DAMAGED

COURT

She was magic. I was exhausted watching her. She seemed still like neon but everything that filled her was movement. It was disorienting. I forgot about the ocean in my ears and a laugh that I couldn't hear over her voice in my head. I didn't think I would like what she did but I couldn't look away. If music killed her than it did it beautifully and with purpose. It almost felt like her voice and her words were wasted but this was her embracing who she was, a child of music and tragedy. I don't think it would have sounded the same if she played it any different. This was her anger, fragile and built of broken glass. Watching her turned all my thoughts poetic; she had a face when she sang that was a song of its own.

I felt it the way I felt the bone in my arm break when I was seven, a pain that felt like a stab but spread slowly before it consumed me. It was my resolve that broke this time. I hated liking her; I didn't want a difficult girl. I wanted something simple. I shoved girls away because if I tried to hold them it was always too hard. Her blonde hair was a flash of light with arcs of rainbow as she moved effortless across the stage, with all the grace of a ballerina and all the rage of a street kid. She inspired metaphors and effort. I wanted to know her the way she was letting everyone see her now. I don't know if she existed like this anywhere but on the stage, her murderer was her nurse. This would all be closed and bandaged back up by the end of the night.

"Whoa man, she is so damn hot. I can see her bra!" I didn't see a face just heard the voice. She was all of that but I fought impulses to hit the kid behind me. He was young and she wasn't mine to defend. I wanted to. I wanted to with every fiber of my body. I could just move backwards and slam into him.

"Hey man. I found you." I sighed; I couldn't hit anyone with Casey right beside me. He would beat the shit out of me himself. No more public brawling. It was on the chicken scratch list he had written and taped to my case the first day of the tour. No more fighting.

"Was it really so hard?" I smiled. He laughed next to me.

"It was. I was all but sure you had fucked it up with her." He shouldered someone back while transfixed on the stage.

"Oh I did, I am off the bus and back in no man's land. She doesn't want to talk to me but Jesus man, look at her. For a minute that girl was starting to like me...I think." I smiled at Casey.

"I am looking at her Court, I feel bad looking at her like I am right now. Who knew? I've never really been into punk girls."

"She is more than a punk girl. I don't even know what she is. On a side note, stop looking at her like that." I meant it. I did not want him to look at her like he was, his face lit with light and awe, hormonal somehow. I shoved him to the side with a smile.

"Sorry brother. Give me a minute, I have never seen her like this, I didn't know she could look like this. Why are you surprised? You have seen every inch of her."

"I have, I've seen every inch of her body but she keeps all this to herself. Up there she is all her parts, up there...nothing is a secret. I don't get that privilege and wont get that privilege probably ever."

"Are you chasing her now? You can't chase one woman while you carry another. No one has that in them. I say one word and you fall apart. Don't chase her man."

"Say it. Say the one word that makes me fall apart." The sound of Kat singing fell away with the murmur of the crowd. I turned ignoring all the strange faces around me and waited for my brother to show me the truth, the one I hid from unless someone flung me into it.

"Fuck you. Lets enjoy this Court, take advantage of this reprieve from being you. Watch that girl and get lost in your music again. I don't want to be a part of your self-punishment. I wont do this with you." He pleaded. He waited. I waited.