This week and in the weeks to follow, I will endeavor to post a section of a seven-part short story (that is quickly becoming a novelette). It's the rough draft and likely wrought with inconsistencies, so I beg you to plead with me, but over the last couple months, I've entertained the idea of retelling a fairy tale as a writing exercise. I hope having the deadline of frequent blog posts will prove encouragement and pressure enough to finish something for a change. I'll let you try to figure out what fairy tale I'm attempting to retell. I hope you enjoy the first installment of Boy With a Bear Tattoo! And if you don't, please comment why below. I'm always open to hearing constructive criticism.
Boy With a Bear Tattoo: Part One
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Colin strolled the vacant streets of the city, buildings looming
overhead, spires jutting into the obsidian sky.
No stars, he thought grimly, and his stomach tightened,
the familiar sensation of anxiety pushing through his unconscious. The street
lights spaced every so often and the faint glow from all-night coffee houses,
the occasional club, and from apartments high above him drowned out the soft,
heavenly lights. Colin stuffed his hands in his jacket pockets and continued
walking. He missed the stars.
In North Africa they had freckled the night, marking where desert
ended and sky began, billions of them in white glory that guarded and protected
the men sleeping or patrolling the camp below on the cooling sand.
“Maybe that’s the problem,” he said, withdrawing his hands and
grinding the heels of his palms against his closed eyelids until pink and
orange sparks shot across his vision, “no stars, no sleep.”
Two months ago, no stars graced the heavens with their presence,
and an attack startled Colin and his unit awake, catching them by surprise in
the dark hours of the morning. Whatever angelic protection the stars provided
failed, and friends and brothers around Colin fell in the lethal hellfire of
bullets and shrapnel that rained upon them and tore their flesh to shreds.
Shuddering with the memory, he glanced at the black ink bear tattoo on his
forearm, the design faint on his brown skin. The light from a street lamp
caught the jagged scar splitting the design and it gleamed white and pale.
He would never forget.
His roommates, his brothers, didn’t understand the change and
instead complained about how he never accompanied them to the clubs they loved
to frequent, those buildings clouded with smoke, the throbbing pulse of bass
drums, the people in the shadows lurking and dancing. Colin wondered which one
he might find them at tonight if he bothered to search. Nothing from his past brought
him joy.
“Losing people changes you,” he tried telling them earlier that
evening when he refused their invitation to join them on their cavaliering and
weekend revelry.
Jordan had taken a swig of beer and shook his head. “That was
months ago, Colin. C’mon, relax. Come with us. Once you’re there, it will all
come back to you and you’ll remember how to have fun and enjoy yourself.”
Colin refused again, and waited until Jordan and Allen left their
shared apartment before throwing on his coat and venturing out into the night
to clear his head and fill his lungs with fresh air, or as fresh as air tainted
with the exhaust from cars and the grease from fast food could be. It smelled
and tasted different, a faint yet constant reminder that although he walked the
familiar streets of his youth, he was a foreigner, an outsider.
He no longer belonged, he realized with a mild sense of
trepidation that chilled his flesh. Not now, not ever. Regardless of how many
times he walked the streets to rediscover the old Colin, that person would
always elude him. He died in Afghanistan, with the other members of his unit.
Even so, he kept walking, his mind void of a specific destination,
and allowed his feet to carry him wherever they wished. Down a curb, across the
street, up another curb, along the sidewalk past an alley. Tilting his head at
one moment, he glanced at the sky once more as though expecting the angelic
lights to suddenly appear, signaling him to return home, to sleep, to rest, but
the artificial, orange lights from the city swallowed all traces of the host in
the blackened sky.
Colin sighed, and an overwhelming sense of loneliness crept into
his heart and tainted his blood, seeping out and coursing through his body.
Then the terrain changed beneath his tennis shoes from hard and
cold to spongy and soft. He shook himself from his stupor and looked up.
The stone arch marking the entrance to the city park loomed
overhead. Ivy embracing the columns fluttered in the breeze, the rough edges of
the leaves scraping the stone, a thousand fingernails faintly scratching.
Colin’s feet planted themselves in the grass, and he stood for a
while waiting, watching the ivy swing, listening to the rustle of owls in the
trees beyond the arch and to their quarry scurrying through the grass
“You’ve walked through this park a hundred times,” he laughed, but
the sound was cheerless and failed to lift his spirits. “What are you afraid
of? Owls? Mice? Maybe a bat or two?” Summoning his resolve, Colin uprooted his
feet and forced them forward.
No stars, no angels. Welcome to hell, chimed
the voice in his head as he passed beneath the archway and entered the park.
Trees creaked above him in the dry wind, their bare branches
scratching against each other and every now and then sending a flaming leaf
fluttering down to the dilapidated sidewalk. They carpeted the cracked
concrete, a blanket of crimson, orange, and gold that crunched lightly
underfoot. Thorns reached out from the overgrown shrubbery bordering the path,
threatening to catch and tear at him.
In the brush, a creature startled and scampered away.
Probably a raccoon or an opossum, Colin
thought, quickening his pace. Or, he forced himself to smile, a
bunny. Another shape shot through the tree limbs, long and quick as it
glided on outstretched wings. An owl, no doubt in pursuit of the creature Colin
disturbed.
As he passed by a clearing, in the middle of which sat a broken
and waterless fountain and a solitary street lamp emitting a faint, orange
glow, Colin noticed a solid shadow slumped over, its back against the curved
stone of the basin. He hesitated, and continued walking. Stopped. Took a few
steps in the direction away from the man and stopped again. Turning, Colin saw
the man as he left him: disheveled and seemingly asleep, a worn and torn jacket
pulled tight around his wiry frame, although Colin couldn’t discern the man’s
exact build due to the excess of ragged clothes that enveloped him.
With tentative steps, Colin edged toward the man, fearing him dead
rather than asleep. His concern deteriorated when he stooped nearer and
squinted at the man in the dim light, for the hairs of the man’s grizzled beard
quivered with the inhalations and exhalations of his breath, and his chest rose
and fell with shallow yet methodical precision.
Should I leave him? Someone else might come
along and help him, thought Colin, looking around although he needed no
confirmation that he was entirely alone with the stranger and that the odds of
someone else walking the path through the park at night and spotting the man
were slim.
I’ll wake him. No. he paused. What if he
scares, thinks I’m robbing him, and pulls out a knife?
Colin crouched for several moments, his arm half outstretched to
rouse the stranger, but an invisible force held him back. Fear. That same pause
that overwhelmed him in North Africa during the attack, when instead of darting
out, he remained. His friend had not been so cowardly and had run out only to
welcome the blast of a grenade. That time, hesitation saved Colin’s life. The
scar over the bear tattoo itched.
This isn’t Africa, he decided, and laid a
hand on the man’s thin shoulder before fear assumed control again.
Between the grizzled beard and unruly hair, two bright eyes
cracked open and fell on Colin. With a shout, the man latched onto the rim of
the basin and staggered unevenly to his feet, but as his lungs filled with the
cold air, he doubled over and a raspy, heaving cough racked his body.
“Sir,” Colin said calmly, maintaining a safe distance between
himself and the stranger. “Sir, are you all right?”
Slowly, the coughs subsided enough for the man to breath. “I
shouldn’t be surprised if I lost a lung, but,” he straightened and inhaled
deeply, “I’ll manage.”
Colin sighed, relieved, and most of the tension he had harbored
seeped out of him. “My apologies to wake you, Sir. I saw you and didn’t know if
you were, well—”
“Dead?” the raspy heaves started up anew, and Colin thought
another fit overcame the man until he realized that the stranger was laughing.
“I should be so lucky. Too sick to work, too sick to travel around like I used
to, but not sick enough to die. It’s ironic, really, but then again, what would
you know, young man in his prime such as yourself.”
“More than you think,” Colin muttered.
The dark eyes narrowed. “Why are you out so late, and in this park
of all the places?”
“Couldn’t sleep. When I can’t sleep, I walk.”
“Soothes the voices,” the man nodded. “Calms the flames.”
“Beg your pardon?” asked Colin, bewildered.
“The guilt, the shame, the loss and anguish,” he bobbed his head,
glancing Colin over before remarking, “You’ve seen war.”
Colin blinked. “How can you
tell?”
“Experience,” he said, “and
it’s still fresh on you. You have that look in your eye, as though you’re here,
but you’re not really here, you know? Haunted is how I’ve heard it described.
Haunted by the ghosts of people you couldn’t save and people you didn’t save.”
He sat on the rim and beckoned Colin follow suit.
“Let me tell you something,” the man said. “It isn’t your fault.
And I know it’s hard to admit, but those souls, those people, they were
destined to die at their time. Nothing you did or didn’t do made it happen,
understand? I’ve spent half a lifetime blaming myself for deaths that weren’t
my fault.” He laughed again. “Lost my family, friends, job, and my home because
I couldn’t escape my head long enough to live. You’ll never flee from that
devil, but you can quiet him.”
They sat in silence for a time, listening to the screeches of
distant owls and the faint fluttering of bats as they dove in and out of the
orange light, chasing insects and gorging their bellies before hibernating for
the oncoming winter.
“Do you have a name?” asked Colin after a while.
“Samael,” the stranger replied, “Sam to my friends.”
“Is that what we are?”
A slow, sly grin crept over Sam’s face, and his dry, cracked lips
parted to reveal teeth in remarkable condition for a homeless man. “That
depends.”
“Depends?” Colin shifted, the bench growing cold and hard beneath
his legs, and he stood. On impulse, he studied the road on either side of him,
exploring the shadows with his gaze but noticed nothing to warrant his concern
or suspicions. He’s a sick homeless man. What can he do to you? He
crossed his arms, making his shoulders as broad as possible and allowing his
size to speak for him, hoping to prevent any altercation before it began. Plenty,
sang the intruding voice, ever suspicious, ever afraid. “This is terribly
cliché,” he said, and laughed at the ridiculousness of it all.
“I thought so,” chuckled Samael, “but what can I say? I couldn’t
help myself. Was a theater student in high school, and I guess I never grew out
of that flare for the dramatic.” He turned toward Colin and extended his hand.
“Call me Sam.”
“Good to meet you,” Colin took his hand and shook it, finding
Sam’s grip stronger than he anticipated. When he tried to pull away, Sam’s
fingers tightened around his own.
“You got a name?” he inquired, his tone low and his eyebrows
arched quizzically.
“Colin. Just Colin.”
“Well Colin,” Sam released him and leaned away, “I may have a
solution to your problem.”
“Sleeping pills?”
“No.”
“Therapy?” Colin guessed a second time. “Because I tried that.
Helped me work through surviving but didn’t help...everything else.”
“No, not therapy either.”
“What then?” Colin yawned involuntarily, his body warning him to
return home to sleep. By this time, it must be after midnight. He patted his
pockets for his phone to check the time, but realized he left it at his
brothers’ apartment. If Sam had been dead, he realized with a start, I
couldn’t have called 911. Or if he stabbed me… with that, he banished his
thoughts to the back of his brain.
“Travel the country for, oh, say seven or eight months. However
long it takes you, that’s up to you, but you can only use the cash present in
your jacket pocket. Nothing more. It’s been my experience that we learn
thankfulness by knowing poverty. We learn more than just thankfulness, but I’ll
let you figure that out by yourself. Some buddies of mine tried that method too
at some point in their lives when they arrived at a crossroads and their ghosts
returned.”
“Did it work for them?”
“Yep.”
“You’re asking me to be
homeless by choice?” asked Colin, his jaw slackening as he mulled over the
possibility of hitchhiking America for the better part of a year. It seemed
impossible. Then again, he could use a road trip and a fresh start. If he used
what money he saved away in the bank sparingly and only purchased necessities,
he could survive.
“I agree,” said Colin before
the doubt set in and he reconsidered. “If nothing else, a road trip might put
my soul at ease,” he grinned halfheartedly.
“When you come back—if you do come back—find me. I can’t
travel anymore, but I want to hear about your trip and more importantly, what
you learned from it.”
“As soon as I put my things in order—”
“Go.”
“But—”
“Go. No second thoughts,” a wild gleam entered Sam’s eyes,
“otherwise the ghosts will drag you down to hell with them.”
“Okay,” Colin quelled the urge to argue. “When the bank opens,
I’ll withdraw what money I have and set out afterward.”
Sam caught hold of his arm and forced Colin to meet his stare.
“You promise?”
Every muscle in Colin’s body tensed, and he fought against the
voices compelling him to fight, or at least shake off the old man. “I promise.
Tomorrow morning, I’ll walk to the bank, withdraw every cent I own, stuff it
all into my jacket pocket, and then walk to the nearest highway. I’ll hitchhike
if I have to. No plans, no maps.”
“Good,” Sam’s vice loosened, and he sighed. “One word of advice,
Colin.”
“What’s that?”
“They never leave you, not completely. Those ghosts, those souls
you carry with you. They never truly leave. You learn to quiet them, to ignore
them, but they’re always there, so don’t expect my method to take them from
you.”
Colin nodded, his thoughts pensive. “I understand. When I return,
I’ll find you.” He stood and prepared to leave. The wind, bearing the bite of
the oncoming winter, rattled the branches of the trees encircling the clearing,
sending shadowy leaves raining upon the ground. Glancing at Sam, Colin noted
once more the ragged tears in the man’s coat and realized that with harsh
weather approaching and nothing to protect him from the elements, Sam might
succumb to his illness before Colin returned.
“Here,” he shrugged off his coat and offered it to Sam. “Yours for
mine, as payment for your advice.”
“If I was a
younger, prouder man, I might refuse, but seeing as I’m not, I’ll accept your
generous offer,” Sam grinned slyly and removed his own tattered jacket, once
brown but now streaked black with wear, before taking Colin’s and slipping his
arms through the sleeves. It hung somewhat loosely overtop the couple of faded
flannel shirts Sam wore, and for the briefest moment, Colin worried that Sam’s
would be too small; however, when he tried it on, it fit perfectly. In his
younger days, Colin realized, Sam likely was not as thin and wiry as the man
who now stood before him. Homelessness and illness had obviously taken their
tolls.
After seven
months, how might I be changed? Colin wondered, apprehension gnawing at his
gut and twisting his insides.
“Be gone with
you,” Sam urged. “Find me.”
Shaking Sam’s
hand in farewell, Colin asked, “How?”
“Come back to
this park.”
“That’s it?”
“That’s it.
Goodnight. And good luck.”
A smile tugged
at Colin’s lips. “Another dramatic cliché.”
Spreading his
arms wide to his sides, Sam laughed. “See? It never left. Parts of you never
do, no matter how hard you try to hide them. They’re always there, below the
surface.”
“I’ll remember
that,” said Colin softly as he began toward the path. “Goodbye.”
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Did you figure out what fairy tale I loosely based this off of? Comment your guesses below!
Thank you for reading, and in two Saturdays, I promise that, unless some tragedy strikes, I will post the next installment of Colin's journey. Happy weekend!
~Abigail
