Never Fading Melody} [latisha]

[brad bradford ★ d5b [arx]]

\\ Jequirity Eckhart //

District 6 - Eighteen - Tempus Opera House

I don't want to go. I already know that a breakdown is imminent, seeing as how I have remained without a single panic attack (at least the severe ones) for a good few months now. When I pointed this out to my Shale, she only squeezed my hand and said, "You'll be fine. Just relax." I had to completely change out of my t-shirt that I had bravely slipped over my head that morning to wear around the house and the shorts that I had worn to bed the previous time to sleeves and jeans that covered each and every scar that criss-crossed across my pale skin. Children would certainly be frightened of such intricate scar tissue. Plus they would only elicit questions - questions I could not answer and would never answer. Not to anyone. Especially the creative and imaginative minds of young children who could develop nightmares from an encounter with me. And speaking from experience, they don't want nightmares about the scars and where they came from.

I sit on the stoop now, the place where my moms found me some 18 years ago, trying to get a hold of myself - but still I am breathing at a rapid and panicked pace. Truth be told, I want to scream. A day off from Tempus has now become a living nightmare. Even with the reassurance that I will be with my family the entire length of the day does not ease my distress anymore. I'm becoming more and more paranoid with each waking moment, and my only peace comes when I immerse myself in composing and playing music. That's why i am thankful that Shale allowed me to bring my violin with me. I pray to Ripred where we are going has a piano. I would just love to sit on the bench and picture myself back on stage at Tempus instead of surrounded by inquisitive and pressing children.

But Shale laughed at me when I had asked her about a piano. "Orphanages aren't like our house, Jeq." But she had paused and pondered for a moment, only to add, "Except for all the screaming kids." but still my hopes are high that things have changed since Shale was living within the walls of the children's home not too far from our mansion. My head spins at the sound of the door swinging open and I have to scramble to pick up my violin case as Shale hooks her arm in mine with a smile and begins dragging me along down the street to what I believe to be imminent doom. I begin to whistle to try ease the fear.

The streets reveal a bit of my past, smoke from very different sorts of rolled up joints floating through the air in wisps, intoxicating even the innocent bystanders such as Shale. But I am not innocent. I used to be one of the hooligans, on of the druggies of the district, and even now - even after everything I have been through - I feel the urge to take a deeper breath and to seek out someone to have just a single puff from their cigarette. But as Shale coughs at the smell and my scars burn, even hidden beneath my shirt, I fall from my momentary trance and continue to compose and transpose music in my mind to keep the panic from intruding any further into my bones.

As we reach the entrance to the orphanage I can hear infants crying from beyond the heavy wooden door. But where as my feet shuffle to a stop and my eyes widen with a sort of paralyzing anxiety, Shale bounds up the stairs not only fearlessly, but with an excitement that I have not seen in her in a very long time. But she does love children. And because I don't want to be the one to hold her back or curb her enthusiasm, I put on the best smile I can and run up the stairs after her, pushing through the doors to running children and sulky teens and a flustered old lady who I can only assume is supposed to keep track of each and everyone of these kids. Shale jumps right in by helping to settle the screaming ones in the living room, enticing them with a promise of candy and a story, but I hold back, one hand clenching the doorknob.

But soon all of the children are settled, Shale having taken charge of the situation and all, and all of the cranky teens have retreated to their rooms. I just back out onto the stoop and take out my violin. I don't want to speak. Words. Sentences. Speech. No. I can't, I won't - please let the universe stop begging me for words ... My tainted heart can't take any more of this torture! I've had enough, this fear, this anxiety, this pressure to live like a normal person after so many un-normal circumstances have taken place in my life. I just-I just ... I just want to play.

And I do exactly that, letting the euphoric melodies wash over me like a bubble bath washes over my chilled skin and warms my frozen heart. One note after the other, one rhythm blended with another until I am playing a new song - one straight from my heart and performed by my soul. I don't care who is watching or who is listening because the song is not for them but for me. This song is for me. And no one can take away what comes straight from within, the melody that is me.