Juxtaposition of the Human Heart

Prologue: The Sorrowful Beginning

Ellie's thin, long fingers outstretched for another gingersnap on the dull tin platter. With shaky hands, she popped the cookie into her mouth. The sharp taste momentarily revived her senses, and for a microscopic interval in time, she didn't percieve the dark circles underneath her eyes or her pernicious state of living and mind. But all too soon, the taste had vanished, and all too soon, the gingersnap was gone, leaving the bitter taste of emptiness that always haunted her now in her mouth. It was cruel, the meager snacks and portions her family called meals. Ellie poured her modest serving of milk down her throat, and she again pondered that this was like a feast for them. She was fighting to keep her eyes open. She didn't see they would be tired though, because her world lacked stimuli for them to see, only the absence of stimuli coloured by a child's unassuming hand in ashen gray. Finally, the weight overwhelmed her, and Ellie's eyes closed.

"Ellie" her mother snapped, forcing Ellie to painfully ease open her eyes and face the unforgiving autumn wind. This jolted her back to reality, along with the realisation that not everything was lost. She was lost and trapped, but she had a mother, and and a little brother. Her mother handed Ellie a grimy, torn, napkin with a list of what seemed to bring the only touch of an unfeigned life directly into her aching hands; a chore list.

"The usual?" Ellie almost whispered in a faint voice. It slightly shocked her to hear how far away she sounded.

"Yes" her mother replied. Her voice sounded almost like an echo of Ellie's. She strode across the sorry excuse for a dwelling, and through the screen door. It slammed behind her. Ellie bowed her head down and stared with a dry expression at the list, though she already knew what it contained. Babysit Maxwell, even though she should be in school, weed, water, and tend to the garden, an almost hopeless effort to breath life into their pitiful food source, do the laundry, scavenge some supplies somewhere and attempt to scrub the layers of dirt, dust and despair out of their wardrobe, if you could even call it that, wash the dishes, find something generally clean to pass for flatware ,etc. It was the same monotonous, tedious activities day after day.

Ellie frowned. When she got to the last bullet, it read that her mother would be home very late that night and that she would have to do a "security lockdown". If she had the energy, she would have groaned out loud. The security lockdown was a routine her mother had established about a month ago to make sure the few things they possessed were kept safe in the dead of night, where people such as themselves. There was a minuscule safe tucked away in the shabby roof that Ellie would've sold for food months ago if she were her mother, but nevertheless she would store Maxwell's dented toy car and a few scavenged plastic utensils. They were nothing worth stealing, and the safe itself could be stolen by the dullest thief. The safe itself was only actually used once in a blue moon. Ellie thought it was a comfort to her mother, that it created the false sense they had something valuable. It seemed everything was now a hyperbole in Ellie's life.

Both she and Maxwell seemed to be forevermore consumed with work. Ellie considered this a stroke of luck sometimes, that she wouldn't have to face the weight of poverty. She much preferred facing the cold, teeth-chattering air outside. However her brother, Maxwell, didn't need that kind of escape. He wasn't as small and wide-eyed as he used to be, but he still saw a psychedelic intricate world, one that transcended what he could experience in real life. Ellie almost envied her brother's disorder, jealous that he had an escape,a special hiding place where only he could go. It seemed to her that Maxwell didn't just get an extra chromosome, he got an extra salvation. And then she would realize that it was not an escape, it was a prison, that she and her family were all simply in a prison, and she would feel so guilty for her brother, who was always in a cage, no matter if they were in silks or rags.

Ellie gathered a large mound of brittle leaves. Brittle leaves that were once bursting with color and life. They once beheld the grandiose of the world too.

What happened to my life? Ellie wondered to the uncompromising sky with tearful eyes. This is the aspersion of your incomplete mind, when you stray from the aplomb of real life through childish daydreams Ellie could imagine her father saying in response, with that austere tone of voice, and that blank smile. But it was not a deviation from what was real that hurt Ellie, it was the bleak face of reality.