them, and sights of the colorful red and white taxi’s and women’s colorful high heels enraptured her….wait, No, no, NO…….what did she see move AWAY from the crowd?…..Oh god….it was him….with that girl…..they’re hand in hand….no….no…..it can’t be….no…….she tried to scream but she didn’t have the strength left…oh well, he would see the news….and he would get stung then…..

Could have…

“I did my best, it wasn’t much
I couldn’t feel, so I tried to touch
I’ve told the truth, I didn’t come to fool you
And even though it all went wrong
I’ll stand before the Lord of Song
With nothing on my tongue but Hallelujah” – Hallelujah, Leonard Cohen

“YOU’LL BE SORRY! I WILL BE SURE YOU THINK OF ME EVERY SECOND, MINUTE, HOUR, DAY WEEK AND YEAR OF YOUR LIFE AND BE HAUNTED BY THE FACT THAT YOU KILLED ME!”

She tapped the crimson END button on her iPhone and tossed it on her bed. Hot salty beads dripping from her googly eyes as she paced into the bathroom and grabbed that Winnie the Pooh canister, twisting off it’s head with ferocity as if the poor rubber bear she had so loved growing up had turned into her most hated nemesis; reaching into it’s depths, extracting a pill bottle with around a hundred small dollops of white flint. She clutched the bottle, replaced the head onto the canister and went into the small kitchen of the apartment, swung the fridge door open and grabbed a green capped bottle of Watson’s water – running back into her room she slammed the door and with her back pressed against it she twisted the cap off the bottle of water, pried open the pill bottle and poured half it’s contents into the bottle. With her clammy petite hand she replaced the bottle’s cap and swished it around watching the white flint swirl and dance and jump in the fluid like particles in those snow-globes she so loved playing with as a toddler; then settle all at once becoming one with the h2o – seemingly vanished into the beverage but impenetrably having transformed it.

More hot, salty crystals dripped from the corners of her eyes as her lush lips and tender mouth puckered in a tense yet gaping pout as she contemplated the bottle and it’s poison; she reached way back into the depths of her mind and mustered up all the hatred, bitterness, anger, darkness, and destructiveness she could – nothing was going to break the spell and she wasn’t going to be dissuaded into the lies of hope and happiness again. She could taste the pain and hurt – it was sweet.

The bottle got fitted into her polka dot backpack’s mesh side compartment while she swiped the crystals off her cheeks. Grabbing her iPhone, several miscellaneous items as well as a yellowing polaroid frame with teddybears and hearts drawn around the border with black permanent marker; she growled as she huffed and weeped, stuffing her backpack with her trove of belongings.

She then swung a white hoodie with Winnie the Pooh and friends printed all over it, slipped the backpack over her shoulders. Slamming her fist against the light switch as she left the room and clicked the door locked. She held herself together like a iron maiden – she couldn’t allow herself to get sentimental.

“Nui Nui ah! Nei do na lei chui ah?” Her maternal grandmother’s beckoning pierced the tenseness of her mood as she paced across the living room to the door of the apartment.

“Ngoh chu peng you jia, tser dee way lai poh poh” she replied in her grandmother’s favored (and only understood) Shanghainese dialect.

With a glance she pondered her grandmother watching old black and white films on TV, the empty brown and cream dog bed, and the smell of mothballs and chicken noodles in the cramped apartment.

She smiled a weak smile at her grandmother before leaving her home.

“Bye-bye poh poh”.

*******************************************************

My paternal grandmother was Shanghainese herself, something I have in common with Gem Tang, The girl in the picture and the physical manifestation appearance wise of my character. I have been told on many a occasion that I share a resemblance to her (somewhat) and although I do not know her personally, it was after all a song of her’s that sparked something off in my mind to write this short story – that, as well as our shared Shanghainese ancestry (she has more of it than me) is something that makes me wonder if we don’t just have some sort of distant fate together.

The reference to the brown and cream dog bed was a bed that I purchased for Hanabi, a friend of a friend’s white minature American Eskimo that I cared for for two months. She changed alot for me and has left a great deal of emptiness in her absence after her owner picked her back up. She now resides in Dallas, Texas and has left a huge hole in my heart that will never be filled by anything or anyone else.