Monsters In Knee Socks

Epilogue

The day I walked out the hospital doors, I bought a walkman in a retro tech shop. I was catching the train in a couple of hours, and later my mum would go pick up everything except for the backpack I was carrying with me, holding the essentials like toothbrush, charger and notebooks. Walking around London, I listened to Alex's tape over and over again, strolling haphazardly, without any sense direction or destination. Some blocks I recognized, some I didn't. Strangely, it felt like home all the same.

You got the lights on in the afternoon
And the nights are drawn out long
And you're kissing to cut through the gloom
With a cough drop coloured tongue

It was warmer now, almost summer, though Britain didn't seem to realize what that implied as all seasons usually were equally gloomy. Today was beautiful, though. A bit chilly, but beautiful. Chirping birds competed with the city sounds and the sun was doing it's best to avoid getting eaten up by the clouds.

The neighbourhoods grew increasingly familiar and before I realized why, it was too late to turn around. I stopped walking and took a deep breath, standing quietly in front of the house I'd spent the first days of the year in. Why did I feel so out of place all of a sudden, like an intruder? It was a brown house, probably built in the fifties or sixties. Most of the balconies were small with a dark green draping, though on the top floor there was a wider one, big enough for... you know. 

And you were sitting in the corner with the coats all piled high
And I thought you might be mine
In a small world on an exceptionally rainy Tuesday night
In the right place and time

I tilted my head backwards, looking up at the balcony, wondering if he still lived there. Alone or with someone else? Happily or sadly ever after? And if he didn't, did he ever come back too look at the balcony just to remind himself that it had all been real? I heard the door open and quickly turned my head back down to see who was exiting. Out through the door walked a middle aged man with a beige summer blazer and a combover, nodding  as he walked past me and my sinking heart. I suppose I felt disappointed, but what had I expected? I knew they'd sold the flat. 

When the zeros line up on the 24 hour clock
When you know who's calling even though the number is blocked
When you walked around your house wearing my sky blue Lacoste
And your knee socks

I stopped by a corner shop to pick up some cigarettes. The hospital had a strict no smoking or drinking policy, but I was free to do whatever I wanted now. Was I free? I noticed the question knock in the door of my mind but I did not let it enter.

"A pack of American... No, I mean Marlboro reds please." I corrected myself. That was his flavour.

I lit the cigarette and inhaled the smoke  deep into my lungs, casting a last glance over my shoulder, at the balcony, before hitching up my knee socks, finally directing my steps towards Victoria Station, not noticing the guy with the teddy boy hear, leather jacket and sunglasses approaching from across the street.

–––––––––

If you have made it this far, I urge you to read the author's note as well. I want to address some things regarding the problematic elements that permeates this story.

Authors note

When I began writing Monsters in knee socks  I was a young mentally unstable teenage girl with an enormous obsession with Arctic Monkeys and a fiery crush on Alex Turner. Naturally, I was influenced by the fan fictions I had read, as well as the glamourisation of the rock star life I dreamt to get a taste of some day. But I was young and in school and definitely not in a position where I could even try to enter that world, so I fantasised and wrote about it instead. As we do. That's what Wattpad is about for many of us.

At present, while I cant say I'm particularly old or mature, I am mature enough too see the indisputably problematic elements of this story. Not only is it a borderline romantisation of mental illness and unfaithfulness, I am portraying a real life person as a pedophile, which is absolutely unforgivable. Mind you, this is a person I still have a big admiration for. 

I'm sure we all know that these kinds of stories and character portrayals don't come from hate, but rather from young hearts deprived of adventure, excitement and cool older guys. While urging you to understand that the intentions were whole-heartedly innocent, I want to emphasise that I absolutely do not condone what I have written.

Now, I'm sure Alex will never read this, so he likely won't be personally offended (thank god). Yet, by keeping this story up I am contributing to keeping a toxic trope alive. The 'young girl and the rockstar' is a story we all know, both from fiction and from real life. Many times, the girl is underage, as is the case in this story. The unspoken universal acceptance of this trope is not something I want to contribute to. Girls like Sadie are not not powerful portrayals of liberated young women, even though society and the media often want to portray this seductive power as something anti-patriarchal. But there is nothing feminist about a young girl dumping a boring immature guy only to start fooling around with an older, unavailable man as her mental health deteriorates. Especially as Sadie is so young, her story is more tragic and perverse than it is romantic or glamorous. These "strong independent young women" are more often than not insecure, mentally fucked up targets of pedophilia and/or manipulation. If she is underage, she is a child. I do not make the rules. That is a fact.

As this story goes against everything I stand for (with perhaps one exception: I do believe Fred was an immature asshole), I have decided to post the epilogue and let it stay up for a few weeks before making the story private. However ironic it seems, I have enjoyed writing it, and I know many of you have enjoyed it too. Therefore I thought the best thing I could do now is give you the ending and this little clarification. If you are, like I was, a young and bored teenager, waiting impatiently for life to begin for real, I hope you take some time to reflect on the normalisation of stories like these, both here on Wattpad, but also books, movies, and everywhere, really. It is worth thinking about how we all know that pedophilia obviously is horrible, yet tropes like these are so common that many of us don't initially recognise it as it disguises itself so eloquently as romance and idolisation. Evidently I did not, and it breaks my heart to see how messed up my idea of love and adventure was when I began creating the story of Alex and Sadie.

At last I want to emphasise that I'm not excusing or defending what I have written. I truly do not want to keep the story up, but I felt it would be better to give a clarification before I take it down. 

It doesn't seem so suitable to thank you for reading... but I guess I want to thank you for sticking to the end and reading the author's note. And to anyone who has been personally hurt or offended, I want to give you my deepest and sincerest apology. I hope you can believe me when I say it was never my intention to write so carelessly about such problematic topics.

Take care.