This Time Tomorrow [D6 Train]
Oct 17, 2018 13:36:37 GMT -5
Post by Deleted on Oct 17, 2018 13:36:37 GMT -5
Look who's digging their own grave
You put up your defenses when you leave
You leave because you're certain
Of who you want to be
---------------------------------------------------
My father took us to the junkyards when we were old enough to walk. He’d point out the hunks of metal and explain the different pieces; how nuts and bolts wound together to secure a frame; that rust was caused from oxidation; or that sometimes the right piece came along after hours of searching through what seemed like garbage. Except he hated when I would call it that. Trash was reserved for things that could never be used again. Every piece has its place, he’d tell me and Ether. We might not see it for what it was at first, but it could prove itself when given the chance.
I like to think he and my mother didn’t need to know why I’d stepped forward to volunteer for a girl I’d never met. Or maybe Ether had told them what had happened to the underground crew, and they’d though there was nothing left to be said. Inside the cold gray room of wooden chairs and oil paintings I’d never recognize, down the corridor and to the left, we’d spent the minutes ticking away in silence. My father’d never been one for tears, and he wasn’t about to start now. He still smelled like a mixture of ash and rust, his overalls smudged with some combination of oil and grease. When we hugged, I closed my eyes to remember how the scrape of his beard felt against my cheek. My mother was quiet, and pale. She’d spent the evening at a late shift in the train depot, and I could still see the dark circles underneath her eyes.
They were heavy – but was it sleep or sadness, I’d never know.
“You’ll do all right, Quest,” Ether had said. He was tall and gangly, all skin and bones and a foot taller than me. I stared into his eyes, and wanted to will him to scream at me—something, to make this moment feel worse, to make me angry at all of them. It would’ve been easier to have left in anger than in quiet. Almost like the disappearing of a girl into the night.
They’d keep looking for me, even after I’d died, thinking that I’d be a ghost stalking the district. They knew just how stubborn I was – it would’ve been a fitting end.
And so I tucked myself out onto the platform, head light and humming. The overalls straps chaffed my shoulders, even sitting atop my white tee, and my face flushed in the cool October wind. It should’ve brought me something, to step aboard the train and head toward the end. Instead all I could think about were the sounds. The rush of steam from underneath the wheels. The footsteps of peacekeepers and their boots behind him. The metal creak of the carriage as I stepped upward, the last step I’d take in the district. I could close my eyes and imagine them, all the sounds reverberating about me.
I walked along the carpeted floors and felt my stomach turn. Under my arms I grew cold, but could feel the sweat dripping off of me. I was light headed, heavier with every step. By now Wilfred had to know that I was on the train, out of view from looky-loos and gossips. At least I wouldn’t owe him a fiver anymore, I had that going for me. Wilfred would probably bring that up at my funeral, after shaking Ether’s hand and wishing him a half-assed condolence.
The dining car was awash in cakes and treats, styled with the sort of glassware and porcelain folks would’ve loved. I mean – I didn’t care much for it. Made me itch to see the type of thing that was at the fingertips of all of us, out of reach because we weren’t born in the right place. I tipped a glass pitcher of water and poured out the cold water and ice. I took a long drink and then another, before the pounding in my temples seemed to subside.
“Right.” I said to myself (it was okay to be crazy now, I suppose, since I’d done the most insane thing I could do). “Where’ the alcohol.”
The vodka here didn’t burn my throat as much going down as a shot. I suppose anything would be better than what we drank in the underground, but there was something dangerously smooth about this. I knocked back a second before I turned my attention to sounds in the hall.
“Let’s have a drink, yeah?” I don’t turn to see which one it could be. My district partner, another volunteer that was a smallish looking boy was unknown to me. What was it now? The P sits on my tongue, and I can’t hear it. Parsnip. Was he named after a plant? And then there was Teddy, who I owed some sort of chance to help teach me how to survive.
“We only have a few weeks to take this all in y’know? And they gave us the good shit.”
I like to think he and my mother didn’t need to know why I’d stepped forward to volunteer for a girl I’d never met. Or maybe Ether had told them what had happened to the underground crew, and they’d though there was nothing left to be said. Inside the cold gray room of wooden chairs and oil paintings I’d never recognize, down the corridor and to the left, we’d spent the minutes ticking away in silence. My father’d never been one for tears, and he wasn’t about to start now. He still smelled like a mixture of ash and rust, his overalls smudged with some combination of oil and grease. When we hugged, I closed my eyes to remember how the scrape of his beard felt against my cheek. My mother was quiet, and pale. She’d spent the evening at a late shift in the train depot, and I could still see the dark circles underneath her eyes.
They were heavy – but was it sleep or sadness, I’d never know.
“You’ll do all right, Quest,” Ether had said. He was tall and gangly, all skin and bones and a foot taller than me. I stared into his eyes, and wanted to will him to scream at me—something, to make this moment feel worse, to make me angry at all of them. It would’ve been easier to have left in anger than in quiet. Almost like the disappearing of a girl into the night.
They’d keep looking for me, even after I’d died, thinking that I’d be a ghost stalking the district. They knew just how stubborn I was – it would’ve been a fitting end.
And so I tucked myself out onto the platform, head light and humming. The overalls straps chaffed my shoulders, even sitting atop my white tee, and my face flushed in the cool October wind. It should’ve brought me something, to step aboard the train and head toward the end. Instead all I could think about were the sounds. The rush of steam from underneath the wheels. The footsteps of peacekeepers and their boots behind him. The metal creak of the carriage as I stepped upward, the last step I’d take in the district. I could close my eyes and imagine them, all the sounds reverberating about me.
I walked along the carpeted floors and felt my stomach turn. Under my arms I grew cold, but could feel the sweat dripping off of me. I was light headed, heavier with every step. By now Wilfred had to know that I was on the train, out of view from looky-loos and gossips. At least I wouldn’t owe him a fiver anymore, I had that going for me. Wilfred would probably bring that up at my funeral, after shaking Ether’s hand and wishing him a half-assed condolence.
The dining car was awash in cakes and treats, styled with the sort of glassware and porcelain folks would’ve loved. I mean – I didn’t care much for it. Made me itch to see the type of thing that was at the fingertips of all of us, out of reach because we weren’t born in the right place. I tipped a glass pitcher of water and poured out the cold water and ice. I took a long drink and then another, before the pounding in my temples seemed to subside.
“Right.” I said to myself (it was okay to be crazy now, I suppose, since I’d done the most insane thing I could do). “Where’ the alcohol.”
The vodka here didn’t burn my throat as much going down as a shot. I suppose anything would be better than what we drank in the underground, but there was something dangerously smooth about this. I knocked back a second before I turned my attention to sounds in the hall.
“Let’s have a drink, yeah?” I don’t turn to see which one it could be. My district partner, another volunteer that was a smallish looking boy was unknown to me. What was it now? The P sits on my tongue, and I can’t hear it. Parsnip. Was he named after a plant? And then there was Teddy, who I owed some sort of chance to help teach me how to survive.
“We only have a few weeks to take this all in y’know? And they gave us the good shit.”
tag: what up my d6s words: 879 notes: them blues man
