Shadow Love (World Collisions) [#1]

Stripes in Every Which Way

In life, and as humans, there will always be something you obsess over. Whatever that thing is can define you as a person in society. If you're into something weird, then you're weird, you're into something suspicious, then you're suspicious. It goes on like that. The list is never ending and especially when you go into the weird and suspicious things. It just never ends. What's my point?

My friend, let's call them Alice, was one of those people...that could be considered weird, or suspicious. They were...really into death. Not that they would mention it every time you saw them, but they would mention it a lot if they had the chance to.

I had asked Alice once why they were so obsessive over death and their only response was that death surrounds us, it's inevitable. That we might as well accept it. It didn't really answer my question on why they obsessed over it, but I had figured it was going to be an answer as much as I could get from them.

Alice wasn't much of an explainer, more of a duer kind of person.

So, it had not surprised me that they didn't answer me really. Maybe that's why I didn't really answer Alice's question when they had asked me the same question. Maybe that's why I am answering it now. Maybe in some way I hope Alice would choose me over Gregor, their boyfriend, but the truth is I know they're never going to choose me. I know they're happy with their life and I should move on from them. So, here is my moving on letter to myself.

Dear, Me
I know life seems hard right now and it's hard to move on from things. But, it must happen for life to move on and you are being left behind. So, leave behind your sorrows and remind yourself that life does not end, but it continues and so you must continue.

Sincerely,
Robert Leyson.

As lame as it sounds it was a good letter.

I nod my head to my thoughts and I pick up the letter from my desk and I fold it in thirds as I store into my desk with the others. They were reminders of the past and what I had told myself to move on from. I look longer and longer and I keep looking till I start to blank out and I start to realize that the letters are formed in a way of being striped.

That is my obsession after all; stripes.

I remember once when I first told my mother she told me I would end up alone and dead as my father told me I would end up in prison and die there. Both did not have a positive view on my obsession, but I could only think that maybe they were telling the truth. My mother gambled in being a seer and my father quite literally gambled away our money when I was younger. It didn't help that they would abuse my little sibling, Pip, when I was younger. I think if I grew up with a different background then maybe I would be a different person, maybe I would have a different view on things.

I sigh as I roll a cigar in my fingers and I look around for the lighter. Just as I'm about to light the cigar my phone buzzes off. I take one look at the caller ID before putting down the cigar and picking up my phone.

"Hello?" My voice was gruff and carried an annoyed tone with it as I lazily looked around my room.

"Don't hello me! You're late!" I sighed once again and I could hear the person on the phone gasp dramatically. "ROBERT!"

"I'm coming, I'm coming." I hang up the call abruptly and I stand to my full height as I throw on a jacket and head out of my house.

As I walk to the nearest bar I wonder what I'm doing with my life. It's all starting to fade to becoming the same thing. The same pattern, the same stripes.

"NICOLAS I TOLD YOU TO BE MORE CAREFUL!" A scream and shout could be heard throughout the house and I cower under my blankets. I knew I was going to get it. I just knew it.