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- Story Listed as: True Life For Adults
- Theme: Family & Friends
- Subject: Death / Heartbreak / Loss
- Published: 05/26/2014
Balloons
Born 1996, F, from Missouri, United StatesThe truck with Diet Coke-stained seats was always there to pick me up. I used to wait for it on the blue benches when my mom was too busy to come for me. Another girl used to wait there with me, too, but she eventually stopped. Maggie was always late; the school looked abandoned by the time she turned into the parking lot. The road there was fast: one where mud-splattered trucks always passed you because they refused to humiliate themselves by staying behind a smaller vehicle.
The more I think about her parent’s little brick house off the main road, the more I miss it. It always looked sad and dejected, even though it wasn’t. The Wild Venture sign in front of her barn never changed. But I did. When I first started taking lessons there, I saw it as a novelty; when I had been taking lessons there for a few years, it looked like comfort and familiarity; when I looked out of the car window as we went to the funeral, I saw it as the last trace of a heart that once beat and voice that once laughed; when I passed it without turning, it made me feel lost and detached.
I feel alone as the white gravel rocks crack and clang beneath my boots; I see nothing through the little window of the front door. The door creaks as I open it, but it would be unusual if it didn’t. Smoke billows out from the inside like a toxic cloud confined for days. I choke and my eyes stream. I see only traces of the warm wood floors as the air clears slightly. Maggie’s office is to the left, and I know the glass paperweight I made still lies on her desk inside: a long forgotten Christmas gift. Maggie’s mother jumps out of the smoke toward me, with her face like a skeleton, weak and gasping. She clutches at my blue jacket, whispering, “Help me! Help me!” I stutter that I can’t… I can’t stop him.
We used run around the seemingly vast land around the barn because there was always something new to discover hidden off the gravel path. In the soft grass on the hill, we found a horseshoe. Walking behind the barn, we found a locked building filled with old stuff. On a whim, we cleaned out the case full of faded ribbons and trophies, and it shined brightly once again. We were the last ones to touch the memorabilia of Maggie’s past successes. I didn’t think about how great those times were when we had them. I didn’t appreciate those moments surrounded by friends putting our cell phones under our boots to get better reception, nor did I appreciate the spirit in Maggie’s horses that pushed me. I remember riding with rain thundering against the barn’s roof and being as calm as I have ever been. I remember the ribbed texture of the brush against my horse’s soft pillow of hair. I remember the sounds of saddles buckling, voices always asking--never commanding--and whispers of sweet nothings.
I was too young then to remember the rest of the day. I suppose it went like every other one: walking through the creaky front door, across the main room, stepping on the blanket of dust that always lay over the place no matter what we did, down the walkway of rutted and worn concrete, between pairs of horses’ eyes that stared out from behind the chewed wood of their stall doors, and out to the huge tree. That’s where we released the teal balloons as wind stung our faces. My long lost friend and I cried together on the day of her funeral; we knew it was what Maggie would want. Parents who just lost their only daughter comforted us. I was tall enough then to see her mom’s hairline as she hugged me. “Maggie wanted you to know to always keep your head up and your heels down,” she said, though she looked like she was dying. Everyone cried for the present and for the future, but no one wore black. It just wasn’t right to.
The barn is still there, but it fell apart. It haunts me everyday, though the ghosts of her family were not meant for me to bear. The warm wood has long turned cold, the horses have stopped neighing, and the bustling noise has been suffocated. I look at it anymore if I drive by. It is a thing of my past and remembering forces me to regret.
Balloons(Morgan Hope)
The truck with Diet Coke-stained seats was always there to pick me up. I used to wait for it on the blue benches when my mom was too busy to come for me. Another girl used to wait there with me, too, but she eventually stopped. Maggie was always late; the school looked abandoned by the time she turned into the parking lot. The road there was fast: one where mud-splattered trucks always passed you because they refused to humiliate themselves by staying behind a smaller vehicle.
The more I think about her parent’s little brick house off the main road, the more I miss it. It always looked sad and dejected, even though it wasn’t. The Wild Venture sign in front of her barn never changed. But I did. When I first started taking lessons there, I saw it as a novelty; when I had been taking lessons there for a few years, it looked like comfort and familiarity; when I looked out of the car window as we went to the funeral, I saw it as the last trace of a heart that once beat and voice that once laughed; when I passed it without turning, it made me feel lost and detached.
I feel alone as the white gravel rocks crack and clang beneath my boots; I see nothing through the little window of the front door. The door creaks as I open it, but it would be unusual if it didn’t. Smoke billows out from the inside like a toxic cloud confined for days. I choke and my eyes stream. I see only traces of the warm wood floors as the air clears slightly. Maggie’s office is to the left, and I know the glass paperweight I made still lies on her desk inside: a long forgotten Christmas gift. Maggie’s mother jumps out of the smoke toward me, with her face like a skeleton, weak and gasping. She clutches at my blue jacket, whispering, “Help me! Help me!” I stutter that I can’t… I can’t stop him.
We used run around the seemingly vast land around the barn because there was always something new to discover hidden off the gravel path. In the soft grass on the hill, we found a horseshoe. Walking behind the barn, we found a locked building filled with old stuff. On a whim, we cleaned out the case full of faded ribbons and trophies, and it shined brightly once again. We were the last ones to touch the memorabilia of Maggie’s past successes. I didn’t think about how great those times were when we had them. I didn’t appreciate those moments surrounded by friends putting our cell phones under our boots to get better reception, nor did I appreciate the spirit in Maggie’s horses that pushed me. I remember riding with rain thundering against the barn’s roof and being as calm as I have ever been. I remember the ribbed texture of the brush against my horse’s soft pillow of hair. I remember the sounds of saddles buckling, voices always asking--never commanding--and whispers of sweet nothings.
I was too young then to remember the rest of the day. I suppose it went like every other one: walking through the creaky front door, across the main room, stepping on the blanket of dust that always lay over the place no matter what we did, down the walkway of rutted and worn concrete, between pairs of horses’ eyes that stared out from behind the chewed wood of their stall doors, and out to the huge tree. That’s where we released the teal balloons as wind stung our faces. My long lost friend and I cried together on the day of her funeral; we knew it was what Maggie would want. Parents who just lost their only daughter comforted us. I was tall enough then to see her mom’s hairline as she hugged me. “Maggie wanted you to know to always keep your head up and your heels down,” she said, though she looked like she was dying. Everyone cried for the present and for the future, but no one wore black. It just wasn’t right to.
The barn is still there, but it fell apart. It haunts me everyday, though the ghosts of her family were not meant for me to bear. The warm wood has long turned cold, the horses have stopped neighing, and the bustling noise has been suffocated. I look at it anymore if I drive by. It is a thing of my past and remembering forces me to regret.
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