Long ways away.

Long ways away.

1 Her. (14)
I was laying in bed, trying to sleep but I ended up thinking about her the whole night. Fantasizing about what we could be, what we might be and what we won't be. I know I have to get back to reality at some point but I'm enjoying this fantasy. She is the most beautiful thing I've seen. Her voice is like no others, one of an angel. Her golden brown hair flows smoothly to her shoulder blades, and covers her back, leaving her forehead exposed. I think about the future, my future, and hers. About us together, married, kids. I was going through a nonexistent timeline that I was making as I go. Planning my whole life with her. At that moment I snapped back to reality and realized how irrational I've gotten over this girl that lives in Pittsburg, when I'm all the way over here in the Windy City. That's 600 miles away. I'm only fourteen. My parents are paranoid skeptics. No way I'm seeing her until I'm at least eighteen. That's four years of trying to keep a steady long distance relationship. How can you keep smalltalk going for 1460 days?
I looked at my clock, and realized how late I was for school. I examined the situation, and decided that there is no way my parents will let me stay home. So I planned out how I was going to make up for twenty minutes that I lost. Eventually, (a grueling twenty minutes later) I'm standing at my bus stop alone as usual. I probably left too early, I can't tell how fast I can walk the mile down my freakishly long street. So I stand there, feet shoulder length apart, hands clasped behind my back waiting. The cold wind stings as it slaps my face.

I get to my locker, and spin the rattling wheel. As soon as I open it a foot closes it shut, I look to the left and I see my friend Daniel and shove him back playfully. I get my things after I open my locker again and we walk up to the third floor of the high school together. Then we start walking towards geometry class and I ask him if we had homework.
"Yeah we had homework, remember? Page 453 in the book 1-48." He says it placidly in his monotone voice.
'No I don't remember' I think to myself as we keep walking, 'that's why I asked.' We get to class pretty early, like we always do, and I pull out my geometry books and a piece of paper and get working on my homework.
A few minutes later I hear music, the musical minute, that is the last minute before the bell rings. I think that it's nice how my school thinks of ways to make the kids happier. And allowing phone in class is a great way to do that. The teacher comes around and checks to make sure my homework is done and he asks where is my work. I reply sassily that I don't work, I'm not allowed to get a workers permit at fourteen. He gives me a look and asks again and I tell him that it's in my head, because it really is. I never do anything on paper, it's too unorganized and it cramps the sheet. But my mind has unlimited space. I can solve problems pretty fast in my head which is how I managed to get 48 problems done in a few minutes. He finally walks past me and moves on to Daniel behind me. I start drifting away, feeling tired considering its 7:30.
I soon jerk awake and see the teacher standing in front of me yet again. I glance at the clock. I fell asleep for a half hour apparently. He asks why I was slacking and I asked sarcastically If I had fallen asleep. No one laughs. He tells me to go to the office and I do. I get an "in school suspension" for the rest of the day.
The dean gives me all my homework then closes the door to the tiny white room. I quickly finish it and think about her. I start to fantasize again and I start sketching her face out. When I finished the paper looked horribly disfigured from my discontent of shape. But I trace what I've done into a clean sheet and I have a nice drawing of a beautiful girl.
When I get off the bus I run to my house, lugging my backpack and coat along. I jump up on the cement stoop and swing my back around so I can access the zipper that guards my house key. I take it out and I fumble it into the snow beside the stoop. I crouch down and look for the hole it fell in when something moves in the corner of my eye. I look to see a fortune from a fortune cookie and wonder how it got there. It read "Fulfill your dream before you wake up."
2. This night. (16)
Later that year my mom and my dad died in a car crash, killed on impact. Me and my brother were left alone, and since he was a legal adult and my legal guardian, we stayed at the house and we kept it. We learned how to do taxes, we both got jobs, (he has a night job too since he quit college for me, and I have a part time because he wants me In school still) and we lived on the brink of almost everything. Starvation, bankruptcy, losing the house, losing each other.
As I was cooking dinner, my phone rang. I finished up what I was doing and answered it. It was from the hospital. I immediately sank to the floor and sat there for almost an hour. Everything ended up burnt or boiled over. I get up with my knees shaking, and straighten out my posture to how I usually stand. I stand tall and proud. Then I think of her, and crumple over. I get to the hospital an hour after my meltdown. I ask the nurse at the counter the room number of my brothers new room.
I get to his room and run my hand over his cut and scratched face. He has been in a coma for a few hours now. He went head-on with a semi. I'm just glad he's alive, even if he's not completely there. His spine is crushed in three spots, he has a completely broken rib cage, a broken femur, he has major cuts all over his body, organs are smashed and bruised, and the most prominent feature after the crash, he lost his left arm up to the shoulder. I'm sitting there alone with his body. So pale and red. His forehead has a deep gash creeping jaggedly from his right eyebrow to the center of his hairline. Almost like Harry Pot-head, but not quite.
I hear my phone buzz again and it's her. She asks me what's up. I tell her that my brother got into a car crash. We talk later and she assures me that everything is going to be alright, then the nurse comes in. I ask her about his condition, and of course they have no idea when he might, If he might wake up. I wonder if he's dreaming now. If everything he hears around him is somehow tied into his dreams. I wonder if he's happy in his dreams, if it's not like the hellhole of a world it is out here.