Fighting The Rain

Salutations to my imaginary readers!! here's a short story I'd like you to read. leave a comment if you will and tell me what you think!!
1That day, it was raining, raining, raining, harder than it would ever rain before and harder than it would ever rain again, but still the fire was burning my guts out, the fire was burning, burning, burning, consuming the place where my heart used to be. Usually, here in Prince Edward Island Canada, it only snowed, but that day it rained, rained reality; it rained cruelty and hopelessness and stinging, burning, fire. It rained until water poured through all the cracks and crannies in our little shoe-box house, it rained until the world was nothing but a sludgy grey smear, until the trees stood ablaze, caught on fire in their glistening hues of red and gold. The fire inside of me, it wasn’t one that rain could put out, like sky rain, that beat the leaves down off of the trees, soggy and brown, ashes on the melting ground in the aftermath of the storm. Rather, the rain, that rain, the rain of reality just filled me with spiraling smoke, until one day, I would suffocate at the end of my pain.**** 2 I slip backstage that night, right before I was supposed to go on. They all jeered at me, but I just ducked my freshly showered head and looked away, hoping the remnants of my cereal supper don’t show. “What are you doing here?” Melissa hissed. “Oh, wait, I forgot, Willow is here to because she won the pageant, and she has to be crowned Miss Take.” My face burned, the flames leaping, leaping, leaping, the flames where the music, the magic, the power used to be. Then, I knew what I had to do, but I suppose I had known it all along. If you let people take everything away form you, then you aren’t you any more. I knew what I needed to do to prove to the bullies, to the worlds, to myself, that, yes, there are dark places in the worlds, but I was going to use the fire inside of me to will them up with light. The raging, blazing pain would serve me as warmth and comfort, in the rain, the storm the night, I would fill the world with light, filling in the dark unknowns, even the gaping hole beside my father, the place where my mother used to be. With trembling fingers, I replaced the broken string, ignoring the snickers and snide remarks of the other kids, as they laughed at me, as they laughed at my father, who, in the audience was chomping on dry cheerios instead of pop corn and chatting with a new victim about Montana, spraying her with bits of cereal stained spittle in his exuberance. as I stepped onto the makeshift stage under the angry, brooding sky, the sky that was crying tears of rage and rain all over my new dress, I realized, as I looked at my eargerly smiling, cereal eating father, that, no, the music was not gone forever, and that the fire inside of me was of my own making. That when God plunged my into a world of dank and dismal rain, that I would burn my fire, burn it, burn it, burn it, and would force him to see that I Willow, that I, me, was autonomic, that I made my own light amidst the world’s cruelty and darkness, amidst the world’s pouring rain.
*** 3I rosined my bow despite the driving rain, and I came out after all when they called my name. they called me names, too, jeering as I walked out, but I walked out anyway, and I smiled at them, smiled at my dad, smiled at my mother, smiled at the whole blasted town, smile at the whole #@$% Island, the whole $%^& country, even. And as I smiled at them, I felt music well up inside of me instead of the usual savage, insatiable fury that I held in my heart, but not instead of fire. “Good evening, Avonlea!! Good evening, Price Edward Island, Canada!! We gather here tonight in support of the Canadian Cystic Fibrosis Foundation!! Can I hear a woo-hoo?” my voice got smaller, softer, as the driving rain, their applause, the jeering cries of mirth of the kids backstage, tapered off, died away to an echoing roar. “I’m here today” I continued, “for my mother.” Their awful, antagonizing stares bored holes in my brain. Their eyes sweep over the empty spot beside my father. Just because you can’t see something, doesn’t mean it’s not there.
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4 On the morning of the rain, I was so afraid of what was to come that I could hardly down my cocoa-puffs. My dad sat across from me, unnervingly steady, patiently slogging his way through his fourth bowl of cheerios, dribbling milk across the political cartoons, today’s making fun of the Prime Minister’s buck teeth. No matter how perfect you are, the public can always find fault, or the world, the dumb-#*@ kids at school. I squirmed in my seat, even though I knew my dad hated that. You know how when someone tells you to stop squirming, you always end up squirming more?? I tried to find a place on the bus that morning the growing knot in my stomach didn’t hurt, but every twist and turn seemed to make it worse, not to mention my coat was crinkling, crinkling, crinkling, with every move I made. I hunkered down as low as I could so no-one would notice, so maybe today they would leave me alone. After my mother died, all of my used to be friends estranged themselves from me. People sense difference, and they were afraid, so afraid, that they would have to hurt like me if they got too close. They want to drive the difference away, so that they will all be the same, because they couldn’t make fun of someone for being just like them. First, it bothered me a lot, even though it was just little quirks that had always been there anyway, like my Harry Potter glasses, my gangling, awkward, skinny body, my fly away curls. But secretly I was always afraid that they would look inside of me and see the ugly truth, the fire burning me alive with hot, hateful pain, the fire that I had to keep inside, all of the time, every day. I was petrified that one day, they would tear down the walls I had so carefully structured around myself for protection, and they would see the truth, the truth that I tried to hide from even myself. You see, you can’t see someone’s pain when they hold it inside, and as much as I tried to tell myself that the bullying started the fire, but I knew the truth, even though it was a shattered mosaic of facts and memories cobbled from the shards of what used to be my heart. Nothing the bullies did on the outside started the fire in my soul. Rather the walls around me, the walls I thought were my salvation was really my sordid death sentence. They couldn’t get close enough to hurt me, but that didn’t matter because my walls, they were going to crash and burn from within.
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Some people wear their pain on the outside, but there are others who hurt on the inside, too. Just because you can’t see something, you know, that doesn’t mean it’s not there.
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5 After a while, I became invisible, and the first few days, it was so totally great. But then, our old hag of a teacher who’s gender is up for debate decided to make me play my violin at our benefit day, where were would have a talent show, a bake sale( I definitely couldn’t participate in that. My dad had a hard time pouring cereal into a bowl as it is.), and some games and races. Then, they started in on me because of the music, because of the way I am, because music wells up inside of me instead of tears when I am hurting, instead of violence when I am angry. They told me, “Why bother to play your violin when your mom won’t come to see you? Everyone thinks you’re a freak anyway- if you didn’t act so weird, maybe they would just leave you alone.” Yes, in the auditorium, there would be a dark place, a gap, a black hole where the brightest place in my life used to be. That day, they cornered me at recess, Amelia and Katharine and Sarah. Amelia had been my best friend. They taunted me, caught a hold to me before I could get away, before I could run, before I could hide. I backed into a tree on the play ground, reaching backward for a source of salvation that had gone away, that used to be but would never come back. My mother. My best friend. My music, oh, God, how could I ever let them take the one thing I had left??? God. That’s it. God. Maybe he’ll save me, but I knew I was done for, because in the end, the only person who you can really depend on to save you is yourself. Myself, what had I done to myself???
***
In that instance, the truth overcomes me, and I find the courage to look into my ex-bestie’s eyes. I knew the truth, the awful, hateful truth, for the fire inside of me, burning, burning, burning me out. They may have hated me for who I was, but when I gave up my music, I hated myself more for who I had become.
**** 6 In that instance that I look at her, Amelia looks away, and I escape, running blindly, the rain lashing at my back, the air biting at my lungs, the breath of Canada bitter and smoky, its teeth cold, cruel, metallic. I run harder as I hear their shrill voices surging forward on the wind, stumbling over my fumbling feet, slowly at first, my progress rendered for progress’ sake. Then, for one sickening, heart rending moment, I am completely motion less, but then, and only then, did I turn and look back. And there they are, chasing, chasing, chasing me. Panic seizes up in my throat, more bitter and choking than bile. As I look away, without thinking, I knew what to do, how to get away, and I was running, running, running, running like I had never run before and will never run again. Faster and faster, swifter and steadier, until the ground and the sky run together, until the rain pounding at my back, resonating through my hollow, heartless chest. I Ran until my hair was plastered to my skull, until my converse squelched sickeningly every time my feet pounded into the brown relief of muck and mire that had once been the ground. With the celestial boundaries of the earth tumbling upside down around me, I wondered why the world as the masses know it has to be all wrong for it to be, for me, all right.
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7 I ran until at last I could not run anymore, until my chest was about to burst and my feet no longer touched the racing ground. Then, I felt something inside of me give, something from a part of me I hadn’t known was there until now. I felt it give, felt the rush of power, and I was no longer running, running, running, but I was flying, flying, flying. I didn’t know that I had wings, and as I soared through the school yard and the woods ablaze beyond, I forgot just exactly what I was running form: I just knew it would hurt me, and that I wanted to get away.Little did I know that I was really hurting myself more than anybody else could hurt me; and no matter where I went, I could not get away form that slap in the face, the sordid truth of myself- that who I was was not who I wanted to be.
*** 8 Unfortunately, if you get high like that off of natural sources, it never lasts long, and sure, I had escaped from my tormentors, but new problems would arise if I couldn’t sneak back into room 312, home of Maple leaf Grammar School’s most vicious species, worse by far than even the sixth, seventh, and eighth graders all combined. Da Na, da Na, da Na- the fifth graders. The hall monitor glanced my way, and in a frenzied panic, I ducked into one of the kindergarten bathrooms, locking the door behind me, I was gulping and heaving convulsively, sucking at the atmosphere in vain, for it refused to provide me with adequate air. I leaned over, seeing stars, and my messenger bag banged against my knees, holding my soaked and soiled music books, my violin, my bow. I usually practiced it at recess, on the outskirts of the playground. My shoes skidded, and soon I had sunk to the ground, curling into myself, not even thinking about what kinds of gosh awful bacteria littered the floor of the kindergarten bathrooms. The truth resounded across the empty room. Yes, the truth. I had let them convince to quit music. The words resounded in my head, like the notes when the violin had a broken string. It could amaze you how quickly something that was just a little off could mess up the whole song. I hoped that I was wrong, but I wasn’t. I had done the one thing I’d told myself I’d never, ever do, no matter what else came my way. I’d let them hurt in a twisted way: I had let them hurt me because I had ended up hurting myself. They hated me for my music, but I hated myself for the lack of it. While they thought they hated me for who I was, I hated myself more for who I had become.
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9 Now, the strings in my heart, the strings that had once played beautiful melodies, they were snapping like rubber bands, and my heart, it would never work right again. The music had been the rosined bow, playing the song of joy in my heart, but now, whatever I used, the strings would do nothing but shriek in their anguish. Shriek out the truth, one resounding note, not a melody at all. It is amazing, isn’t it, how one wrong note can ruin the whole song.
***
As I curled into myself some more, a fiddle headed fern, tears welled up inside of me instead of arpeggios, and I willed myself not to cry. They’re just teasing, people would say, or lots of kids get bullied. Build a bridge. Get over it. You don’t matter to us, that’s what they really meant to say. No one cares. Go hide your hurt. Go deal with your issues alone. As the shards and fragments of advice make a mosaic, I realize that all lies come from that tiny grain of glass at first, a piece of the shattered truth.

*** I gulp down a shuddery, distorted cry, forced to accept that the music, the magic and power inside of me, the raw ability, that they are gone. I flushed the toilet to drown out my last shaky sob, and then I stood at last, staring at my reflection, at the full length, smeary, crayon smudged mirror, and the girl that looked back at me, I swear I’d never seen her before. I watched the mirror girl pass a shaking hand over her eyes, determined to blitz away whatever burning sight was searing holes in her retinas. If was as if she was saying this can not, not, not possibly be me. And no, my reflection no longer looked like me at all. Her (my reflection’s, that is) eyes were dark and huge and hollow, a color no one had ever seen before and would never see again, an unethereal hue of grayish greenish black., with shadows underneath, her nose sharp and pointy, as was her chin. Her hair was roan brown, or had once been, and it had once been curly, too, but now it was just limp waves, stringy, scraggly waves. She was the sort of willowy, gangling person that was always tripping over their own feet, but her whole figure was small somehow, wild yet frail, as if someone could break her more than she was already broken just by reaching out, by touching her. She passes her concussing hand over her eyes once more, but one day, she, too, will know, just as I do, that there are dark places in life, but just because you can’t see something, doesn’t mean it’s not there.
***** 10The music is gone, and that’s the ugly, hateful truth, even though it’s full of lies. The string’s of my heart are broken and out of tune, and they will never make music again. In an instance, one horrible, terrible instance, I am raking the rosined bow across everything I can find, the walls, the floor, and finally, my bare arm, knowing all the while that no instrument can play the song of my pain.
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11 I slip back into class some twenty minutes later, and I realize that no one noticed I was even gone. I kept my head down in class, hunching over as low as I could, hoping and praying that no one would see me, that if they couldn’t see me, that they would all just leave me alone. Just because you can’t see something, doesn’t mean it’s not there.
Some parents had started a bonfire right before the show, but the rain squelched it in an instance. As I look at the charred, ashy remains, I realize we should be not fighting the fire, but fighting the rain.
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12 In that storm, I played harder and swifter and stronger than ever, and the fire inside of me manifested itself, and it and I burned harder and brighter and better than ever before as well. I filled the dismal, darkened school yard with fire and music no one had ever heard or seen before or will ever hear or see again. And the place beside my father, it suddenly didn’t look so much like a dark whole anymore. For my mother, yes, for my mother. She was everywhere, all the time, and people just couldn’t see in the dark. The rain drove on, pelting me with cruel, cold whip lashes, hitting me with a hard reality that I had never before been able to truly accept: yes, my mother was dead. The music, however, it drowned out the sound of the driving deluge. Bullies, are like rain you know, beating you down, drop by drop, chilling and soaking you through. Cruelty reigned the world these days. But my fire, it was stronger, and it could drive the rain away. Some people devote their lives to fighting the fire, but as I look out at the crowd, and know that mine will be devoted to fighting the rain.
p.s. when cutting and pasting, it got a little mixed up, so paragraphs 2 and 3 are suppsoed to be between 11 and 12.
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