Mark lifted his head slightly from his
pillow, revealing faded lines across half his face where the
pillowcase scrunched under him in the night. The alarm clock flashed
2:30 in glaring, bright red figures. AM or PM he asked
himself. A basement apartment can stay dark year round with the
right curtains, and over the last year he'd developed a taste for the
dark. As he relaxed his head back down to the pillow, a gleam of
sunlight caught his eye. “PM”, he acknowledged into his pillow
with a sigh.
He cocked his head to the side, face
drooping, eyes fading in and out on his surroundings. So this is
my life he though to himself. A statement made everyday upon
waking, upon glimpsing the shattered remnants of a once productive,
happy life. His life, or what it used to be.
Surrounded by the past, by memories of
good times only made the bleak situation seem worse. And any minute
a voice would be calling down the basement steps asking for signs of
life in a cheerful, sarcastic, and condescending way that only a
parent can muster when speaking to a child.
“Are
you alive?” they'll ask. “Are you going to get up sometime
today?”. And then
there was his favorite, “Jesus
Christ, it's almost 3 in the afternoon, are you gonna get your ass up
and look for a job today or what?”.
Only his father would use that one. His mother was always much more
diplomatic. Even though she didn't understand what her son was going
through, she tried to be sympathetic. But
for Dad, for Dad it's all about laziness. I'm just a lazy kid. With
that thought a small wisp of fire stirred in the pit of his stomach.
Anger. Anger for the man who not only didn't understand, but who
actively tried to make things worse. Relentlessly prodding his only
son deeper and deeper into the basement. And
just like that, as quickly as it ignited, the flame flickers and
fades to smoke.
Mark
lays there, unmoved, exhausted from his slight tango with a solid
emotion. The cool nothingness slowly creeps back into his bones as
he reaches down to the side of the bed and shifts his gaze towards
the TV. With the flick of a button, he's normal again, numb.
Sedated from the world, from the past, from himself.
