Have you read Living on Borrowed Time yet? Want to see through Charlie's eyes? Read on...
Charlie
What the hell am I doing here?
That thought swirled around and around in my brain as I glanced
my eyes around the room, drinking in the slow descent of what promised to be a
very legendary house party. As I looked at everyone I could see in turn, I
quickly realized that they were all faces
I barely recognized—sending me back to
another time in my life. One where I spent most of my time at parties with
people I didn't know.
I clutched the bottle of beer tightly between my fingers,
recalling how it didn't matter back then because I would always manage to find
a way to get myself so wasted that I didn't care. I thought the screwed up,
off-my-face version of Charlie was a whole heap of fun.
Now I could see that he was just another fuck up with no future
ahead of him.
I wasn't sure why I had allowed myself to get talked into this
night, but the more that time passed, the more I regretted it. The home
belonged to one of my old school friends, someone that I bumped into randomly a
few days ago. At the time, I thought it would be good to reconnect with some of
my old crowd, the ones I knew before everything went wrong,
but since I'd been here, I hadn't actually managed to see a single one of them.
I sighed deeply to myself, making the smart decision that this
one drink would be my only one. After I finished it I would make my way back
home, where I could reflect in peace about the prospect that I had finally
reached that grand old age where I was too old to party—where it wasn't as much
fun anymore. I'd probably gotten there
much quicker than everyone else because of my past, but they would eventually
catch up to me and see that this lifestyle was pointless.
It was time to move on, to start thinking about settling down
and really carving out a future for myself. Everything else was
futile...pointless.
I hadn't done bad, considering. As soon as I discovered that
Olivia—my much older girlfriend who had been integral in setting me down the
wrong path in life—was cheating on me, my crappy life crashed around me leaving
me with only two choices.
Did I take the easy way out and carry on down the shitty route
that I was currently traveling down, or
did I really put in some effort and clean myself up, to try
and achieve something more? After all, I had been filled with a whole heap of
potential and promise not that long ago—everyone told me that!
Sticking to the difficult option was not a
simple one. In fact, I almost went back on it more than once, but now that I'd
seen the light at the end of the tunnel, and I'd dragged myself through it, I
could see how worthwhile that journey had been.
The only problem was I'd been left with some quite serious
baggage. I didn't like to let anyone in too close anymore, and I'd purposely
made decisions to help me with that. I started up my own graphic design
business, which after a slightly rocky start was actually starting to do well.
It was great to have something so intense to throw myself into, but it isolated
me too. It kept me locked in my office, in solitary confinement, while I completed
very intricate, time-consuming jobs. It gave me a whole heap of my own company,
and no headspace to think.
At one time, that had been perfect, but as time went on I
started to realize just how lonely that
was, and now I wanted more. I wanted to meet someone, to start a future with
her, to get over the trust issues that Olivia had left me with.
But I was utterly terrified to take that first step.
Maybe that was why I'd agreed to come here, maybe I was hoping
that it would help lead me back into socializing
in a normal way, rather than what I was used to.
Sighing dejectedly, I slowly made my way towards the kitchen to
chuck my bottle away. There was an intense disappointment crushing down on my
insides, hurting me because tonight hadn't gone the way that I wanted it to. I
allowed it to consume me for a few seconds, knowing that I needed to really feel
it before I could brush it to one side. I had gotten into plenty of trouble in
my life by trying to ignore all of my issues, so I was perfectly aware that
this was the only way...
Woah.
As I stepped into the kitchen, my eyes instantly fixated on the
lone girl gripping tightly onto what I knew was a bottle of very strong
whiskey. I stared in fascination as she poured three glasses of the stuff,
wondering how the hell someone so petite and waifish would be able to handle
something like that.
Maybe she didn't know what it was, maybe she was just about to
make the hugest mistake of her life—one that would lead her to throw up all
over someone's home, completely humiliating herself.
Warn her! I
tried to tell myself, by my racing heart and my bone-dry
mouth was too scared to speak out. Tell her, she needs to know.
"Strong choice," I eventually managed to blurt out, in
a nervy-sounding voice that I was certain would put her off me forever.
But as she span around,
and our eyes connected, a burst of electricity bolted right through me, so
powerfully that it almost knocked me backward.
I smiled—or at least, I tried to—while I soaked every inch of her in. That
sleek auburn hair, her pale, almost translucent skin, the body language that
seemed to scream 'fear'. But what drew me in most of all were her eyes. They
were a deep, ocean-like blue—a color that
I had never seen before—and they were windows to her soul, and what I could see in
there was a reflection of myself. That deep, intense sadness, that
hollow, empty feeling, that sensation of being lost.
I knew at that moment that
I had found a kindred soul, one that needed me, one that I would do just about
anything for.
This is the one, I decided as she finally forced our eye contact to
break. The one that will change me forever. Maybe I was being
naive, maybe not, I wasn't sure—but for the first time in my life, I was willing to find out...
No comments:
Post a Comment