Scratched

Six

SIX

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I felt the warm summer air brush my cheek like a caress. A smile tugged at my lips as I looked around me. I was in my backyard. How long had it been since I had been here? I wiggled my toes, feeling the grass dance between them. It was amazing. I felt at peace. I felt happy. I couldn’t remember a time I had felt like this. There never seemed to be a time I didn’t feel as if my nerves were exposed to the world, but now I stood feeling completely calm. And then I heard it—the soft sound of a guitar. It drifted to me from somewhere distant. “If I leave here tomorrow would you still remember me? For I must be traveling on now ‘cause there’s too many places I’ve got to see,” the voice breathed out. It was like silk on my skin so smooth and perfect. Almost as if I was compelled to I moved, wandering.

I had to follow the voice.

I felt myself move but it seemed so slow. My limbs felt heavy and I felt lost and then the voice was floating out to me again, beckoning. I had to find it. “But if I stayed here with you, girl things just couldn’t be the same ‘cause I’m as free as a bird now; and this bird, you cannot change.” I could hear the voice growing louder the further I moved. I knew I was close. “—Lord knows I can’t change. Bye, bye, baby it’s been a sweet love. Though this feeling I can’t change but please don’t take it so badly ‘cause the Lord knows I’m to blame.”

I walk around a corner, leading me to an open part of the yard. I could see him now. He sat on the grass in the far corner of the yard, propped up against the fence. He had his guitar resting in his lap, his fingers running over the strings. They moved so smooth and quick that it appeared as if he wasn’t touching them at all. I stopped, watching him as he strummed the notes out. His eyes were fixed on the guitar, unaware to the world around him. And in that second I realized I had never truly looked at him—really looked, beyond the fake smiles and sweet words. He had the saddest look in his eyes as if he had lost everything or was going to. His normally dark eyes were almost black with despair and I wondered what put it there.

At that moment thunder cracked across the sky, no longer the cheerful blue of earlier but grey as smoke and ash. As the thunder sounded my father’s eyes snapped up, fixing on me. I felt my body tense under his gaze. I stared back at him. His face was completely exposed. I could see his whole life written there but I never understood a bit of it. It might as well have been written in a foreign language. “But if I stayed here with you, girl things just couldn’t be the same ‘cause I’m as free as a bird now and this bird you cannot change.” The music cut off, enveloping us in silence as we stared at each other. I wasn’t sure how long we stayed like that—maybe seconds, minutes. I would never know. And then it started to rain.

♪            ♫             ♪

I have been dating Cody for a few months now. And honestly, I don’t know how it’s lasted this long. It started out just wonderful. I would laugh and we’d tease each other. I’d get wasted on his crappy beer and go to bed with him. And then—it sucked. We’d fight and throw stuff at each other. Then I’d get wasted and crawl into his bed because I couldn’t go anywhere else. There was really only one reason we gagged each other, and that wasn’t doing it anymore. There were too many issues we had with one another. No amount of sorry or flowers could fix a relationship.