Hickory

Kadence

Bailey moved in with me last summer. it seems crazy to think that we would, that we could ever get to this point. Living together responsibly, already getting by without our parents money, and somehow managing out first year of college. Hell, it's a miracle we both got in. Bailey stole the title of an artist, which I would have wanted too, had it not been for her condition. For her sake and for my own sanity, I chose the psychology track. Specifically mental health. 

Bailey has a hard time trusting people, and I have a hard time getting her to trust her therapists and doctors. Sure, medication helps, but not as much as it should. That's why I'm doing this. I want to help her myself, so that I can be all she'll ever need. She's my entire world already, I don't need anyone else.

That's why I don't text people back, or loiter around public spaces. I don't need any of them. I spend my time doing better things, like working on my art, the art I can't do in school because I love Bailey so much. 

Friends are variables. They're temporary. They're distractions when it comes to relationships, and they're never worth the trouble. I have better things to be doing than talking to someone who isn't my #1. I don't care about some neighbor's opinion about the the weather, or who's team won the "big game" last night. 

Which is why I don't smile back at the lovely couple carrying plastic shopping bags shoved with cereal boxes and microwavable lunches to their front door. I bet they have hoards of their tiny, giggling offspring just behind those walls. Why do they seek my optimism as well, when their life looks like a cutout of some tacky brochure, made to sell perfect homes to perfect families with picturesque lives, white picket fence and all. God knows, there's probably some friendly golden retriever or some shit frolicking around their manicured backyard, dodging stumbling toddlers and obediently fetching toys. I bet they have a pool.

This street is full of it, all the perfect families with happy lives bullshit, with their idiot kids and smiling parents in perfectly stable relationships. I passed a soccer field earlier. These NPCs must take their kids over there all the time, watching them injure each other and planning Saturday brunches. I've never understood it, the need for family gatherings. These guys are already living with five other people, all under the same roof. And yet they feel the need to bring other families into their life as well? There's no logic to it. I've considered the possibility that perhaps they wish to compare their lives to the others. I've rules this out, however. Not only is it completely self-centered. They're all clones, so there would be no point. 

Every bit of it makes me want to vomit.

I turn the corner, heading away from those perfect families with perfect lives, into the alleyway that feels much more natural to me. There's nothing fake, no pretense about this place that always irritates me so much. The graffiti that emerges from the brick confines of my domain exist because someone felt something, had a human experience, or wanted to leave their mark. Nothing like those sickly sweet paintings of things that never happened, of people who nobody would even have thought should exist until they stained a page.

The art world is like that, at least the art world society deems is appropriate to even be considered "art". A person with zero creativity and only a glimpse of human anatomy can taint a canvas, and everyone goes nuts because he has enough money to obtain his prestige. And if he's lucky, people with even more money than he does will collectively agree that his work is valuable and then sell it for a very high price, so that some capitalist snobs might brag about how much cash they blew on whatever they hang from their walls. It's repulsive. As if any of them would know anything about true art or human emotion. I happen to be a budding master in both of those fields. 

I climb up the stairs to the small apartment Bailey and I share, careful not to slip on the water-slicked asphalt. It must have rained while I was studying. How could I not have noticed how humid it feels? I was probably distracted by those idiot parents down the street. People tend to be very good distractions, as far as I've observed. 

I sigh to myself and slide the key into the rusted lock, and turn it sharply. Our lock jams sometimes. There's a grating click, and I swing the door open. The first thing I notice is the chair. It's on the floor. Let me rephrase, it's on it's side in the middle of our cluttered living room. I blink. Bailey is suspended from the ceiling, a rope twisting around her bruised neck. 

From far away, I hear my watch chime twice. It's 6:00. I always keep close attention to the time, because time is important. And there truly never seems to be enough of it.