Fight With Fire

24

The clouds are dark this morning. Eating up any life that the sky possessed before. Almost as if there will be no sun today, only darkness. I splash water over my face trying to wash the nightmare away. Letting the memories wash down the drain.

I slept longer this morning but still early enough to go sit with Charlie. We don't talk anymore. I sit and read or just watch him play his songs. Some mornings he doesn't play, he just builds. He said he was making the most beautiful instrument. He said it was a surprise.

The hallways are empty, both empty and full at the same time. I feel lighter than a feather but the air is heavy as water, pushing from all directions.

The stairwells are duller. The stairs sharper than normal. The corners holding more darkness than would be thought possible.

This morning there was no music flowing out of theater. Just dangerous silence. I push the doors open slowly thinking that maybe Charlie finally got some sleep. But he's there.

All the lights are off except for a single spot light on Charlie who is sitting on an uncomfortable plastic chair from the classrooms. I creep up the aisle trying to figure out what Charlie is doing. His hands are moving slowly past each other and his face is calm with the ghost of a smile on his lips. In any other situation I would smile but I nothing would fit the situation less.

"Charlie?" I whisper just loud enough so he can hear me.

"Don't" Charlie says pointing to my foot which is walking up the stairs to where the stage is. I am close enough to see all the tear tracks that are staining his face. I listen to him and backed away.

"Charlie. What are you doing?" I feel the velvet of the seat against my bare legs. Charlie opens his eyes and he isn't hiding anymore. His eyes are wide open seem bigger than before. So full of sadness and pain.

"Famous musicians sat like this almost every day. I don't know how they could stand the light. It's so bright I can't see anything else. It's making me sweat like crazy." Charlie laughs and more tears escape his eyes. I watch his pupils shrink as he looks into the bright light of the spotlight.

"Charlie, I don't understand." I find tears in my eyes knowing that there is something incredibly wrong.

"This place." Charlie sighs. "The council has ruined everything. I refuse to change for them. I almost did. I made up this lie about my Aerdell." He turns over his palm looking at his iae. A black circle with 3 diagonal lines. He drops his hand and more tears fall from his eyes. I can almost see them dripping on the floor around him.

"I can create something so beautiful and yet I hide it. Music was for everyone to enjoy. Something that brought people together, not pushed them apart. It was all so beautiful, lost in history but I ruined it and now it will be forgotten forever."

Charlie moves his arms from his lap letting small red drops fall from his elbow to the ground. He reaches for a small instrument on the ground. It was similar to the guitar because it had strings and one thin end and one fat end. But this was smaller and the fat end was placed on his neck. And he used something else to play this instrument. His blood covered hands shake as he tries to grip the instrument. The blood is oozing out of two long cuts, one on each wrist. They are no jagged but clean and straight clearly made with no hesitation.

"Please." I reach out to him mentally stopping the blood that is everywhere. It's like my nightmare where the blood is flowing and you can't tell where it's coming from but it doesn't matter. "Don't do this."

"Just know that I forgive you for exposing me that day. You helped me more than you know. I believe that you can do a lot of great one day." Charlie has that calm look wash over him as he looks at me.