Empty Spaces

I am linking up with Write on Edge again this week. I love the practice and getting to writing again. I am pushing the deadline and this piece is in need of lots of work....(but here goes)


I went with the photo prompt:

The last of the boxes were finally unpacked. It had taken just a few days..she came with so little. Boxes anyway. But the luggage she carried in her heart would take much longer to unpack.

Carri slumped into the couch. Her eyes searched the room...empty spaces everywhere.
She closed her eyes and lifted her feet. She allowed her ears to tune into the stories beyond her empty walls and down the halls. She listened to the laughter of children. The clanging of pots and pans. The gruff voice and muffled responses. She imagined the walls in their spaces. Photos and plaques. Shelves of collections and trophies. Histories. She yearned for connection. She desired a history she'd want to remember.

From the street below she heard the sound of a lone trumpet. Intrigued she went to the window. Below she saw him. A little disheveled, eyes without life, but from those notes came an emotion she couldn't describe. As he played, the passerbys seemed not to even notice. Carri couldn't understand how they could ignore him...she felt mesmerized and drawn in. It was as if those notes carried hope, and invitation of a future. It wasn't a song she knew or heard before. Yet she felt as if it was for her. As the rhythm changed her body moved into motion. She felt a desire to run and sit with him. She was locked in position by fear, afraid if she left the window he'd disappear. So she stood and stayed with him, there at the window until the dusk rolled in and the stars rolled out. He put his trumpet into its case and walked away into the darkness.

That night she dreamed of the music and of his face. In her dreams, his face was softer and brighter. She could see his eyes more clearly, and they held hope. The music had words...whispered in a smokey tune.  When she awoke she could no longer capture the images or remember the words. But she felt her heart yearn for it. It haunted her daylight hours. She went out and walked the streets, searching faces and hoping to find him in the masses. She listened for the music amidst the traffic and rushing crowds.

Back in her empty space she found herself humming the songs she heard, closed her eyes and captured his face again...and then the trumpet came. She didn't even walk to the window, she opened the door and rushed through the hallways and down the stairs. As she opened the door it was if the city stood still and he was there alone. She slowed her step and walked towards him.

He continued to play, his back to her. She felt as if each note was pulling her closer.

On his late note he turned....and greeted her with a smile. "I've been waiting for you."

As she looked into those eyes, and saw the light...she knew he had been. Destiny had finally found her, connected her.

He lifted the trumpet to his lips...and she stood beside him, singing the words to a song she had never known.

Fight

Night was settling in. Echoes of the evening songs began to bounce from the trees to the floor of the forest. But she sat.

Silent. Still.

She knew the flashlights would come shortly. The calls would fill the empty spaces. But she would tuck in. Stay hidden from the reality that waited beyond these branches and leaves.

She needed to hide.  She needed to lose herself and believe she hadn’t heard those words today.  She wanted to either leap into the past or fast forward to a distant future. She didn’t want the journey these circumstances placed on her today. Instead, she ran. She ran with fury. She ran as far and deep as she could move.

But the silence was only there on the outside. Inside she screamed. Inside the words shouted and condemned her. 

Cancer. Tumor. Chemo. Radiation.  They repeated and bounced from her heart, to her stomach and to her head swarming like bees.

In the dark she settled to her knees. She collapsed and lifted the dirt into her hands. A shift took place in her veins, like the path that meandered in front of her. She clutched the soil and dropped lower to the ground. The tears began to quench the soil below her. Her scream moved from within her and out to the air. The sobs were muffled with words that tried to spill out. She inhaled deeply, and exhaled with grief. Finally she sprawled to the ground, exhausted from the race away from life and the emotion that pulled her down.

On her back, she stared into the darkness. The questions seem to be etched there into the sky. How can she fight this? Where would her strength come from?  But over, and over…why? Why?

She searched the stars for answers. She listened to the wind and the voices of night to see if they would whisper the answers that she needed to hear.

But the only sound breaking the silence was her heartbeat. The rhythm of it calmed her. A peace seemed to reach from every direction and wrap itself around her. The pounding of her heart carried with it a fight, a resolve. She wouldn’t surrender, she would meet this battle with a vengeance. She would grasp her fingers around faith.

As if on cue came the voices and lights, revealing the soldiers of love that would surround her and march beside in her in this battle. Their arms carried her and she let go and allowed it.

From behind her she heard a chorus from the sounds of night, “Fight, fight, fight.”

 

I am linking up with Write on Edge this week. My prompt is the photo above.  It has been a while and I am feeling quite rusty! I do love feedback though.