Spanish Solutions

She wrote a letter to me just the other day
It seemed hard to get but it had to be some way

She told me I hadn't been myself
And that I shouldn't keep myself down

She told me that I had to be more upbeat
Instead of being all over the place

Yeah she's happy with that other guy
But hey, she told me, that's life

See them together in all the albums
It's alright though, she's happier with him

I didn't lose her, just a friend to me
Someday we'll all laugh in front of the TV

It's alright, It's alright
All of us get through the night

Sometimes all of us have to fight
Sometimes all of us have to fight

If I have too many problems, I say sorry
If I get too different, I feel too boring

I may not have a storyline, and I might not have a script
I don't see the point in being heartbroken and having feelings ripped.

When the Time Comes

My head rested against the old, rotting wooden beam. The dim lightbulb penetrated the darkness of the basement. Winter nights were now unbearable after we had to cut back on the heat. I couldn't ever figure out how we made it this far. I'd seen movies about the last of mankind. I've read books and reread them. I've read theories and thought of ideas. As a kid I drew comics and wrote stories about adventures like this. Blowing up zombies and vampires and werewolves and whatever else my mind could think of. Now here I am sitting on cracked concrete watching the dark evolve into nightmares, listening to the stereo system reverberate switch through CD's we found. Mix CD's no less. Some of the songs take on a different meaning now. Shadows became a living nightmare, punk outrages against a nonexistent government, techno songs asking for death. The stairs creaked and I froze. My eyes locked onto the wooden handrail and my body died inside.

"Are you alright?"
My spine relaxed. Casey's old white sneakers were unmistakable.

"Yeah, just cold."

She walked over slowly and sat next to me.

"So what's new with you?"

She rested her head on my shoulder. Her sweatshirt was still white, despite all the years she's been cooped up in this dirty old house. Something about her kept the monsters away.

"Nothing Case, just sitting down here in this cold room trying to get my mind straight." I blinked slowly. She calmed me so much it was unbelievable.

"You do that everyday for hours on end. I couldn't do that. I can't even work with the people we got here. They're so uptight and-"

"Well they're uptight because we're running around without any fuel and we're running out of food and shit."

"I know, it's just... people need to chillax."

"Yeah, totally." I sighed. We sat quietly for a while.

"What do you think about?" her voice carried unnaturally through the room.

"Everything and nothing, I guess."

"Explain. You're always so quiet, I never know what you're thinking and it worries me."

"Just everything. All those life questions that everyone has. All those little moments that now blend together. I just don't know what's the point of living right now."

"It's alright, it's life. It's a miracle. Just go with it." She nudged my shoulder.

"I'm trying. I'm trying..." My eyes closed and we sat next to each other for hours. Then I dreamed of everything.

I woke up and Casey was gone, so the darkness crept up again. The stereo was playing static again. I tried to get up but my legs were stiff. This basement became my room. No one else came down here. Except for Casey occasionally. Even then not that often. In a way I was glad she was worried about me. It meant someone cared. Was I really that lonely? I was also glad that the basement didn't have windows. The world looked lonely itself. The trees were dead and the soil couldn't grow rocks.

I still couldn't get up so I sat there some more and watched the dim lightbulb die.

Monsters in my Closet

Everyone's got secrets. Everyone has that pile of dirty magazines under their bed. Everyone has skeletons in their closet. The only problem is that the monsters ate my skeletons. What does that mean? I don't even know.
I stared in the clouded mirror. I had a random outburst of hygiene control. My hair was getting long and the comb kept getting stuck in the tangles. My thick scarlet sweater was making me sweat underneath. Must my force myself to fit in? Either that or have the mob after me. Again. Brushed my teeth. Flossed too. That was a rare occurrence. Washed my face. I was no runway model. I wasn't runaway bride material. I couldn't get away with it with how ordinary I was. I'm the girl that guys are friends with.

Now came the hard part I thought to myself. I hated doing this part.

========

The paper stared at me with it's eggshell confetti color that just begged me to mark it. What was with the librarian and her fancy paper? Even on a stupid worksheet, nature was being reused and recycled. Life lessons are everywhere, children. Her voice echoed in my head. I've lived too many life lessons. I've had the chance to make mistakes, and I've taken advantage of it. But I look around and wonder how many of these dimwits are going to make it in the real world. There's not enough hairnets and fryers to go around for these people. It was one of those times where I kept my head down and kept my eyes on the speckled paper. I kept tonguing at the cut at the front of my gums. I need to be more careful with the file. Sure, some may think fangs are sexy, but it's rather annoying when it's not Halloween and you're trying to chew sideways. I finally wrote my name down on the line. I spent a good ten minutes doing that. Carefully swirling the dot of the i and making the strokes of the n quite bold and ornate. It's funny. You'd think after a couple decades, Allison would have lost it's touch. The silent bell rang in my teacher's eyes. I was out the door before anyone noticed my seat vacant with my paper finished left on the flat top.

Sex was love to these adolescents. I walked down these halls and looked all the hormones flowing through the students. My "peers". I heard footsteps and immediatly gasped and sped up. I felt a hand on my shoulder. It was only Dan.

"Hey Allison."
"Hey Daneil."
"Why can't you just call me Dan like the rest of the universe?"
"Why can't you call me Ali?"
"Because you're not Ali, you're Allison."
"And you're Daniel."
"No I'm not."
"That's what it says on the football roster."
"Yeah, but that's professional. Hey wait slow up!"

Oh yeah. I had the tendency to speed up when talking. I guess it came natural to always stay on the movie. It didn't help that I could probably be at my class by now, finishing up on whatever assignment was tossed at my face.

"But yeah, Allison, you still announcing the game on Friday?"
"Daniel, I've been doing it for the last hundred Fridays, why would this one be any different?"
"I don't know, just don't want you to miss me doing anything special."
"Oh really?"
"Yeah, but I gotta head off to English, Mr. B's gonna kill me if I can't get that C up."
"I understand. I have to be heading off too."

He walked into the classroom. The hall was empty so I skipped to my class. Not a good idea with my sweater on.

I was glad when lunchtime came around. Walking fast and skipping tended to wear out your muscles faster when you moved faster.
My eyes burned as I walked past the scent of bleach and other cleaners on the way to the table.
I hated my sense of smell.

5 A.M.

Drunken Randomness for half an hour at 5 in the morning:

I saw the age left in her eyes
Undecided, unrealized her doubts suddenly had come alive

She had that sad look upon her face
Everything left behind to her slowly became replaced

Either way, I say, you've gotta get up and get out of town
All the things you thought you loved are no longer around

Did you throw me away intentially or was I another dropped penny
Another miscalculated loss of the notches on your bed

Relocating my drunken thoughts during the long summers
I'm waiting, I'm here waiting. Come to me, in my head

I'm dreaming, of your thoughts
I'm sleeping, in your arms

I can't wait, for us. Every moment, Every stop motion movie.
Small steps, deep breathes. Don't speed up, hold off on the losing.

We're too in a hurry to grow up
Drive fast and watch times blur by

Listening to the letter blocks that we spelled out so long ago
Dance to the plastic tape recorders you left over my house
Play with the scale cars on the carpet
Rot to the bites of your apple tree in front of your window
Sleep in the backyard adventure we called home

But it's okay, in the end we're young
By the time we've figured it out we're done

Forget about the times you found me in your tree outside
Trying to grab your attention from the road
Scar our memories with thoughts of suicide after simple wounds
Damn those who got in our way and ruined our playdate

Pouring sand into the crevices of our demons
It's okay to let go when I'm with you.
Put on our jumpsuits and go jumping for no reason
Hop the side walk cracks for lack of information

I can't listen to the tapes anymore
I can't put togther 1 and 3 and make four
I can't spin a 720 on the merry go round
I can't think straight like after falling down

All those life lessons erased
I've lost all sleep
Making all the pictures in the wall makes sense to me now

Yearbooks spread out, stapled to my wall
Our sneaker prints on the ceiling
I've got the past the present and the future as my decor
No other kinds of faces than the one's been seeing

Nostalgic to the point of pills, it seems as if I've lost my will.
Nothing seems to make sense, and my memory banks have gotten dense.

I've got,
Nothing,

Nothing to rely on.

Bowl cuts, quick remarks

Photos burned after getting a fast high.

Fuzzy Mittens, Frost Bitten

Everything that we had washed away in the tide.


But we don't have to grow up.

Clouds with silver linings make heavy clouds
Then how could watch for shapes when we go out?

If we go out?

Where's the stuff, that we grew up on?
TV shows and lunch specials chucked on?

But you got no reply

The Halloween costumes we laughed at
Are still sitting in my closet.

The Christmas presents we wanted so much
Are still here waiting to be junked.

Dirt in the wheels and everything is now so unreal.
I've got nothing without you, my best friend.

Let's go play outside for real

Aberrant

A little refresher.
A little nostalgia.

She was the kind of girl that you'd write songs about. The kind that when you heard her name, your heart fluttered, and when you heard her say your name, it damn well might have stopped. When you walked with her, you had the tendency to talk faster. Partly because you were nervous, but partly because you wanted to keep up with her. The kind of girl that had look in her eyes that said she knew exactly what was going on. That if she decided to turn up a one way dead end street, you would have to be right by her. When she laid her head on your shoulder, you were careful not to wake her up. You kept her thoughts in mind before your own. Your life didn't revolve around her. Your life was her. Every single goddamn night you saw her face in the patterns in the wall. Every single morning you fucking smiled because she was right around the bend. Careful not to stare, you'd look at her and say to yourself, "What did I get myself into?". You grinned.
Now what do you do? You're feeling gone. Instead of trying to patch a broken tire, why not just let it deflate slowly and stop trying to defy what was coming. Maybe you should relax and it's just a moment of anxiety and frustration. Frustration over what? You tell yourself that it'll be alright in the end. You're friends after all. You made the choice of underpursuing an actual relationship. You were the one that said it would be better this way.
This is where you run through the situations in your made up world.

Maybe she wanted more and gave up on you after you "let go".
Maybe you're over analyzing, as usual.
Maybe she's just bored.
Maybe you wish that you knew what everyone was thinking.

A Cullen in disguise would come in handy now, you think to yourself. Are you trying to hard to fit in? Are you asking yourself too many questions?

Are you alone?
Are you lonely?

Are you waiting for someone?
Or is someone waiting for you?