Dead Poets and Dying Roses

Twenty Second Chapter

(AN: own plot idea)

After this confrontation in the school, we finally leave the building and I help Mr. Keating pack his belongings into a car. When it is time to part our ways we shake hands. "And remember, this is not the end of the story." I nod, even though it hurts to see him go. Atleast I know, he will be okay. "And don't forget, you can always write me." A smile forms itself on my lips. "Of course." As there is nothing more to say I turn to leave, but I salute to him one last time. "It was an honour to join your lessons. Thank you." "No, it was an honour to have you, Ms. Parks-Dubois." I wave him goodbye and walk away, but somehow I'm not ready to go home yet. So I store my box on my bike and then wander off towards the woods. A storm is about to come up and the wind is already howling between the trees. It immediatly covers my traces up again with snow powder, making it look like I have never been there. Just a ghost, unable to leave something behind. Unseen and alone. Caught between the world of the living and the one of the dead. I don't even realize how far I've gone, until I try to find a place to hide from the weather and find shelter in our cave. I step into the wet entrance and brush my fingers over the cold stone wall. From the inside the whisteling wind sounds like waves crushing against the shore. It's kind of spooky, but also soothing in a weird way. The chaos and the leck of control. I'm sitting down on the rock I've always used to sit on. Before it felt like a golden thrown, now it's just an uncomfortable and dirty torture instrument. Resignated I pull out a cigarette and my lighter. I'm about to light it, when I spot that damn figure in the corner. The remains of an old lamp and the god of the cave. His eyes are pointing directly at me. Nerved out I sigh. "What the hell are you looking at?", I ask it with a rude tone, as if it would just turn around and leave me alone. I look back at the cigarette and twirl it around between my fingers. Then I just drop it and squash it with my foot. I glance at the statue and silently ask it if it is happy now. I'm certainly not. This place has used to be so bright and full of life. I can still hear Meeks and Pitts arguing about something stupid and Knox complaining about his poor love situation, I can hear Charlie's saxophone and Neil telling a scary story. And what about now? Nothing. Silence. As I lower my head my eyes land on some sharp stones on the ground. This can't be it. I grab the rock and start to scratch lines in the wall. C-A-R-P-E D-I-E-M. And then I write their names arpund it. Steven Meeks, Gerard Pitts, Knox Overstreet, Charlie Dalton, Todd Anderson, Rosalie Parks-Dubois. Neil Perry. Carefully I trace the letters one by one with my finger. Startled I drop the stone in my hand, when I hear footsteps approaching. I'm already expecting to get screamed at, but the head who appears in the cave is familiar to me. Very familiar. "Charlie.", I exclaim surprised, trying to push back the fear. "What the hell are you doing here?" "Well, I could ask you the same." His voice is hoarse and exhausted. "I thought you got expelled.", I whisper out as if it is illegal to talk about it. He sits down opposite of me, but it feels like there are miles between us. "I was. I just wanted to talk to Mr. Keating and see this place one last time." I nod understanding. "Me, too, I guess." I look around the cave. "I think I just wanted to leave something behind. Something memorable. Something that defies time." His gaze falls upon the words and his lips shoot up for a short second. But his smile fades away almost in an instant. "And what about us? Will we defie time?" I frown at his question. My silence speaks volumes. "I get it.", Charlie whispers pained. He wants to stand up and I grab his hand to keep him here. But as soon as I touch his skin I flinch back as if I have burned myself. "Please, don't go.", I still ask of him. "I wish everything went different, I wish things worked out. But I have to go back to France. I just have to. There is no other way." I almost choke on my words. "But what if there was? What if you stayed here? With me." His eyes pierce through me, but I can't look at him. "It would be hard, but we could work it out. We could get along with different jobs and travel around." Charlie's eager face is excruciating. "I can't. I cannot stay. I never wanted to be here in the first place and now after Neil's death...I just need to go home. There is nothing holding me here." The words fly out of my mouth before I realise what they mean and how aweful they sound. I regret them as soon as I see Charlie's face falling apart. He has gotten quiet. "Well, if you think that way." "No-", I stutter out, but the lump in my throat keeps me from getting out anything more than that. "You know, I really thought this would be it. That it would mean something.", he rasps out. "But obviously I was wrong. I think I should go now." "Charlie, please!" I jump up, panicing. Fear strikes me and makes my pulse go higher. "I don't want it to end like this, but I've got no choice!" My voice sounds thin as if every sentence takes a bit of my life energy, until I'm empty and powerless. The boy that has used to look at me with glowing eyes, just sighs tiredly. "Everybody's got a choice, Rose.", he hisses at me sharply. And even though I know he is just hurt and probably doesn't mean it I'm immediatly taken aback by his tone. I can't recognize him. The funny and loveable Charlie seems gone, now there is just a stranger. His whole demeaner has changed. There is nothing soft about him anymore. Instead he's acting like an asshole. Like I'm just a heartless and selfish monster as if it wouldn't tear my heart apart. "That's not fair.", I press out between clenched teeth. The pressure on my chest rising. "Life has never been fair.", Charlie replies seriously. "No it's not.", I try to hold back the tears. "But I'm not like you, okay? I have no money. Or support. I don't have parents or a family." I helplessly throw my arms in the air, because I don't know what else to do. "You have your friends, Charlie. And I'm glad for you. I really am. Because that is something precious. But I don't have that here. I've got no one." "But that's not true!", he cuts me off with a grimace of disappintment painted on his face. "You had me." I bite my tounge so hard it bleeds. He points at his chest with watering eyes. "You had me and I would have gone with you through everything. No matter how tough it would have been!" A heavy silence settles between us. The only thing we do is stare at eachother. His last statement has knocked all the air outside of my lungs. Because I know it is true. And it cuts me even deeper to know what I'm loosing. That meeting Charlie has been one of the best things in my life and just for a short amount of time I have been truly happy. I've had hope. For a better life, for a better future. For love. A happilly ever after. An image crosses my mind, that I have thought to be gone. Louis. Now I know how he must have felt when his father has sent him to military school. To not be able to do something and to stand there, destroying the person most dear to you. Today I have to be the heartbreaker. It's inevitable. It's killing me. "Goodbye, Rosalie.", Charlie gives me the death blow by calling me by my full name. I think I have nearly ever heard him say it. It sounds final. This is the end.