Chapter Two Something Concrete 4 страница

“You have enough classes in school,” he stated promptly, detaching his gaze from my own and starting to cut up his ham. He ground the knife extra hard into the meat, causing a high pitched scratching sound to fill the room along with his voice once he finally hit the ceramic of the plate.

“I have a spare still,” I informed my father, suppressing the cringe I felt inside me from the ear shattering noise. I had to be serious with this if I wanted anything.

“Isn’t it too late in the semester, dear?” my mother cut in, folding her hands together on the table and leaning in. Her voice was soft and concerning, but she wasn’t concerned for me. Just my father who was still cutting his meat up into little pieces.

“No, I don’t think so,” I answered, darting my eyes between the two of them. I’m an only child and I’ve always hated this part of the game. Two parents on one kid; the odds weren’t in my favor. I didn’t have enough people on my team. Even if I had a sibling and we hated each other, I had a feeling we’d still back each other up, just to spite our parents. But I was alone now. And I needed to keep on talking. “Even if it is too late, I’m sure I could catch up. I could take a beginner’s guitar course in school. I’d be stuck with a bunch of grade nines but I guess that would be worth it.”

I shifted my gaze again but nothing had changed except my father had run out of meat to cut and my mom who merely pursed her lips and looked to be thinking hard. About my father, no less.

“I don’t know, honey…” she trialed off, her eyes meeting my dad’s across the table. He shoved a piece of meat in his mouth, giving me a chance to cut in.

“I don’t have to take a course at the school,” I jumped in searching my mind for anything. “There are probably some courses at the community centre. It shouldn’t be too much money…”

My father cut me off, still talking with the half mangled piece of meat in his mouth. “If it costs money, then I’m not paying for it. Especially when you can get it for free.”

Despite my anger of him cutting me off and rejecting my idea, I used what he said to my advantage. “I can get it for free at school, if you let me take the course.”

My dad’s movements stopped and I could feel his body stiffen, releasing tension across the table to my mother and spreading it to the side where I sat.

“Honey, I don’t think it’s a good idea,” my mother informed me quietly, slipping one of her hands down on the white tablecloth. “You should be using your spare time for studying. We want you to get good grades and get a job –“

“And guitar playing doesn’t bring you a good job. Just a bad reputation and a lot of wasted years.” My dad’s voice cut in and out so quick, it left an icy chill in its place. I couldn’t help but laugh at my mother’s comment – there was no way I had ever used my spare time to study; it got me into more trouble. But I felt myself become outraged at my father’s words more. So much that my own almost got stuck in my throat as I choked them out.

“But – but –“ I breathed quick, my hand gripping my neck. I felt like I was being suffocated, but found nothing there. “You used to play guitar, dad.”

“So take it from someone who knows what they’re talking about,” was all he said to my remark. And that apparently, was all the answer I ever needed. My mom cut in then, calming her ‘boys’ down. And though she placed her hands down folded, a smile on her face satisfied with the negotiating she had done, it was clear neither me nor my father were quite the happy campers she envisioned us as. My dad wolfed down his food in a haze of grunts and labored breaths while I just stared at the food I did not want to eat. I still tasted the wine in my mouth then, and it made me even madder. How could I have a creative outlook, if I didn’t have parents who supported me?

“I don’t understand why –“ I began to talk again, unsure of where I was going but not allowed to find out. My dad cut me off, snapping his head up from his food and shooting me a death glare.

“The conversation is over, Frank.”

My mouth hung open, words muted but thoughts coming full force. For once, my dad was right though. The conversation was over. It was over because I wasn’t going to be taking anymore of this shit. I placed my palms down on the table sternly, looked at both my mother and father before murmuring a harsh and snide, “Excuse me.”

I didn’t wait for their response to my semi-polite exit and merely turned my back to them and walked right out of the room, food still on my plate as cold as my father’s heart ever would be.

*

When I got to my room, I saw my guitar lying on my bed idly, as sick as it was before. I felt my stomach surge and I suddenly wanted to throw the fucking thing out the window, just to put it out of its misery. It was violently ill, from too many years of not playing and not caring. And at that moment, though I knew I could be the one to save it, I felt like I was only killing it further by getting its hopes up. It seemed like a better idea to just throw it out my bedroom window and watch it smash into a million little pieces than to watch the already dull wood fade day by day. But instead, I stuffed my anger deep down inside of me and kicked the first thing I saw. It was my pale yellow garbage can and its contents went spiraling all over my room. It was nothing but paper, dead pens and the occasional pop can but it scattered the room like the first snowfall. The mess only made me sigh even more, feeling my anger swell within me.

The only thing that kept running through my mind over and over again was how I had let down Gerard. I kept seeing the older man’s excited face when I told him about how I used to play guitar. His eyes had lit up. He had been happy. He was always happy, but this was different. He was happy with me, happy for me. We were a lot a like then. He had his art and I had my music. But now, my guitar fantasy was taken away. And I didn’t even want to see the fucking instrument, let alone Gerard’s sad face tomorrow when I saw him. If I saw him. I was even starting to doubt that as well.

“Fuck,” was all I could say or think. I hadn’t eaten or drank anything much since the wine at Gerard’s place, and usually when I didn’t get enough food into me, my thinking patterns jumped all over the place. No other words came to me and all of the sounds around me were muffled. It would have taken me years to calm down if it were not for the some logical sense of information I kept inside my head. Whenever I got into moods like these, where I would be so angry smoke would come out of my ears, I needed to talk to someone. I needed to get out of the house and go for a walk. Or I needed to eat something. But since the last two involved actually getting out of the secluded area of my room, I opted for the first one.

I grabbed the white phone receiver next to my bed and dialed Sam’s number. I chewed on my finger nail as I heard the rings reverberate into my ear over and over again. I was about to give up and throw the phone out the window (followed by the guitar) when finally I heard Sam’s voice. Only it wasn’t exactly Sam; the octave level was lower and much more lethargic. I heard other voices in the background and incessant giggling followed by chatter.

“Hello?” I called into the receiver, thrown off by the other racket. “Sam?”

“Hey!” the voice on the other end cooed into the phone. It was excited and inebriated with all the wrong things. “Yeah… It’s Sam.” There was a muffled noise at the other end of the phone, more giggling and Sam shouting to someone “You gotta share that shit!” And then I realized it; they were getting high. And high without me.

I felt a twang of jealousy added with the reverent anger I had for my dad. Sam and Travis (I recognized the incessant talking as his constant babble speak) were getting high without me, and it looked as if they had someone there as well. They were replacing me? About half a year ago we had decided to stop the constant intake of the blessed leaf, only because it was making us so fucking dumb and we were forgetting shit all the time. But it appeared that I was the only one who actually stopped, and they were still forgetting things; like inviting me along. It wasn’t that I really wanted pot all that much, I didn’t like the way it made me feel after I used it; stupid and fat because I usually ate three times my body weight when we did it. But I hated how they had just not bothered to ask me. And when I had called, they were talking to me (when they did) like the forgetting was nothing. For the most part, as I tried to shoot questions at Sam all I got was muffled laughter.

“Sam, why didn’t you invite me?” I asked for about the sixth time. My grip on the phone receiver sent my knuckles into a shade of ivory that matched the object I was holding onto for dear life. Or certain social death.

“I thought you didn’t like this shit anymore,” Sam replied, breathing out heavily. God, I could fucking smell it over the phone.

“I do,” I lied, gritting my teeth. “Can I come over too?”

There was silence for awhile in the sense that Sam said nothing to me, but murmured to the people in the background. It sounded like they were having a debate over my simple question. Most of the time, I just had to say the words and Sam came over or I was allowed there. But now they were debating? Fuck no.

“I really need to talk to you, Sam,” I said into the phone sternly and I wasn’t lying. Usually when my dad bitched me out, Sam was there. His dad wasn’t a perfect angel either; he had lived through the war and done his duty in the military. Sam and I understood each other in our father dilemmas. But now he was changing his ways and so was I. Though my voice was stern as I talked, presenting a harsh exterior, you could hear me cracking. And Sam didn’t appear to hear me at all. He came back a few seconds later, the drugs still littering and fucking with his voice.

“No,” was all he said. There was a commotion of noises, sounding as if the phone had been dropped. Then it just went dead.

I didn’t believe what he had said until I heard the dial tone echo in my ear. I threw the phone down onto my messy bed and stood up again, found nothing to kick and instead ran my hands threw my hair, tugging on some strands, feeling the root detach from my skull.

Fuck you, Sam. Fuck you, Dad. Fuck you fucking everyone. The thoughts and curses poured into my mind. I had been having an actual decent day and it had been shot to shit. I felt so trapped right then, walking around my room, my hands flailing unsure of where to go or concentrate on. I was stuck in this room the four walls around me, suffocating me. I couldn’t leave, I couldn’t move. I didn’t have anyplace to go. My eyes darted around the room violently - and then I saw it.

My shirt and pants that I had had to throw out the day before. The ones streaked and stained with the blue paint Gerard had thrown on us from atop the balcony. They had been in my trash can and when I had kicked it, I failed to notice where they fell. But now I saw them. They were more than clothes then, they were works of art. And Gerard’s words came into my head from our conversation on the park bench. You should have kept them.

Gerard knew those pieces of clothing were a work of art. He knew that guitar was a creative outlet. And he knew we were a lot alike. I stared at the clothing, the art, the creative outlet that I was missing. And I knew I had to go to Gerard’s the next day. I knew that if I didn’t go, then my room, my family, my friends and even myself would eventually fold in all around me, suffocating me entirely.

I reached down and grabbed the shirt from the ground it rested on. I gripped it in my hands, feeling the ridges of the dried paint on the polyester fabric. I felt all it represented and I knew it didn’t belong in a garbage can, just like my guitar didn’t belong in the closet. And I didn’t belong in this house. This shirt needed to be shown, to be known and it needed to say a giant ‘fuck you’ to everyone who didn’t understand.

Taking what little courage I had left, I walked forward and nailed the shirt to my door.

Chapter Five
Red

The next day, a weird sensation filtered through my body. I could never quite pinpoint where it came from; whether it was deep in my gut that kept churning so much I could barely eat a thing or if it started in my head which raced with hundred-mile an hour thoughts that only made the room spin and my head ache. I could also never quite pin down the exact emotion I was feeling too. I didn’t know if it was fear that Sam and Travis would find out where I was going after school, nervousness because of where I was going or excitement because I would get to see Gerard again. I couldn’t tell anything anymore; all I knew is that I kept looking at the white clock with red and black numbers willing it to go faster and faster.

In all my years of high school, I had been pretty good at making time go by faster and pissing it away. When all the teachers did sometimes was give you busy work while they slept on their desks, you learn pretty quick how to either make use of the free time they gave you or piss it all away. And for the most part, I’d piss it all away. I’d sit and stare at walls, count how many kids I knew in the room that had probably gotten high and then having staring contests with the second hands of the clock. I was getting pretty good at tricking myself into thinking time was going faster than it really was. I’d extrapolate how much longer I’d have to wait in class, so when the bell finally did ring, the half an hour I told myself I had left would really only feel like five minutes. Today was no exception to my clock antics. And finally, when that fucking bell did ring, I jumped out of my seat and headed out into the dreary streets of Jersey, making my way to Gerard’s filing cabinet apartment.

Most of the time, Travis or Sam would wait for me after school, by the bike rack to see if I wanted to do anything. But ever since the phone call the night before where they totally and completely blew me off, I had been ignoring them. I met up with them in the morning, (merely out of force of habit) where we had said stale hellos to each other. Sam’s eyes were still red rimmed and water logged and I could tell that he was still semi-high from the night before. He had probably fallen asleep in the room where they all had lit up, causing his eyes to still retain the distinct features of a night smoked away. Travis, as usual, smelt like the pot he had consumed and was still wearing his clothes from the day prior. No one but me would have noticed that small detail since Travis usually blends into the background anyway, only being picked out of a crowd by his smell.

The three of us had waited in the hallway for our teachers to come and open the classroom doors for our first period when we met. Sam clung to Travis’ side instinctively, knowing that out of the three of us, he would be the one to save him. Travis was the one with the drugs; he was the important friend. Even if Sam and I had known each other since we were five years old, Sam would sell me down the river for Travis, if it meant he would always have his lifetime supply of pot. And honestly, for the most part I would have been hurt. I didn’t have many friends as it was and I tried to cling to the ones I was able to keep like a leech. But in the morning all I could feel was resentment and a weird twist of hope mixed in with it. Sam and I may not have been as close anymore, but that didn’t matter. I had plans after school now; I didn’t need to deal with my drugged up best friend and our dealer underling. I had a job to do. I was going to be cleaning paintbrushes for free alcohol from the fag artist. It wasn’t perfect, but any job I had had before ever came close to it. And it gave me a good feeling, knowing that I didn’t have to depend on my friends anymore. I walked out of the school with a confidence I didn’t know I had.

However, my confidence crumbled beneath me as I reached the gray area where Gerard’s apartment stood. The streets were always black here for some reason, whether it had rained the day before or not. I found it ironic that as I looked around at the bleakness of the alleyways behind the liquor store and the dilapidated dull appearance of the apartment building that inside all of this, inside the top floor in a small apartment lived such vivid life of colour. Not the shades that I was normally accustomed to. But real life colours; reds, purples, greens and oranges. Colours I could touch and feel, and now they were waiting for me.

Gerard’s home had struck a chord in my mind the day prior. It was so bright and full of life; something that Jersey was sorely lacking in most areas. Gerard’s house was an escape from the tedium around me. But it was getting to that rainbow of hope that was the hard part. I felt so out of place, crossing the street over to the red and rust brick building. I opened the big steel door that was heavier than I had anticipated and began to work my way up the creaking stairs slowly, to not draw attention to myself. There had been a call button system at the front of the building, but when I tried the black knob, no sound had emitted from it. And when I tried the other buttons, I realized that the system was long broken and probably hadn’t been working in years. Knowing John, the super of the building and what his drinking habits were like, it didn’t surprise me. So I had pushed on ahead, slightly scared of the people I may find in the stairwell. Other than Gerard living in this building, I had a feeling it was frequented by many drug dealers and other shady characters. As I passed the doorway for that I believed was the second floor, I heard loud yelling and drunken footsteps, colliding into walls coming closer. It scared the shit out of me and made me run the rest of the way up the flights of stairs until I was finally at Gerard’s olive green door, panting hard and waiting for him to answer my knock.

“Welcome!” I heard Gerard’s distinct chipper and deep sing-song voice enter my ears. He opened the door with exaggerated movements, spreading his arms out wide and letting me enter the small apartment like it was some famous villa. It really was however, when compared with the other pieces of shit that were located in the same area.

I nodded a hello greeting and walked into the spacious apartment slowly. I looked around again, studying the area once more as if I had not been there the day prior. I guess I had expected something to change, but when I was still met with the same overturn canvasses and split paint puddles, I adjusted my thoughts.

“I already gave you the tour yesterday,” Gerard started, invading my thoughts. He was wearing all black as usual, his tight pants hugging the contours of his long legs and thick thighs. This time however, he was wearing a blazer instead of a jacket, hung loosely over his broad shoulders. It was a black like the rest of his attire, but gray and white threads ran through it, cross-stitching and creating an interesting blend of colours. As I entered the room fully and went closer to him, I noticed a weird blotch of white fabric over the left lapel of the jacket. I squinted at it, trying to make out what it could be, but came up with nothing. Gerard must have seen my confused expression because he quipped in quickly.

“It’s a dove,” he answered, lifting his eyebrows up and cocking his head slightly. He ran his finger along the line of his lapel smoothly and flicked it out slightly; causing the patch of fabric to protrude, practically fly off his jacket, giving me a better look. And once he told me what the blob was suppose to be, I guess I could sort of see what he was getting at. The white globule had two other parts branching off from it with jagged edges, which I could only assume to be wings. It was a rather harsh and comical depiction of such a miraculous bird that it didn’t really fit with anything, but as I met with Gerard’s eyes who displayed his patch proudly, I realized that it definitely fit with Gerard.

“It’s nice,” I said, only really half lying about what I saw. I backed away from my closer inspection and began to look around the room more. And that’s when my eyes fell on something I had never seen before. Off in the corner to the room, where the giant window met with the mural wall was something I had thought was an old fashioned stand up lamp. The stand had been a brass colour with a beige shade over it. But now, the supposed lamp still had a brass stand but the shade was not a shade at all, it was a cage of some kind.

I began to walk closer to the object, hearing Gerard follow close behind, his hands pressed behind his back. I could hear his breathing change to somewhat of a chuckle and I just knew he had a huge smile planted on his devious face. Finally, I reached the object of my focal point and began to study it. It indeed was a cage, not a lamp at all. Its bars met at a knob at the top of the cage, then filtered down making a dome shape where inside there was a wooden perch, dug at many times by small claw marks. There was seed inside, everywhere but the dish that it was supposed to be placed in. And in the centre of the cage, sitting pleasantly with its head cocked to the side, looking at me just as strangely as I was looking at it, rested a bird.

The bird’s feathers were smooth over its body, slicking to its skin like a fluffy layer jacket. It was a fawn colour, creamy white at some places like near its tail feathers. There was a small taupe ring around its neck, almost resembling a noose. Its small beady black eyes looked at me and I saw its small throat vibrate as its coos began to fall out of its mouth and fill my ear. It was honestly the weirdest and most beautiful thing I had ever seen. And it was right in the middle of Gerard’s fucking living room.

“I see you have met my prized possession,” Gerard stated smugly. He was standing behind me as I poked my nose into the bird’s cage, rocking back and forth on the balls of his feet. He was about to say something else before I cut him off.

“Why on earth do you have a pigeon in your living room?” Despite it being very beautiful, I couldn’t help the fact that this bird looked so much like the animal that most people hated and tried to get rid of. Weren’t pigeons supposed to be rats of the sky? And Gerard had one in his living room. It was in a cage and it was very clean, but still, I could not get over the striking similarities between the animal I was looking at and the ones that I saw in the local park all the time, ripping apart left over bags of food.

“It’s a dove!” Gerard exclaimed, almost sharply, taking a lot of offence to my misunderstanding of the bird before me. Gerard walked forward, stepping beside me and sticking his fingers in the cage, calling his bird over to him. He looked at me who still stood hunched over wide mouthed at the animal, and gave me a snide look. For the first time ever he actually seemed offended by one of my innocent and ignorant remarks.

“I thought doves were supposed to be white?” I asked, trying to explain myself.

“Not all of them are,” Gerard explained, his voice easing down and becoming more sympathetic. It seemed that he had to remind himself yet again that I was only a teenager. A teenager who was not caught up in all of these fine arts. Yet, anyway.

Gerard removed his fingers from inside the cage and began to fiddle with the small door to the side of it. I watched in amazement as he unlocked the piece and stuck his hand fully inside, grasping the small and fragile bird in his smooth hands. Gerard tugged the bird out of its safe environment with such ease and gentility that I was amazed. If this creature really was a dove, then the way the bird perched itself on his hands after being removed from this cage, bobbing its head along and cooing made everything else seem ten times as magical.

“Why do you have a dove?” I asked slowly, still watching the bird as its claw-like feet gripped into Gerard’s skin. It looked like it hurt, but Gerard’s grin merely grew larger as the bird began to walk up and down his hand. The way Gerard’s eyes lit up as he played with this dove made my heart skip a beat. He looked so happy, so in love and so childlike. He was playing with a myth that all of us wanted to touch at some point or another. Only Gerard was actually lucky enough to hold it in his hand and keep it in his apartment.

“Why wouldn’t I have a dove?” Gerard smiled, finally taking his eyes off the bird and looking me straight in the eye. I shut my gaping mouth immediately, hearing my jaw crack slightly as I did so with such speed. He merely smiled again and took his index finger on the other hand, gently caressing the folded feathers. The dove purred and cooed, bobbing its head more, but never made the attempt to fly away. I thought doves were only found in the wild, which made this act ever more remarkable in my mind.

“Do you want to hold her?” Gerard asked suddenly, holding out the hand the small creature was perched on. I jumped back instinctively. For some reason, when I was a child I was always afraid of birds. I think my mother had told me once that the plague was passed through tainted bird feathers and that had scarred me for my entire life. I hated birds when I was younger and always freaked out when someone picked up a feather. My fear had subsided only a little bit as I grew up. I could handle being around birds more without having a fit, but holding them was another story in general.

“Um, no,” I answered back, biting my lip slightly. I shifted my weight away from the creature, trying not to be offensive. Seeing Gerard’s face fall slightly from my actions, I added a quick lie to make things better again. “Maybe later.”

Gerard shrugged, getting over my move quickly and began to pat his pet again. “You’ll get used to her soon,” he stated, his eyes focused back on her off-white feathers. A sly smile suddenly spread across his face as an idea formed in his mind. “After all, you’ll be helping me clean her cage as part of your duties around here.”

“Really?” I asked, twisting my face in exasperation. I thought I had only agreed to help out with his paint supplies. There was no consultation to cleaning up bird shit.

Gerard sighed with mock aggravation, chiding me humorously. “Don’t be so bent out of shape about it, Frank!” he teased, batting me slightly with his one free hand as he began to put his dove away. He closed the cage door, made a kissing face at his pet before he turned away, over to his mural and inspected some insignificant detail and then continued. “You’ll come to learn soon enough that doves are wonderful creatures.”

I traced my eyes back over to the cage. I watched as the small bird came down off of its perch and began to nibble at the bits of seeds on the cage floor. I cocked an eyebrow, failing to see how spectacular this bird was. In myths and stories, it was awesome, but in real life, it was just ordinary.

“How so?” I asked Gerard skeptically, still studying the bird.

Gerard sighed over zealously again before he continued. “Doves are the peace keepers of us all.”

“But those are white doves,” I argued. I wasn’t that stupid to not know that detail about doves. I had read about the war and the peacekeepers and the dove with the olive branch. I knew the myth and the legends. But those were something special; something unattainable. “Your dove is brown,” I argued again. “It looks like a pigeon.” And a pigeon, in my mind was nothing to be proud of.

“Your missing the point, Frank,” Gerard interjected, shaking his head, his dark raven locks falling over his large forehead. “Just because it’s brown – more like an ash colour, by the way – doesn’t mean it’s not a dove. Not all doves are white. That’s just like saying all interior designers are gay and all witches are bad.”

I stared at Gerard, the most confused look planted on my face. “Aren’t they?”

“No!” Gerard expressed enthusiastically. He wasn’t mad at me for not getting it, he was more happy that he was teaching me. And though thoroughly confused, I was happy to be learning.

“Don’t you see, Frank? There is always an exception! This dove…” Gerard paused, moving himself over to place a hand on the top curve of the cage, “she’s an exception. Just like you and me.”

I nodded my head slowly, bits and pieces of what he was saying slowly sinking in. “Wait,” I requested, my eyes scanning the ground in front of me, head reeling with thoughts. “What are we exceptions to?”

Gerard smiled wide, bearing his stained tiny teeth. The lines around his mouth grew even deeper, showing how much joy he was putting into this once action. “We’ll just have to see, now, wont we?” was all he could say, leaving me standing there staring at him, speechless. I was beginning to think that this man liked to confuse me every single chance he got. What was I the exception to? I wasn’t in any of the examples he mentioned. I wasn’t an interior designer (thank God) or a witch. And I wasn’t a dove, as far as I was concerned. What could I be an exception to then? And more importantly, what was he an exception to?

“Besides,” Gerard’s voice interrupted my thoughts again. His countenance was cheerful and playful, twisting slightly to add his last remark with minimal bitterness this time. “My dove is not a pigeon! They may come from the same family of birds, but that’s like saying you’re exactly like your father.”