When the Lights Go Out {complete first draft}

Day Four - Failure is all Around Us

Fridays come and go, but this one never ends

  

Have you ever had a moment when you realise you’ve failed? Completely and utterly failed? I know this isn’t about me anymore. I’m dead; I don’t really matter, not now. But it still hurts to know I’ve hurt and disappointed other people. Especially the people I care about. Especially the people I love. Especially the people than me the world to me, the people I would have died for, done anything for – the people in my family. 

                  I never made it to my swim meet. Not in time, anyway. I never really made it to school until the late afternoon. Vincent and I sat, and waited, for ages. A recovery truck had to come and move us, as we were disturbing the traffic. By the time I got to a garage, I’d miss my practice, most of my lessons, and Vincent had missed his track training. I didn’t mean to brake down, I didn’t want to brake down, but it happened – even though there was nothing wrong with my car the other times I’d repeated the day. Maybe this was just another form a torture. I must be someone’s puppet, somewhere, because someone else was definitely pulling the strings.

                  In the end, Vincent and I argued and he left. He didn’t even continue to school, but turned the other way, and went home – to prepare for his party. To him, it didn’t matter if he missed school today. He would have only gone to school to see me, and as he said when he walked off, what’s the point now? You’ve missed it, Marisol. You’re not swimming today. He didn’t even look at me in pity, and say that they might have sympathy for my reason of absence – after all, the car breaking down was no fault of my own.

                  In the end, I ran to school. In a panic, I stopped every two minutes to check my phone. I frantically rang Kendal, and she answered but I could hardly talk, I was out of breath. She answered the phone, and before I could tell her my problems, she was gushing about George, and so I put the phone down quickly, not wanting to rain on her parade.

                  Not long after that, my phone rang, but I couldn’t answer it. I was just a few blocks from the school, and nearly there. Although I was on the sidewalk, cars whizzed passed me which made me jump. I thought, that at any moment, one of them would crash right into me, or someone unstable would jump around the corner and shoot me in the chest four tines with a revolver. I couldn’t stop panicking, or getting these scary thoughts from my head. Something was going to happen to me, I knew it would, I just didn’t know when.

                  No one shot me as I rounded the corner, but I mistakenly turned around to see if anyone was following me – incase someone wanted to try and grab me – and ran into a middle age woman. I apologized, but she only growled and pushed me out of the way. Tumbling onto the pavement, I cut my knee and scraped my cheek. I stayed there for a moment, wondering what I was doing. I had missed it. It was the last class of the day, right before my meet, and I wasn’t there. I was so close and yet I was so far away.

                  Suddenly, someone stood in front of me. I debated not looking up, crawling into a ball, and weeping like a child. But they knelt down in front of me. They smelt of coffee, cigarettes and chocolate. I looked up, blinking amongst the tears in my eyes. It was a man, in his thirties at least, wearing a suit. I frowned, wanting to ask him what he was doing, but then he placed his hand on my cheek. It was soft, and smelt of cocoa butter – sweet, and strong. Part of me wanted to pull away, because I didn’t know what he was doing, but it felt good for someone to care for me, to think of me, try and save me, right now. 

                  He smiled, his silvery eyes soft and gentle. “Are you alright?”

                  “Uh,” was all I could say, rather pathetically.