LittleWyvern.com

Last night was particularly bad in terms of chest pain. Even after downing a few aspirin with a Xanax chaser it took a good amount of effort to keep from moaning aloud. I didn’t, and don’t, legitimately think that I am in serious danger of suddenly dying from this, but as I’ve mentioned before, on occasion it feels like I just might. Sitting in a chair, my body folded over with my head by my knees, wondering at the unlikely possibility of that worst case scenario it surprised me a bit to realize that in that moment, more than most anything else, I wanted to write.

I went to my closet and pulled out my Neo, slipping it onto my lap as I sat upon my bed. I had no plan. Instead I simply started typing the first thing that came to mind. I kept my fingers moving, pausing only for the occasional check of my pulse, and simply allowed my mind to wander. I gradually came to realize that my chest pain was easing, the heart fluttering dissipating, the more that I managed to write.

Two thousand three hundred and fifty one words later I stopped typing mid-sentence, turned off my Neo, and fell asleep… pain-free.

Now I figure that I might as well share what I wrote.

I am extremely self-conscious about my own writing so bear with me for a moment while I politely remind you that I have done no proofreading whatsoever on what I am about to post. Between downloading it off of my Neo and uploading it to this website I have done no more than run a spell-check and perform a word count. Please also keep in mind that I wrote this very late at night while in the throes of what felt to be a minor heart attack. I make no guarantees as to quality or entertainment. I would say that it might be a total waste of your time, but I don’t want to sell myself completely short.

A group of four teenaged boys surround the girls. Though outnumbered two to one, the girls seemed to relish the attention, each one fully aware of the strange power that she held for no other reason than being one of the few amongst the many. It was supply and demand, plain and simple. The girls were the supply, and the boys… well, when it came to teenaged boys there was never a shortage of demand.

The first girl smiled at one of the taller boys, then turned and whispered something to her friend. Whether her secret confession was actually funny or not the second girl giggled anyways, her cheeks turning a slightly rosier shade of pink as she glanced quickly at the tall boy as well. Intrigued and encouraged by their quarries’ antics the men pressed their agenda with renewed confidence. The tall boy stepped closer to the first girl and said something that caused her face to transform in a poorly acted display of shock, feigning insult at whatever her would-be suitor had conveyed. The act lasted only a moment, however, as the girl once more turned to her friend for a private conference. A few hushed whispers – accompanied by several less-than-furtive glances – and the discussion came to a close. The second girl moved to stand near one of the other boys, much shorter than the first, with shoulder-length black hair and an athletic build beneath his excessively trendy clothes. She took his hand, and with all the grace of a butcher selecting a choice of meat pulled the boy from the crowd. The tallest boy threw one arm around his own girl’s shoulder and the pair of couples turned and headed off into the night.

Now alone, the two remaining boys glanced alternately at one another and the twin shadows of the departing couples. Neither boy spoke, but each was surely thinking the same thought, the pain and confusion of this quiet rejection etched across the stoic mask each now attempted to wear as a face.

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Joshua loved going to the movies. Occasionally he would actually go inside the building to watch one, but mostly he enjoyed standing near the theater’s entrance, lost among the shifting crowd of happy teenage society. Leaning casually against a cool cement pillar Joshua watched with light-hearted curiosity as a pair of flirtatious girls awkwardly seduced a quartet of equally eager young men. As the couples wandered into the darkness Joshua found himself unable to stifle a hearty laugh at the hilarious misfortune of the two abandoned boys.

Joshua’s laughter was loud enough to draw the attention of one of the boys, but once he realized there had been a witness to his embarrassment the boy quickly scampered away into the night. This of course only made Joshua laugh harder, his eyes squinting until they were nearly closed.

Temporarily lost in the moment Joshua did not notice the second boy’s approach until he was standing almost on top of him.

“What the hell are you laughing at?” The boy demanded in a voice loud enough to quiet all surrounding conversation.

Joshua slowly reopened his eyes and allowed his wide smile to drift away until it was little more than a smirk on the corner of his mouth. He did not adjust his posture, but instead maintained his casual pose against the pillar.

“Oh, I think we both know the answer to that.” Joshua replied in a calm and careful voice. Taking rapid stock of the situation he knew there was some cause for concern. Joshua had observed humanity long enough to know just how quickly shame could turn into anger. Humiliation tended to cause either cowardice or violence, and this particular boy had clearly decided against being a coward.

“Look, I’m sorry for laughing at you,” Joshua continued in the most deferential tone he could muster. Maybe a fight could be avoided if he was careful.

“Really? Because I don’t think you are.” Joshua noticed that the boy was ever so slightly adjusting his stance, shifting his weight to the balls of his feet. No, he realized with a twinge of regret, a fight was the only way this could end. But since it was unavoidable…

“Well, to be honest it’s not so much that I AM sorry,” Joshua began, “as it is that I FEEL sorry.” Joshua took a step away from the pillar and braced for the impact. “For you, of course. I mean, it isn’t really your fault that you were born so…”

The punch landed squarely on the left side of Joshua’s face, knocking him to the pavement. His attacker stepped forward in anticipation of a fight, but Joshua’s body lay still upon the ground, his victim seemingly knocked as cold as the concrete upon which he now lay. The boy stood over his fallen opponent for a few long seconds before strutting off into the parking lot, his honor defended and his pride restored.

Joshua lay motionless on the ground until he was sure that his attacker had gone. A crowd of curious and concerned teenagers had formed around his crumpled body, and all of them jumped in surprise as Joshua suddenly opened his eyes and sprung back to his feet with a speed and nimbleness that none of them could have imagined possible. Joshua flashed a quick smile to the dazzled crowd before spinning on his heels and strolling off into the darkening night. He walked with an obvious strut as well, but to those who watched him go Joshua seemed to almost be skipping, dancing out of their sight to a song that only he could hear.

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Joshua hated fighting. It was always so damn inconvenient. Of course he could have won the fight – the young human boy was utterly incapable of causing even the slightest injury to Joshua – but had he allowed himself to fight back it was simply far too likely that the boy would have been accidentally killed. And for what? A simple case of wounded pride? No, Joshua could not allow that.

He hoped that he had made it look good, at least. As he turned down a residential street Joshua paused briefly beneath one of the roadside lamps and checked to make sure that he hadn’t soiled his new shirt while falling to the ground in front of the theater.

Pleased to find his clothes intact Joshua continued down the street, casually admiring the darkened facade of each home he passed while he reflected on the night’s events.

It just didn’t make sense to him. But then again, it never had.

It wasn’t the altercation with the boy that concerned Joshua, but the curiosities of the events that preceded it. For one thing, the four boys were clearly close friends. What could possibly have been so special about the two girls that would cause the men to turn on each other like they had? The boys had transformed from brothers to rivals in a matter of moments, two of them ultimately abandoned to a night of humiliation and solitude. Even though he had laughed in the moment, Joshua now felt a wave of pity and sadness wash over him. Reflecting on the feelings Joshua came to realize that the pity he felt was not just for the boys who had been abandoned, but for all the others too. He felt sorry for the tall boy and his dark haired friend; sorry that they could be so careless and shallow, so cold and unfeeling towards the people they otherwise professed to care about. He felt pity for the two young girls as well. Joshua imagined the undeserved sense of joy they must have felt after successfully wooing the secretly heartless boys.

Not that it mattered; the entire situation was pointless anyways. Joshua knew that better than anyone. “If only these people knew what I knew,” he thought to himself as he continued down the darkening street. “As if something as silly as…”

Joshua stopped dead in his tracks, all thought instantly wiped from his mind.

For one very long moment Joshua felt his heart stop beating. The rest of his body still frozen in place he scanned the empty street, a pair of pale green eyes flitting side to side with unnatural speed.

He was alone.

A strong, cool breeze carried through the night air, but Joshua did not feel it. To his heightened senses the surrounding air had become suddenly heavy. It felt thicker, more difficult to move through – almost like being underwater or trapped in quicksand.

Joshua waited, his eyes closed, knowing well what was about to happen.

With a thunderous boom his heart jumped back into motion, the power of the first beat enough to visibly shake Joshua’s perfectly still body. The second beat was less jarring, the third almost normal.

His eyes still closed Joshua felt out into the liquid sea of the world around him. To three sides of him the air was impossibly heavy, even the slightest of movements requiring the utmost effort. To his right, though, the air opened up with no resistance at all. Joshua moved in that direction until the heaviness returned. Once there the air opened up in front of him, and so he began to move forward. Joshua continued like this, feeling his way through the voids as a blind man might navigate a maze. Inside his chest the heartbeats grew louder and gradually more forceful as Joshua continued along.

After many long minutes of wandering Joshua reached a point where the surrounding air opened up in all directions. He opened his eyes.

Joshua was standing before a fairly small, one-story house. The home itself was unremarkable in every way, particularly because every house on the street appeared to have been constructed with the same floor plan. Had Joshua not been led directly to its doorstep he would have never had reason to give the building any notice or attention whatsoever.

But he had been led here. This particular house was special. Joshua had a job to do.

The pounding inside his chest had reached a fever pitch as he approached the front door. Joshua gripped the doorknob and slowly, carefully began to turn. The door’s lock quickly put up some resistance, but Joshua’s steady, unrelenting grip could not be withstood. Somewhere inside the doorknob two pieces of metal were gradually wrenched apart, bending and twisting until the entire lock eventually shattered to pieces. Without a sound the previously locked door swung open, the cool darkness of the night rapidly flooding into the house’s interior. Wrapped in that darkness, moving in total silence, Joshua crossed through the doorway.

Once in the main hallway he froze once again, closing his eyes as he mentally searched through the house with a sense no human possessed. Joshua furrowed his brow when he learned that there were three people sleeping inside the home: two parents and a little girl. One by one he focused his unnatural hearing to their heartbeats, listening to the different rhythms until he found the one that he was looking for. Joshua’s face fell in a brief display of agony.

The heartbeat that he was looking for, the heartbeat that matched the one now pounding through his own chest… it was the little girl’s.

Turning down the hallway Joshua moved slowly towards the bedroom, his entire body beginning to tingle as his target drew near. He hesitated as he reached her door, giving himself a brief moment to prepare for what lay ahead, and then turned the handle.

The little girl was asleep in her bed, a light pink comforter covering her to her waist. She couldn’t have been more than four years old. Please just make this quick, Joshua thought to himself. He wished that he could deal with the girl immediately, but there were rules that must be followed, rules that must be obeyed.

From within his right pocket Joshua removed a small silver pocket watch. He wound the dial twice and then flipped it open. The interior watch face was composed of several different dials, each of a different size. He studied the watch face for a moment and shook his head and sighed aloud. It just didn’t seem fair.

Putting the watch away Joshua closed his eyes once more and directed his focus onto the steady rhythm of the pulse inside his chest. Nothing happened at first, but gradually it began to weaken. The little girl stirred in her bed and Joshua opened his eyes, though he maintained his focus on the ever-slowing heartbeats.

“Daddy?” The girl’s eyes were open, but she was still groggy and half asleep.

“No,” Joshua began in a quiet voice just barely above a whisper. “I’m not your daddy.”

The heartbeats continued to get slower and weaker.

“Who are you?” There was a growing tone of fear and confusion in her voice.

“Shhh… just relax.” Slower. Weaker. “I’m here to help you.”

“Help… me… what?” The girl was getting more and more scared, but as the heartbeats inside Joshua’s chest continued to fade the girl was gradually losing strength.

“I have to take you away from here.”

Slower.

“… where?”

Weaker.

“Far away.”

Slower.

“… wh… when?”

Weaker.

“Now.”

Slower.

“I… I’m… tired.”

Weaker.

“I know.”

The little girl looked up at Joshua with half-closed eyes. Her mouth moved to form a word, but no sound came out. The girl’s eyes closed for the last time just as Joshua closed his own. With awesome finality both hearts beat once together and then were silent.

Joshua stood in the girl’s room for a long time. He knew he should leave, knew that it was dangerous to stay, but he was still standing in her doorway, staring at the lifeless little body as the sun began to shine through her bedroom window. He knew that he should go, but he wanted to be there when the girl’s parents came to check on her. He wanted to be there to confess what he had done, why he had done it…