Young Tragedy | Teen Ink

Young Tragedy

February 1, 2016
By Olympus BRONZE, Belle Mead, New Jersey
Olympus BRONZE, Belle Mead, New Jersey
3 articles 0 photos 0 comments

We dreamt like martyrs.

If the universe couldn’t understand us, then it didn’t have to; it was rotten. We were the renegades – the Prophets and the Neo-Messiahs – of a world blackened with virgin soil no one had ever dared to tread. We were the pure mavericks. We were the misconceived aces.

We were tragic.

“For f***’s sake, do you ever say anything?!”

He was drunk. Again. Neither the jittery jaw nor the cascading drool gave it away, though; the air was thick with a musky bourbon – or maybe spirit – fume, and the screech of crumpling metal revealed the fate of his Camry’s bonnet from the driveway.

He was waiting for an answer. What it was couldn’t have mattered less.

“I just needed–”

“–needed what?”

“Babe–”

No!” Glass flew like a bullet and exploded into glistening confetti against the kitchen island.

I looked at him. His eyes were hurricanes – so much different from the crystal oceans that had swept me away years ago. The water was still just as cold.

“You know what your f***ing problem is, Margaret?” He shook his finger with eyes so wide I could see the scarlet veins sewn onto them. “You know what it is?”

I inched backwards. “Wha–”

“YOU DON’T F***ING LISTEN!” He raised his arms and brought them crashing down onto the island. In a blur, the foreign china we had gotten as a gift for Easter was now part of the ceramic graveyard the kitchen had become.

I shifted backwards even more. His burly arms were trembling and his jaw was grit with iron, but he didn’t move; instead he rested his hands precariously on the granite with his head dropped solemnly in between – like a defunct pendulum. There was a sharp howl from the woods outside, reverberating through the atmosphere. The animals were listening.

“What…” he mumbled.

The lights flickered. I didn’t say anything.

He slowly twisted his head, cocking it towards me but with eyes still glued to the tabletop. “What…did you buy…?”

I swallowed. “Just some food, babe.”

“Don’t…,” he winced, raising his callous palm. “Don’t lie to me, Margaret.”

His fists uncurled, but the air only became heavier. He was mad, yes, but there was something else dwelling within him – a weakness that only now resurfaced after years of suffocation. I knew what he was going to ask.

“Tell me the truth,” his shoulders sagged and his sapphire eyes met mine, “…is it him?”

I tried to take another step but my spine hit the counter. “Jason–”

“Is it?”

I began feeling for the drawers behind me as he lifted his body off the counter and stepped forward. I had to find the one with the chipped handle; that was what I needed.

“Margaret…,” he trailed, now with misty eyes. “You said you were done with him. What about everything…”

“It’s not what you think.” My fingers scrambled and raced as my heart slammed against my chest. With every centimeter he grew closer, more blood pumped through my veins like burning petroleum.

His expression turned dark at my movement. I could see the muscles in his neck shift and churn as he took another step, firm but trembling with rage. “You w****. What did you f***ing buy?”

I choked back a sob. There was more noise now – an animalistic choir – humming against the midnight wind. A streak of moonlight penetrated the window pane as I felt a prick in my finger. The pain was deft, but poignant. Not too soon afterwards did I feel warm fluid cascading over my retail manicure.

“Margaret…,” he hissed. The moonlight set a sheen tint in his onyx hair so that he was almost phantom-like. “What the hell did you buy with my money?”

“I didn’t…you’re being dramatic!” I spotted his massy fist, clenched and perched flatly atop the spice scaffold. There were ribbons of red flowing from his buried fingernails.

I grabbed the handle and shifted boldly in front. “We need to end this, Jason.”

Immediately his eyes flashed and a light bulb went out. All that was visible now was the flotsam of dust drifting through the silver streaks of moonlight and the ripping electricity in his pupils. His breaths became more rugged; short, but throaty. I couldn’t feel anything but the boiling of my skin and the coldness of my fingertips.

“No…” he tried, but his lips only produced a breathy whine.

I loosed my grip on the handle and wiped the sweat dripping from my temples. “It’s not…,” I exhaled. “We’re not what we were. Not anymore.”

“You’re lying.”

I swallowed, steadying my voice. “I’m not, and you know it.”

“YOU’RE F***ING LYING!” He swung his left arm and grabbed something shiny with his right.

I ripped the maple drawer open, grappling the hefty metal device resting within and jerking it around. I took one last look into his eyes and the oceans of memories drowned within: the simple laughs and stinging tears.

He looked back at me – frozen and confused – with a slick kitchen knife in his palm. An eerie, undisturbed silence followed shortly afterwards, filled only by the chirping of the night dwellers as an eternity passed in a single second.

His beautiful, red lips parted slowly. “Marga–”

Then the room exploded in light. It was only for a moment, but the intensity of flash alone was enough to put the midnight stars to shame. The animals bellowed their last, screeching melody and abruptly faded into the solemn night. Another silence followed; this time, it was toxic and volatile. I refused the river of euphoria which was now flowing through my veins.

And then the light vanished. The whole of the world was trapped in a darkness so pure that even blindness would grant more comfort. It was familiar to me. My quivering fingers curled and contorted in a horrific fashion, freeing the tainted steel to descend towards the floor. Its weight did not abandon my hand with its departure as I imagined it would; instead, the coldness of the polished metal slithered along my arm, biting into my veins and chilling my blood. Soon I was frozen, and at the sole mercy of time. It was swallowing me.

The lights flickered back on.

I thawed out, hearing only the quaint squeak of wet dress shoes and the rustling of a trench-coat. My head whipped around violently to face the source of the noise. Despite the faint lighting, my vision was free enough to see the figure and the terror plastered onto his face. My heart crumbled.

The lion-colored pupils of his eyes were now as wide as does’, examining the residue of the recently transpired horror. He mumbled something unintelligible.

“Ruben…” I sank to the floor, arms crossed over my chest. I stared at the river gushing through the crevices of the kitchen tiles; it started with a just single vein, before diverging into every corner of the room like a scarlet spider-web.

He was staring at me, and I knew he was. The gravity of his paralyzed expression was bone-crushing, permitting the air in my lungs a swift escape as hot tears trickled off my cheeks and onto the floor. I parted my trembling lips, choking back sobs but prepared to shatter the silence.

And then I saw it: a gleam of moonlight piercing the window and into the gauntlet of tragedy, as if to bear witness to the curious meddling of foolish mortals. It shot past the damp lashes of my eyes and onto the alabaster tile to my immediate right. I dropped my head, squinting. The object was lustrous and crystal, with intimate engraving lining its silver circumference.

It was mine. It must have fallen out.

I followed the light’s path as it bounced off the clear gem and towards the tall man frozen in the lime doorway. The humble ornament slipped around his fourth finger illuminated a soft grey. It was the moon that had always been there, but failed to light up the world.

He looked at me. His eyes were settled, no longer shaken with confusion or shock, but much deeper – a dark and vast pool percolating with a molested history that had been submerged for decades.

I closed my eyes, allowing the silence of the night to occupy me as it always had. I listened to the screech of the woods.

We dreamt like martyrs.

The world was for our taking. It was a feast for us to ravage and a treasure that only we could pillage. We kicked dust into orbit and watched it cascade from forbidden stars. Youth was our power - our passion.

It was our tragedy.


The author's comments:

I went outside my comfort zone with this story, wanting to take a novel, dark approach to my story writing. The short-versed but internally narrarative style I utilized was meant to encapsulate the reader in an intense and rapidly shifting scenario while sustaining a shroud of mystery. I also wanted the reader to think, given my vauge character references and descriptions, as well as by my shadowy ending. 


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