The World Soap - Chapter 1 unrevised - The Girl and The Re - encounter
The World Soap
By: Vanora Namu Heart
The Girl and The Re - encounter
He was in a completely white room. There were no shadows or shades, it was just white. It reminded him of a blank canvas or sheet of paper. It felt like it was still waiting for a picture to be created. No, that wasn't right. It felt like it was waiting for a life of its own to be created. In a corner or at least what seemed to be a corner sat a young girl. She looked around five but she didn't seem it. For all he knew she could have been eleven, after all he didn't really know her or did he? It felt like he was starting to doubt himself. Like he had seen this before, but had he? The girl looked up at him, her striking violet eyes pierced him. It was almost like he had suddenly been stabbed through the forehead, quick then it was over. He looked at her, her with her buttery blonde hair and small doll like features, who was she? Was she the girl, but then again who was the girl anyways? He certainly didn't know. Surprisingly she smiled at him and laughed. A friendly and familiar feeling. He felt perplexed. Who was she and why did it feel like he of all people should know? In her small and delicate hands she held a spool of cream-colored thread. He briefly wondered if it was silk. He noticed with a genuine interest she was unraveling the spool of thread. As he knelt down to get a better look her voice hit his ears with a sudden ring. " Have you ever heard the story of Ariadne's thread ? " were the words that seemed to have escaped her lips.
" It's the thread that Theseus used to find his way around the labyrinth when he went to kill the minotaur, right?" he asked and was surprised to find his voice was that of a little boy's. Shaking this off he regained his composure. Her voice rang out again " Something like that. " . She chuckled . "Why do you ask anyways?" he himself asked. "Well I was thinking that I could use it to get home if I ever needed to," she responded. Huh? That was funny he thought. I could have sworn there wasn't a stapler there before he said to himself as he noted the stapler next to her. The small girl reached out her hand, taking his soft yellow cotton shirt and putting the thread against it. As she reached out her other hand to grab the stapler the realization flitted across his mind. With a panicked tone and a slight stutter he said " Oy wha-what are you do-da-doing ? " . A soft smile appeared on her dream-like face and in a sweet and fluffy voice, one that reminded him of cotton candy she said " I'm attaching the end of the thread to what I call home . " With that he found his shirt attached to a piece of cream colored thread and his hand being held by a familiar stranger. The world went dark. Then as if light was peering in through a gradually growing crack he suddenly found himself in a lit room, his own bed room. It was a typical teenage guys room with its light blue walls and slight mess to it. There was a few lamps here and there, a computer, and a bookcase filled with his favorite novels, mangas and comics. There was a red shag-carpet and some red-plaid sheets. It wasn't much really and it didn't even feel like home to him. It was simply a room where he somewhat lived. It was a room with barely any life to it. It's picture had not been properly painted and he wasn't going to be the one to fix that. For a moment he remembered a poem someone he had once known had once wrote. In his mind it was spoken by an older woman's voice, a voice of someone similar to a mother or grandmother.
"Im fine.
My depression is just acting up again.
Soon enough it will be gone.
Around a few days or weeks, it depends,
but soon enough ill be happy again.
The sadness will go away.
After all nothing lasts forever.
In the end so much we experience is fleeting,
that is compared to the lifetime we live.".
Fleeting, huh, he thought. That dream had been fleeting if had even been a dream at all he mused. It felt more like a memory or like he had suddenly been transported into another world or someone else's mind. Then again that wasn't possible, not to the him at the moment at least. Maybe the him at some other moment would understand, but for now he didn't. He sighed as he lay back down onto his big fluffy pillow, pushed his messy black hair out of his annoyingly yellowish eyes,traced that annoying random scare on his right cheekbone, and tried to recall the date. As if on cue his alarm started beeping and with that annoying beep it displayed in fire-engine red letters the time and the date. A view which displayed itself in his field of vision only after he had haphazardly fumbled for that very special button that made the alarm clock shut-up. He sighed with annoyance as he lay back down once again and corrected his previous thought. The thought of how his room was a teenage guys room, as of then , at 5 : 45 in the morning on April 1st , it had been acknowledged as a 20-year old mans room. A room that was part of a 20 year-old mans apartment. It was this pathetic human beings birthday. A day that was suppose to be a celebration.
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" Why do something you hate? " she had once been asked. The response she had given was simple, " because I love to and because I have to." That was the way she had always been, even when she had tried to insure that she could hold on to what she loved, she would let go of it. The same was true with what she hated, even if she made sure she wouldn't have to be around it, it would come back to her. She was the type of person who defied her own comfort zone and did what she was afraid of just to prove she could do it.
There she stood, behind her on the board, her name written in clear letters " Ms. Vasanta Tenshi ", in front of her a podium in which she gripped with unusually clammy hands. The smell of burning rubber coming from the science lab next door was prominent and only promoting her nerves further. "She, a girl with stage fright loved to give lectures, ironic indeed. " she thought and gave off a small giggle. The room in front of her was starting to gradually fill up with students, teachers, and curious people alike. They had all come in hope to hear a logical view, her logical view on the philosophy of something, it wasn't really important. For now she just had to calm her jitters and then just like breathing it would come naturally to her, just like it always had. With that she pushed her buttery long blonde hair out of her eyes and began.
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I'm an idiot, he thought regretfully. Cars zoomed on past him in colorful blurs. His wristwatch ticked loudly in a surreal manner , constantly reminding him he was utterly and totally late. It felt almost impossible that there was a chance for him to cross the road with its busy and dangerous nature. But he knew he had to after all it was right in front of him, the university where the lecture would take place, the lecture he had promised to go to with his friend Amaimon. His heart beat like a drum from a tribal song, fast and rapid. A gap in the busy rush, with no cars appeared.It was the perfect chance for him to cross. As quick as it had come, the feeling had passed and he was standing in front of the university going over the map of the building that had been given to him by Amaimon. After ten minutes of wandering dim lit halls containing the occasional student or teacher, he suddenly found himself in the lecture hall. His eyes flitted over the seats and with a quick search he found Amaimon. Quickly he walked over to him, a fast pace in his step and sat down,trying to calm his jitters. As he was taking out the video recorder that Amaimon had requested and handing it over, he suddenly felt a dizzying rush of nauseatingly hot sickness. Time began to feel like a blur, the lecture had already started and the words seemed to fly around the room, making him even dizzier. " What is this ? " he mumbled in a slightly slurred voice, to low for anyone else but himself to hear. Those eyes he thought why were they here? The familiar feeling took over him, the feeling like a knife piercing through his forehead, quick then over. Her striking violet eyes pierced him. She, she looked like that girl from the blank-canvas room. His vision blurred and darkened at the edges. For a second the world turned to rainbow static, then pitch darkness, like a black cloak of charcoal surrounded him. Then with a blinding flare everything was white. A blank and pure white, a white without any life, a lifeless white. He was back in the blank-canvas room. And there she sat in her corner like area looking at him with her doll like face and features, staring. But this time something was different, but what? Then he knew, the pain, a searing pain was coursing through his body. It was like a white, hot fire, coursing through his veins, a never-ending pain enveloping him. His knees buckled and gave out, hot and sticky blood dripped down his head and his right cheekbone. It bloomed all over various parts of his body. He felt weak and faint, like a thin paper doll being weighed down with water. As he tried to focus his vision he noticed them, the mirrors. It seemed that the blank-canvas room had a ceiling, a ceiling covered in various mirrors as far as the eyes could see. The room appeared to be never-ending, the mirrors looked to be infinite in all directions. The place where the girl sat wasn't a corner after all. The mirrors were all reflecting the same image ( strangely enough ) . The image of him, a little boy version of him in a yellow cotton shirt attached to silky thread, a silky thread whose end was held by the little girl, while he, the child him was dying. She walked towards him, her long buttery hair so long it trailed behind her on the clean, white ground. She seemed expressionless as she stared at the blood blooming all over him, then the tears hit his face. She was crying. " This-this is all my fault ." she tearfully murmured to herself and knelt down at his side. He tried to talk, to tell her it was alright, but he couldn't speak. Only blood bloomed from his mouth when he tried. Her delicate hands touched his chest, tracing the place where the string had been attached. In a quick moment and movement it had been torn from his shirt. Miraculously he started to heal, but by this time she had already faded away. She had faded as she had walked away, as she rapidly seemed to grow into a young woman. A sad young woman. The only thing left from all this was a deep scar on his right cheekbone. It was where part of the torn string had fallen. A scar that he felt he would treasure. Then he was back in the real world, on a cold floor with a room filled with strangers focusing their attention on him. They were not moving.
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The world or reality hadn't totally reached her till the loud thud of someone falling down had echoed across the room. Before she had simply been in a zone relating only to the topic of her lecture. But then it happened. As if watching a slow motion scene in an old movie, she saw him. Him with his messy dark hair, yellowish hazel eyes and that all to familiar scar. The scar that was her fault. Then he hit the ground. He was unconscious, slightly bloody, and had an appearance similar to a tan and very tall, but limp rag-doll. His name escaped her lips in an airy whisper " Acuzio Ajani Zarate ", admittedly a complicated tong twister of a name. The room for a moment was silent, all attention focused upon his pathetic form, then it exploded. People came rushing to his side. The man that had sat next to him, his greenish curls flying as he panicked, shouted his name and tried to shake him in a manner that of trying to wake someone from a deep sleep. She sighed with irritation, leaned against the podium, and took out her E-cigarette.
When she had been about 15, she had started smoking and it admittedly had been the worst mistake of her life. Well a pretty bad mistake, but not her worst. It had all come down to her stress and her curiosity. Now in a situation that made her feel like having a panic attack, but at the same time as she was trying to quit, an E-cigarette was her only option.
For her the world was full of strings, strings made for connecting and un-connecting people. A sunny yellow for those who were close friends, a clear plastic looking one for ones who didn't know each other and never would, white for ones who would know each other. Then there was pink for ones that would fall in love, gold for ones that would be comrades, red for those with bloody futures, and many other colors for many other connections. Using those strings she moved her fingers and like a dancer or puppeteer, in a quick and fluid motion she bound the people of the room, she froze the rooms time itself. As if on cue his eyes opened in a groggy manner. Confusion accompanied by alarm shown clearly on his face like a ripple on a pond. She stayed still, very still, like she was modeling for a painting and tried her hardest not to breath to much. As he sat up, his head whipped back and forth and his eyes danced in panic as they flitted around the room.
Then it stopped, he drank in his surroundings and breathed deep, calming breaths. He stared at her as he rose to his feet and slowly, with dragging steps, like he was in a trance and walked towards her. He reached out his hand and with a childish seeming manner, he poked her. On the forehead, the cheek, the stomach, and the neck he continued to poke her. Then the tickling came. Her cheeks puffed out as she tried, and failed to contain her laughter. He grinned at her with a large and crooked grin. " Sooooooo, is everyone faking this stillness too? " He said in an uppity, almighty manner. She raised her eyebrows at him, " Do you really think that's the case? " she retorted. Then she bound him too.
Once they had all been positioned to their original spots and she had cleaned him up she started the rooms time again. Confusion flickered across the peoples faces as a conscience and well looking Acuzio Zarate, the young man who had fallen unconscious to the floor with blood pouring from his veins sat up with no blood in sight.He stared at her intensely with narrowed eyes. She gave a crooked grin and in her cool and silky voice started to speak. " Well, well I am sure this young mans fall gave us all quite a fright, so how about some one takes him to the nurse down the hall and then afterwards I will continue with the lecture." she suggested to the bundle of people in front of her and tried to avoid his gaze. In a flash twenty minutes had past, she was done with the lecture and walking out of the university thinking about her other job in which because of she had a designated place to be at 4:00 in the afternoon on certain days. There were other times and places too, but at the moment that didn't matter. A small tap on the shoulder was how it began. The light and quick feeling caused her to turn around. Next came the extreme bluntness of his statement, " Go to get coffee with me!" He said it while staring at her with an intense look of curiosity and inquisitiveness. It was the look of a scientist who wanted to know the exact color of your insides. She sighed, as cars rushed on past her with zooms and gusts of wind." Alright, but I have to leave at 3:30. I have somewhere to be at 4:00. " she responded smoothly as she started to walk to the nearest coffee shop, Autumn Leaves & Baked Dreams. He gave a small laugh as he smiled that crooked smile of his.
" Coincidently I have somewhere to be at 4:00 too, so that'll work! " he retorted.
" What are you going to do, meet an information broker?", a sarcastic tone evident in her naturally soft voice.
Once again he smile. A casual " Yeah. " was his reply. At his response one word echoed in her mind, " Shit…. "
