Seeking Utopia

Axl’s Point of view:

All my life I’ve live in Raven Valley, I call it the valley of death. I stay here with my Uncle Laurence in his one room shack where I sleep on a cot next to the only heater we have and a picture of my beautiful mother. Years ago I had lived with her, I actually look a lot like her. The same sandy blonde hair and muddy brown eyes, but she has a vibrancy about her that was contagious and I don’t. Everyday she’d come home from work at the tailor shop at always the same time, until one day she just. . . didn’t. She had been on her way home when a mugger tried to steal her purse and stabbed her.

I’d like to think that if we lived with the other half of society in Dove City she’d still be alive. But that’s just wishful thinking, it’s a coincidence of birth that we ended up lowly peasants in a world of kings.

“Axl, dinner’s ready!” I heard my uncle yell for me and I wandered inside. Even after I ate my one cup of tasteless porridge my stomach growled in protest and twisted in pain. Sometimes I honestly resent my uncle for spending more of his money on cheap whiskey than he does on food. He didn’t used to be like that, he used to be happy and I loved when he would visit and tell me the wildest tales. But after my mom died it hit him hard. He just drowns his sorrows in drinking like I do in hunting.

Hours everyday I’ll spend in the woods, the only place with an abundance of life in this place of death. Illness doesn’t spread among the animals like it does the humans, they’ve been here so long in this place that they’ve become immune to it. Lately Lady Luck hasn’t been on my side, but there was one time where she graced me with food for a month. I remember it like it was just yesterday. I came quietly upon a sleeping doe and her children. I didn’t have anything to trap her with so with all my strength I lifted a heavy stone and threw it down onto her legs. The scream she belted was blood curdling, but the growls of my stomach blocked it out.

I couldn’t let her suffer slowly, so as I looked into her painfully innocent and shocked eyes I whispered “sorry” and cut her throat so she’d bleed out and die faster. The guilt almost weighed out the hunger as I thought deeply on the situation. This was a mother who was going to die without the comfort of her children, since they had run away. Which was good because it they hadn’t he would’ve killed them all too. But still it was a cold reminder that I wasn’t there to comfort my mom during her last breaths. Her little ones were just like me now, orphaned and likely to die, thrown out into the harsh reality of this cruel world.

Remembering the scene made fury and disgust rise in my throat. The people of Dove had it good! They were lucky, feasting on all kinds of things like fried chicken and turkey and things I can’t even imagine. One time someone threw something round and orange down here and I didn’t even know what it was. They probably eat until they’re full and then eat some more and still have leftovers. Leftovers! There was no such thing as that in my household. It’s funny how closely poverty and privilege reside next to each other. The only thing separating us from them was a high cliff that jutted out above us and contained the city.

The hustle and bustle of the city mock me. Among the night sky and devastation lies a place brightly lit like a flame in a dark room. Never would I be able to bask in the warmth of that flame, never feel what it feels like not to always be cold and hungry.

            There was one night in particular where I longed more than anything to be apart of that world. I was walking near the base of the cliff that separated wealth from poverty. It was an eerie night, darker than the rest with an electric chill that frosted the air. I had decided to stand back and marvel at the beautiful city lights, but at the edge of the cliff was something else. Or should I say someone.

She was magnificent, wavy onyx hair what swayed in the winds. Her eyes were like two polished emeralds staring intensively into my own brown ones. She looked like she just walked down from heaven. Like an angel from above, dressed in an all white dress that glittered with jewels. I could even almost swear that I saw wings.

 

In all m life I have never seen someone with such radiant beauty. Not even my mother could compare to her ethereal beauty. But she was from Dove, she was just like the rest of them! Evil. She was captivating and mysterious, looking over the valley. Sometimes I believe she was an angel of death, looking down at me and warning me that soon my time would be coming. She would be coming back. . . In the back of my head I just couldn’t help but hope she would be.