Belisarius
Bluelighter
I posted this on one of my LJ groups; no editing, just off the top of my head.
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July 4th.
Glowing stars falling against a pink night sky, over heads and heads and heads, some as drunk as he is. He laughs and throws one back for the Republic, arm around Julie's neck, Julie who hates his reek of beer and kisses him anyway.
Morning. He wakes up--fireworks forgotten, Julie forgotten, the Republic be damned, puke-sick, head spinning like those lights in the sky had been. He is alone in sheets.
Tomorrow will be different.
Leaves crunch around his feet, the snow of summer past. The air bites with humus and the promise of rain. He looks toward the house off the lane; all the windows are dark. She must be sleeping, though he's never known her to go to bed this early. He opens the door; the warm, stale air and ghost of candle wax tells him what he must know.
The world is split: the white beyond the pane, the black within. His breath is the cloud to follow by day, to this window, to that gleaming mound buried under white. His jacket keeps out the cold, and the silence of the phone. Tomorrow, the road will be open.
The green shamrock on his cubicle wall tells him it must be spring. Why not, when leaves of green and leaves of white sprout without and within, when the Sun warms the Earth and the pot warms the already-burnt coffee, when birds sing and keys clack, and one is worse than the other. Promise.
Stars of red, yellow, and blue rain against farther still ones, over heads and heads and heads, some as drunk as he is. He throws his arm around Amy, and drinks deeply to the Republic. The white-shirted girl does not kiss him.
Tomorrow will be different.
************************************
July 4th.
Glowing stars falling against a pink night sky, over heads and heads and heads, some as drunk as he is. He laughs and throws one back for the Republic, arm around Julie's neck, Julie who hates his reek of beer and kisses him anyway.
Morning. He wakes up--fireworks forgotten, Julie forgotten, the Republic be damned, puke-sick, head spinning like those lights in the sky had been. He is alone in sheets.
Tomorrow will be different.
Leaves crunch around his feet, the snow of summer past. The air bites with humus and the promise of rain. He looks toward the house off the lane; all the windows are dark. She must be sleeping, though he's never known her to go to bed this early. He opens the door; the warm, stale air and ghost of candle wax tells him what he must know.
The world is split: the white beyond the pane, the black within. His breath is the cloud to follow by day, to this window, to that gleaming mound buried under white. His jacket keeps out the cold, and the silence of the phone. Tomorrow, the road will be open.
The green shamrock on his cubicle wall tells him it must be spring. Why not, when leaves of green and leaves of white sprout without and within, when the Sun warms the Earth and the pot warms the already-burnt coffee, when birds sing and keys clack, and one is worse than the other. Promise.
Stars of red, yellow, and blue rain against farther still ones, over heads and heads and heads, some as drunk as he is. He throws his arm around Amy, and drinks deeply to the Republic. The white-shirted girl does not kiss him.
Tomorrow will be different.
