My Friendship With The Deity of Death

First Sunrise On The Road

        As with so many other stories before mine, this story begins with something simple.

If you looked at one of those pictures that hang on my family's wall, you would have thought that there was absolutely nothing wrong with it. Nothing wrong at all. Just your basic Western family: a blonde, smiling mother in a sun hat, a tall and muscular father, an equally tall eldest son, a miniature copy of that eldest son, and a girl with dirty blonde hair and a crooked smile that does not fit in with the rest of the family.

Her hair is a few shades too dark, her eyes a few hues too light, and her gaze is something that tells you she knows the worst of you. Because if you've talked to her, she probably does.

Hi. That's me. My name is Sage Callowyn. This is my family. Mother Callowyn, Father Callowyn, Elijah Maximus Callowyn, and Elias Daniel Callowyn. Between the two boys, rests the forgotten middle child, long forgotten: Marianne Sage Callowyn.

If you were to study the rest of the photographs my mother had tenderly displayed on the wall, you would notice many other things. A copious number of pictures of Elijah, holding his rewards like the pompous prat he is; Elias, and his many beautiful paintings strung across the wall like a fractured mural.

I've always told him he would become a great artist one day.

In the midst of all the smiling Elijahs and Elias, you would notice many family pictures here and there, many couple pictures of Momma and Dad together, smiling, under many different backdrops of almost unreal scenery. They used to travel the world.

And in the cracks, when there are no more awards of Elijah's to show off, or Elias has not done a new artwork, the blank space will be filled with a picture of a girl with long, dirty blonde hair, standing upon a stage and doing what she enjoys the most. Yup, guess who?

I do not see why Momma does not enjoy the things I like to do. It is not that she does not enjoy things that are beautiful, or that she does not like art in general. She enjoys looking at Elias's art. She enjoys listening to Elijah play his violin. So why does she not enjoy my singing, acting, and dancing?

It is not that I am bad at those things. I have won numerous awards for my talents in those three areas myself. So why is it that Momma does not like them? Why is it that only the males in the family show up to my performances, and that all the photos of my success are hung up by Dad, and not Momma?

To that question, I have no idea.

I am not that favourite child. That is something I have known from the day I was born. It is not me, neither is it the youngest child. It is the eldest, Elijah. Momma says he will be a great doctor, or politician, or whatever it is he chooses to be, one day. Elias often says he could win an award for being the most pompous prat on God's green Earth. Which is fairly true. Even I cannot defend my eldest brother.

Elias and I have more of a leaning towards artistry. When we were young (and we still do nowadays, on a rare occasion of free time), I would take him to the town next door, which has a lovely scenery. He would spend time sketching the landscape, and I would dance and sing for the people in the town for a few extra dollars. Then we would buy ice-cream. That town was certainly lovely. And it did not need any of the rest of my family ruining it.

The Callowyns have an odd sort of reputation in my little town. I do not know why. Everyone seems to want to get to know Mrs. Callowyn. People offer to help Mr. Callowyn when they see him gardening. The elder Callowyn child, everyone clamours for a chance to study with him. The younger Callowyn child is something of a desired boy amongst the raving twelve-year-olds of his grade. And the middle Callowyn child is the strange one, with a talent for performing, but a walking target for people offstage.

Again, I do not know why people say that.

Today, I am sitting on the side of the busy road, right on the curb. Maybe my choice of a place for peace and quiet is what drives people to think I have severe autism. I do not. I am just awfully loud when I want to be loud, and terribly quiet when I'm tired of entertaining people. Unlike many people I admire (take Dazai Osamu, for one), I have no energy to clown and entertain all the time.

Entertainment. That is a word that I find my life revolves around by.

I enjoy being on a stage. I like to sing, because I find that song can hide so many more things that prose can. I like to dance, because dance expresses so many more things than speech can. And most of all, I like to act, because I can be someone else that is not Marianne Sage Callowyn. I could be a princess. A prince. Someone whose life is not as crazy and screwed up as mine. I can be anyone. And the best part is, the people who watch me believe every word of my lie without a lick of hesitance or doubt. The faith they have in lies actors spin is surprisingly strong. 

Even offstage, I entertain. In Dazai Osamu's "Ningen Shikkaku", his final work of art, he mentions that he plays the fool, the role of the clown. That is something similar to what I am, but not exactly. Although I use the same verb of 'clowning', I prefer to think that the antics I use to cover up my lies are not 'foolish motions of clowns', but rather, 'acts'. Of a script, of a show, of the endless ballad that I call my life. It is an act of a play.

Switching to a different and unrelated topic, words that people use to describe Marianne are 'goofy', 'energetic', 'outgoing', and 'extroverted'. But words that I would use to describe Sage are 'introverted', 'quiet', 'alone', and as of late, 'suicidal'. Neither Marianne, my appearance to the public, or Sage, my inner self, can answer why I'd use 'suicidal' to describe Sage. I do not know. Perhaps I feel that if I ended my life, it would bring more excitement into someone's life, and joy into others.

But I am not killing myself today, as I stand from my spot on the curb.

It is just, as mystery dictates, a "red herring". Or as prose would call it, "a false ending". Or as I call it, a "diversion", a "distraction", something to bring a little more spice into life. Words can only describe my next course of actions so far.

I set one foot onto the busy road. Cars are only blurs in this scenario. An accidental misstep would send me further into death than I would prefer. I must pick a slow-moving car and scoot into that lane before it can stomp on the brakes and let the police instead of the reaper arrest me.

I may tell many lies on and off the stage, but I can guarantee to you that this itself is no lie. One thing Marianne has always been is a daredevil, playing with death and bungee-jumping further and further into its yawning chasm every time. I enjoy playing with death. It is like an old friend to me now, greeting with me and parting again so I may return to the waking world. And I hope that I  do not regret the day I choose not to part with it again.