The Story of How Flynn Wolfhart Found his Muse

Chapter 1

If I hadn't known better I'd have said Flynn was dying. I'm sure there were flames trapped in his rib cage, where his heart ought to be, and he reeked of gasoline. Heat was raising from his chest and smoke escaping his lips. The fire was symbolic of failure and he was alight. He was dying. Like we all are. After all living is just a fancy word for the line in between the two numbers on our tombstones, you just don't know that yet. But Flynn knew, Flynn knew we were all dying. Flynn knew a lot of things, well, he thought he did.

The silhouette of a boy squinted into the sun through his pessimistic shaded eyes-For reference that shade is a brown-ish colour- as he lay in self-pity on his unmade bed, surrounded by papers and laundry. His room was as sad as he. His blinds were yellowed with age and his wall paper was peeling away. The room was dark in most places, and pretty small, some may even say it was disgusting and in need of a makeover, Flynn didn't care though, it was just a room. His lungs felt tight and empty, and he assumed that's what it felt to be a smoker without the smokes. He closed his eyes as the sun began to burn holes in him and reheat the sunburn yesterday left on him.

Flynn was uninspired, bored, passionless. And what was an artist without a passion? A normal person, that's what. Flynn was just a normal person, and the thought of it made his stomach acid fizz. You see friends, Flynn didn't want to be normal, Flynn wanted to be different, perhaps a little too much sometimes, but that's just one Flynn's many, many flaws.

I guess one of his flaws is the inability to write something worth reading, yeah that's a big one. You see Flynn loved creating art, he loved it a lot. And I don't know if there's anything more heart breaking than to see someone be so bad at something they love so much. Flynn was awful at writing. Well no, that's technically a lie, he was great at writing, because he knew all the words in the dictionary. He was awful at writing something that had soul, Flynn had no passion. Bringing us back to flaw no. 1. It was a vicious cycle that was constantly surrounding Flynn.

"Poor Flynn," he grouched into the back of his hand as he shielded himself from the light pouring into his bedroom. The beams bounced around his room, never seeming to settle anywhere, just hopping from corner to corner. The sun's cast was soft, and rose, intertwined with the black of the shade. In one hand Flynn held the sunshine and in the other he held a rejection letter, a rejection letter from a fancy book publisher. Just one rejection letter of many.

Among the many words on the letter few stuck out. His eyes were too blurred with tears to read them all- he was sick of words, he was sick of the fact that he could never put any of them together to make something beautiful, and he was sick of the fact he could not make art the way others could. All Flynn had to read was the phrase 'I'm sorry to inform you..' to know they didn't like his work, to know he had failed, again.

The weight of his own self-defeat scalded his chest, making breathing harder than usual. The sun shone louder and his breathing stopped completely. He was dying. And it was the first time Flynn had acknowledged that he was dying. But I can tell you one thing about Flynn. Although he was very much into self-pity he did not give up. Ever. He sometimes enjoyed when the flames in his chest began to melt him, in a way, it motivated him. So carry on he would and carry on he did.

Flynn's alarm reminded him that staying in bed was not an option, so he listened to it, and got up. The smell of none-existent breakfast pulled him into the kitchen. See, if his family were functional and got along they'd be all in the kitchen, with breakfast cooking, coffee brewing. Dad would be sat doing crosswords at the oak table, he'd kiss Flynn's mother good-bye before he left for work. Flynn's mother would be stood with his sister flipping pancakes, they'd have a small dog sat in between his dad's legs, waiting for scraps and cuddles. But reality made it so his dad would still be out from the night before, kissing liquor bottles instead of his mother. His mother was passed out upstairs, exhausted from night shifts, and little sister was non-existent because one child was enough. Well at least he still had a dog.