There isn't any moment in my life that means anything to anyone. Not even me.
To me, it's all a waste of time.
It's just a damn waste of time.
I could see her mouth moving, but I couldn't hear the words. They were probably useless to me me, anyhow.
I could see the tears collecting in her eyes, but I didn't give a damn. Her tears didn't affect me anymore. She makes me sick. I hate looking at her. She looks too much like me.
On the table, there was a single sheet of paper. F. F. F. F. F. F. I don't care.
"Melanie, what are you doing to yourself? Melanie, listen to me!"
No, I'm through listening.
"Shut up, Mother."
I flipped her off and shut the apartment door in her face.
"You were such a good kid, Melanie. What happened to you?"
I brushed that question off. I pulled down my hood, peering up at the slate gray of the New York skyline. It was so polluted. So dirty. It was ugly. But it wasn't like anyone was going to fix it anytime soon.
Busy street. That was good. No one gave a rat's ass about anyone here. No one would bother me here.
Melanie Cartier. Delinquent. Failure. Druggie.
It started to drizzle; the drizzle was really annoying.
"Why can't you make something of yourself, Melanie?"
I stared at all the blank faces passing me by. What was I doing that was so different from them? I was eating, sleeping, and breathing, wasn't I? What made them worth more than me?
Was it the suitcase? The clean-cut business suit? The high-tech cellphone, maybe?
I didn't get it. I didn't care.
We'd all end up dead, anyway.
My existence didn't change the world.
My eyes locked with a somber-looking woman. She averted her crystal-onyx eyes away from mine in a heartbeat. She could probably see the red "Untouchable" stamped onto my forehead. I resisted the temptation to roll my eyes at their typical reaction.
Was I unimportant because I wore an over-sized hoodie and insignifcant because I had nowhere to go?
She was probably off--late--to some superficial business meeting, looking neatly polished, detached from riff-raff like me.
I knew she wouldn't give me a second thought. She had more important things to do than wonder what today's youth was coming to, right? Huh, yeah, right, I thought. And as for me, I didn't spare her a second thought, either. She was just another blank, voiceless face in the crowd.
My existence wasn't worth shit. Her's wasn't either. Catching each others' gazes for a single moment in history didn't irrevocably alter it. It didn't do anything. Pretty useless, I'd say.
The rain was really starting to come down now. I didn't have an umbrella, and I was getting drenched. I put my hand up on my brow in a half-hearted attempt to stay the rain.
My existence? It wasn't necessary to anyone. I didn't matter what I did. The fact was that it never would. No one was necessary; no one could change another's life, and it didn't matter what it was.
I stuck my clammy hand back into my pocket.
'Make something of myself, Mother?' I stared straight ahead. Nothing shouted, "I'm special!" 'What, Mother? Make myself like them? There's nothing different between us, utimately, don't you see? We die; and we die pitifully unknown. It doesn't matter if we hadn't ever existed. I'm not essential to anyone. None of them are. It's all so meaningless--'
I stopped in my tracks, my eyes frozen on a tragedy waiting to happen.
At the far end of the street, a young, smiling woman; her undoubtedly warm hand clasped tenderly a small child's. She looked respectable, maybe even loved. Her eyes were shining down at the child's; her mouth was moving. She was probably telling him how they were going to get a tasty snack together and maybe even meet their father for lunch. She was eager to get them out of the oncoming deluge. One hand was stashed in her pocket, and one foot off the sidewalk and on the crosswalk; the child emulated that gesture shamelessly, reverently.
The little boy's face was graced with a half-smile, his lively eyes turning to meet his mother's. He held an absolute and unmarred faith in her.
Doomed.
Their absolute rapture with each other completely blinded them.
They couldn't see a shiny, red Mercedes speeding around the corner, ready to slam their lives into oblivion.
My heart pounded insanely. My hazel orbs widened fractionally, anticipating the crash and end of two, faceless lives.
Can't stop it. Too much distance. Didn't make a move. Too late. Too late.
They're doomed. They're doomed. They're doomed. They're doomed.
My thoughts ran like a machine. 'Time's up, time's up, time's up, time's up, time's up--'
The sudden, mind-numbing screech of car tires on road. A heart-jerking crash.
I unclenched my sweating palms inside my jacket pockets. Dared to look.
The car was a ghastly sight; it was smashed up against a streetlight. The driver looked horrified; she was mouthing, "Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God." There was blood on her forehead, but shock overwhelmed whatever she was feeling up to that point.
The mother was crying and hugging her little boy. "Oh my God. Oh my God," she whispered with disbelief, tears staining rivers on a semblance of distress. "Thank you, oh my God. Thank you, thank you, thank you."
Another nobody had saved them. Pulled them from the curb in a second's notice.
I could scarcely believe it myself. Their time was up, had been up. They should have been bloody decorations on the roadside now.
They had a hero.
In one, critical moment, another person had made himself essential to someone's surivival, had made himself necessary. Meaningful. He changed their lives--he saved them.
An audience was gathering now, down the street. I withdrew myself from the spectacle, continuing on my way, my path to nowhere.
Had I been wrong before? I turned back once to look. Yes, I was wrong, it answered. There was proof. Right there, slapping itself across my face.
'Proof?' I challenged cynically. 'What proof?' I laughed at the mere thought of evidence.
So, maybe there were exceptions. Exceptions to the rules.
But that--that miracle?--it didn't happen to everyone. And soon, everyone would forget. That man--their savior--he would be forgotten. He'd be meaningless again.
'But for that one moment, he did mean something to them. He meant the difference between life and death,' my conscience crowed.
'That may be true, but...it...it doesn't happen...to anyone.'
"Why can't you make something of yourself, Melanie?"
Because, Mother, not everyone can be heros, okay?
Not everyone can be heros.
My numb thumb pressed on the chilly metal button, enticing the lights to turn green for me. A loud blonde was chatting happily away on her cellphone in front of me, telling her mother about the dress she had just recently purchased. Her boyfriend was going to love it. She should totally come see it. She was so excited.
I averted my gaze from her, indifferent to her vivid fantasies. All empty words, useless jabber.
Her bright yellow umbrella was an eyesore, rudely sticking itself into a world of drab and gray.
She wasn't paying attention to me, and I wasn't paying attention to her.
Cars rushed by, soaking me with filthy spray. She was sadly untouched.
'Fucking cars so should slow down,' I imprecated, tensing with half-concealed ire. I glared down at my dirty, brown sneakers. They were soaked, absolutely soaked. They wasn't a dry inch left on my body. It was a fitting fate, wasn't it?
A small shriek of rubber on wet track. I steeled myself for another shower of grubby formula. 'Damn cars should stop going so--'
My skin prickled. My eyes saw it, and my mind was suddenly spinning with a sickening realization.
'GOD DAMN IT--'
My insides were screaming. It was pure animal, all instinct. My hand seized the back of her collar and jerked her back.
I could feel us both falling backwards onto the cold, wet sidewalk as a reckless automobile skidded against the slick blacktop and rear-ended another, parked right alongside the two of us.
She could have been crippled for life.
Her bright yellow umbrella lay uselessly on the side, lying by one of those fateful car tires. Her cellphone was shattered into fragments of worthless shrapnel beside her. Her eyes were wide in muted horror at what would have been.
She stared unseeingly at the disastrous wreck and listened with deaf ears at the stammered apologies and colorful expletives. Her eyes were wide, blue discs, and her mouth was hanging open unattractively.
I finally pulled myself up, shakily at first. I shuddered--only from the cold. I ignored the bystanders' worries and sympathies, beginning to step away from the scene. It was only after I put some distance between me and the accident that I turned back to take in the corollary.
The blonde girl stared unflinchingly at me. Her eyes were open wide, still shell-shocked. I was, too. But there, I saw an unfathomable depth...utter gratitude.
It was then that I finally allowed myself a small eclipse of a smile.
...one, critical moment...essential to someone's survival...necessary.
...saved them.
>>>
=D?
Yes, no?
'Cause everyone's got a hero in them. That's why. ♥
This? Just for kix. ;D
Postscripptttt: I swear I'll get to my messages soon. D: Just let me beat the living h_ll out my Physics and Calculus textbooks first, hmm?
*diesandrotttsss* Dx
