And It Begins.

I Can't, But I Might.

   She places half a shoe into the theater. 

   Dark, she thinks. Why am I here?

   Grand, but lonely. Not a single soul occupies the room- the air is thick and unclaimed. Red velvet seats lay untouched and the small stage begs to bestow the happiness and laughter it's meant for.

   I can't, she reasons to herself, ready to take a step back.

   But she takes a step forward.

   Nervous, she takes another, soft steps echoing throughout the still empty room. She stops. Tugging on the bottom of her t-shirt: Nervous, nervous, nervous. What am I doing?

   Abruptly, she stumbles forward, and inevitably takes a few more steps towards the ramshackle stairs of the stage. Somebody had shoved her! 

   She whips around to a purple-haired girl. "Hey!" She shouts more loudly than intended. "What was that for?"

   The girl looks at her. "You want to be up on stage, right?"

   "...I might." Our protagonist narrows her eyes.

   She smiles. "Then go up there!"

   Her eyes widen, staring at the girl that so seemingly appeared out of the air. "What?"

   "Go!" Repeats the purple headed preteen, "Go up there! No one else is using it, anyway."

   As if given a signal from a director, the preteen then rolls her eyes and takes her by the arm, pulling her onto the first step. Then the second. She skips the collapsing third step by herself, suddenly on stage. The other girl skips back down and plops down in a dust-covered seat in the first row.

   The protagonist makes her way to the middle of the stage, noticing a microphone. She takes it.

   The microphone screams and she holds it away from her, waiting for it to stop. It's sound clings to the walls of the now less-empty theater.

   "Say something." Says the girl. 

   "What do I say?" She whispers back.

   "Anything!"

   She holds the microphone closer now, clearing her throat. "Uhh... Hi." She begins. "My name is... Kalixy."

   The creaky door opens to the theater, and someone else runs in. A red haired girl with a scarf. She takes a seat.

   "I like to draw and write." Kalixy continues, "And also sing."

   The red haired girl wiggles and flings her hand into the air. "I like to draw too!"

   The purple haired girl joins in. "Me too!"

    Kalixy's eyes brighten, grasping the microphone tighter. The door swings open once again, and this time is left open, as a small boy leisurely walks in. He looks around, seeing the dark room, the few people, and then noticing the closed curtains. He goes over and opens them, extreme light suddenly filtering into the room. He sits down by that window.

   Kalixy tries to think of other things to say. "My hair used to be long, but I cut it. So now it's like this." She motions to her less-than-chin length black hair. 

   A couple more people enter, and she waves a meager wave. Some people wave back.

  Kalixy subtly rocks back and forth on her heels as she says, "I think rights for LGBT people are important."

   Someone that just walked in gets up and leaves, so she ceases to say anything else.

   A woman wearing a headscarf stands up in the still silence and says, "Don't mind the other people! Just keep talking!"

   She glances around the theater and a few people nod, so she takes a breath. "Okay. I also think treating religious and ethnic minorities equally are important. And environmental issues deserve some attention, too."

   Two people saunter out, but for that, three others come in. Kalixy grows more confident, maybe more brave.

   "Do people agree with me here?"

   Most people immediately raise their hands, and a person with short brown hair answers, "We wouldn't be here if we didn't!"

   Kalixy giggles at this. "Okay, okay, that's great."

   Someone shouts over the crowd, "So your artistically inclined and care too much, what else do you do?"

   She frowned a little. "......Well, I can be depressed, and not know what to do. I can sit in a chair for hours and just stare out the window." Kalixy began to choke on her words, "but that's..... that's not what I want to do anymore. That's why I'm here.... Do you guys want to come on stage with me?"

   As the crowd grows larger, the first few people to help her on stage run up the creaky stairs to join her. Red. Purple. Brown. Black. Nice colors.

   Now, the room is crowded. The room is still dusty, but not in a melancholic way. Laughter and happiness is the stage, and light bounces of the corners of the velvet room. The air is flowing. The air is claimed.

   "This isn't finished yet, whatever it is, and it won't ever be. This isn't a thing that can be finished. Friendship, cruelty, and the essence of living are all one big cycle that revolves around us. And only we can make it happen."

   I couldn't, but I might've, so I did.

   And this is why I am here.