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~*~ the here and now. ~*~ the done and gone. ~*~ who am i? ~*~ find more like me ~*~
say something to me. ~*~ what they've said about me. ~*~ feel left out? ~*~ get pretty. ~*~

a bedtime story, i suppose...
2009-03-01, 1:29 a.m.

He jumped up from the bed, grabbed the full length mirror from his wall, and threw it through the open window into the garden below. The sudden crash made his cat jump up from her perch on his desk and scurry out of the room. He slammed the bedroom door behind her, almost catching the poor creature's tail.

What the hell am I doing? he thought frantically. He looked at his hands; calloused and wrinkled, they looked like they belonged to someone else - someone twice the age he wanted to be. Exactly the age that he knew he was. He didn't want to believe it. It feels like yesterday, the words racing through his head, that I met Mike and we started the band. He tilted his head back, and squeezed his eyes shut, trying to hold back the stinging saline that was now leaking from his tear ducts.

He heard footsteps coming up the stairs. Quickly, he grabbed the hem of his shirt, and furiously wiped at his eyes. The footsteps stopped at the bedroom door, and everything was quiet for what seemed like an eternity. The knock at the door made him jump, the sharp sound cutting the silence.

"Honey, is everything ok in there?" Her voice sounded timid and soft, as if she were anticipating his answer. "Why did you throw the mirror out the window?" He walked to the door, and whipped it open, watching her vivid red hair sway with the motion. She looked up at him, her eyes betraying the shock, but her face soft and sympathetic. God, she's beautiful.

"Sorry to startle you" he mumbled, turning from the threshold and walking back to the bed, where he flopped down. The guitar jumped, its strings resonating. He turned and picked up the guitar, setting it back in its stand. As Andy looked back up to see Sonja walking towards him, her eyes locked on his face, her mouth gentle. She sat down next to him, seeming afraid to touch him. Andy dispelled her fear by wrapping his arms around her, and she sighed, her slight frame settling into his embrace.

"I know it's hard, Andy." She looked up towards his face, and kissed his neck gently. He turned his head, trying not to let her see the tears welling up in his eyes again.

"You know, you could quit."

He pulled away and looked at her with hard eyes.

"Quit? The band? Are you crazy?" His voice got louder with each word. Sonja sat up, her hands balled up into fists, arms akimbo.

"Yes, quit the band! You know that you can make do without them. You could do a solo album, on your own terms - or you could be a studio musician... You could even just write songs and sell them, for other people to play, you know." She stood and positioned herself in front of him, defiantly.

"What the fuck, Sonja? You think I'm just going to up and leave the band, that I founded, by the way, and let those assholes hire some fucking moron to replace me? You think I'm just going to throw away my entire career?" He stood up, leaning forward to put his face nose to nose with his wife's. "Who do you think wrote every fucking hit we've ever had?"

She steeled her gaze. She wasn't backing down this time.

"You did. I know that. You've written every note of every song that's charted for Twelfth Cannibal. I get it." Sonja tossed her hair, and sighed. "You are the creative driving force behind the 'world's premier speed metal band'," she said, exasperated from the number of times she'd spoken those words. She stepped back and turned away, knowing her next words would sting, and hoping that he wouldn't lash out after she said them. "Don't you think...you're just...I don't know..."

"Just what?" he cried.

Sonja turned back to face him, taking another step back, securing herself out of his reach.

"Don't you think you're getting a little...old for all this?"

Andy puffed up, his face growing red. He opened his mouth, but nothing came out. How does she know what I'm thinking? His mind was racing again, thinking of how pathetic he looked in the mirror, holding his guitar. That was why he'd thrown the mirror out the window; Andy Kiel was tired of seeing himself grow old. But he was more afraid of what people thought of him as he grew old. He'd seen the reviews of their latest album, and the words of those reviews started to float to the top of his mind as if it were a Magic 8 ball.

"Twelfth Cannibal's newest release sounds as aged as the geezers in the band. From the obnoxiously shaky and off-beat percussion (sounds like drummer Marty Matthews is showing signs of Parkinson's) to the clumsy guitar riffs recycled from their previous albums (Andy Kiel, is there some Alzheimer's showing there?), the whole album sounds as tired as the band looks."

Andy choked back the rage welling up inside him, along with the tears welling up in his eyes. Those people don't appreciate how fucking hard we worked on that album, and now, apparently, neither does my wife. My fucking wife! The woman who pledged to stand beside me for the rest of her life! Matt and Marty were right, I shouldn't have married her. She's just looking out for herself, the gold-digging slut.

Sonja took another step back, her eyes now wide with the fear washing over her. He'd never hit her before, but he looked like he was about to. Andy walked toward her and her stomach sank, leaden with terror.

He walked past her, grabbed the chair from his desk, and walked out the bedroom door. Sonja stood in place, frozen. The next thing she heard was the chair crashing down the staircase, and Andy's scream.

His scream was guttural, even primal; the type of scream produced by howler monkeys or women giving birth. Sonja turned slowly towards the bedroom door, as silently as possible. She saw Andy leaning over the staircase, looking down at probably what was left of the chair he'd just flung full-force to the foot of the stair. She stood there, holding her breath, scared to provoke him further. Sonja had always been the only person who knew how to handle Andy's roller coaster emotions and rage-fueled tantrums - it's why they'd gotten married. And for the first time in her marriage, she felt as though she'd lost that mystical power. Her mind started wandering to better days, until he whipped around and stared at her, as though he could hear her daydreams about time long past.

Andy strode towards her, his jaw as clenched as his white-knuckled hands. Sonja's arms rose impulsively, palms outward, preemptively pushing against the body she assumed would quickly collide with hers. She watched his arms rise, hands still clenched into fists as he strode towards her, and she began to shake with dread. The relationship she was in before she stared dating Andy was not a pleasant one, and she feared she was about to relive it. Out of instinct, she squeezed her eyes shut and turned her head to lessen the blow.

Andy stopped, two steps from his wife, scared by her stance. Oh God, she thinks I'm going to hit her! flashed before his eyes, like a headline on the front page of a newspaper, bold and black. His face softened, eyes wide, mouth parted. His hands unclenched, and he gently grasped her wrists. Sonja slowly opened her eyes; the eyes that had been squeezed shut in anticipation of the worst now gazed upon a man that looked sadder than she'd ever seen. Her muscles, tired from bracing so stiffly, weakened as she leaned into him and placed her head on his chest.

"I'm so sorry, my love..." she whispered, trailing off as he embraced her and began to weep. His hot tears flowed into her red hair, his breath wet and warm.

"I'm sorry you thought I was going to hit you... I never meant to hit you, I promise, I would never do that... I love you with every bit of my heart and soul and I would never do to you what that asshole you were with before me did you to and I promise I will never make you think that I'm going to hit you ever again..." He paused from rambling to take a deep, sharp breath in before wailing again. "Sonja, Sonja, please forgive me, please, please, please..." He stopped whimpering for a moment as she pulled away, gazing up into his eyes, which were still flooded with tears and now as red as her hair.

"Andrew Thomas Kiel, I believe you. And I forgive you." She reached up with both hands to wipe the saline from his cheeks, rubbing her thumbs outward under his eyes. His gaze weakened at her touch, his mouth gently turning up at the corners as she smiled up at him. Sonja beamed, her eyes full of love. "Don't worry," she sputtered, holding back the giggle forming in her throat, "I won't tell the guys that the toughest guitarist on the planet was sobbing in my hair."

Andy exploded in laughter, his arms tightening around his wife's slender waist. He lifted her and gently dropped her diminutive frame onto the bed, her hair bouncing around her face. He tackled her, landing on top of her, and kissed her lips gently, desperately trying to push the grief, guilt, and sadness in his mind back with the love he felt for her. He spent the next moments kissing her, silently forming orison in his head, trying to take back all the things he'd thought about the woman who loved him.

Sonja broke the embrace, looked into his eyes, and said, "Ok, Andy. Where do you go from here?"

He shifted his weight, laying down next to her. For the first time in his life, he didn't know what he wanted, and he was strangely alright with that. Tomorrow, he thought, tomorrow I will decide my fate. Tonight I will enjoy my life.

~*~ immediate yesterday. ~*~ divination. ~*~