Chasing Clouds
The scent of budding flowers and the muddy, thawing ground wiggled its way into my nostrils, and my young mind wrinkled up into a ball of pure distaste. Today was my twelfth birthday, the day that my hope was swallowed into a pit of sorrow. It was stolen from me by the evil spirits that hide themselves within the creases of time.
Before this day, my childhood had been scattered with a mix of bitter dark chocolate and willow branches dipped in blood. Personally, I preferred the chocolate part. That at least tasted somewhat pleasant. But the blood appeared to me more often than the chocolate, and on most occasions, it was my own blood being shed. It would stream down my eyelids, past my nose, and straight to my tongue. The opportunity to spit it out was never given to me. Fate plugged my nose and forced me to swallow.
“There’s no point,” the voice would say.
And they were right. There was no point.
A warm hand placed itself on my sunburned shoulder. I grimaced a little, as the skin was tender and starting to peel.
“I really am sorry,” my father said.
No reply.
“Won’t you talk to me?”
No reply.
He bent down on the grass, his grease stained jeans wrinkling as he descended. His goal was to look me in the eye. I would have rather ripped them straight from my skull before I would catch his gaze. My eyes shot down. He didn’t notice. My father was too busy focusing on ways to make himself feel better than to genuinely be concerned with my pain.
“I can make it up to you,” he said, the lies reaching for me, their arms outstretched. “Next weekend we can go to that cafe you really like. Then we can go on a walk along the river.”
No reply.
The man couldn’t tell the truth. If he was truly sorry, his breath wouldn’t smell of stale liquor and disappointment.
My father’s harsh, sharp features soften into butter as he stood back onto his feet. “Maybe I’ll talk to you later, then. Sometimes I really wonder about you. I said I was sorry.” He turned towards the house behind me and started towards it, attempting to leave me alone.
A part of me wanted to stay quiet. A part of me wanted to hug and forgive him. But, my heart had just been torn right from my chest for another of countless times and the pain seared through me. “You should only say that if you mean it.”
He stopped, suddenly, and shifted his feet back to me. “Of course I mean it. I love you, and I care about you. That means I would never lie, either.”
That right there was a big, fat, solid lie, and we both knew it.
“Wish I could believe that.”
His eyes grew wild. I wanted to take my words back as soon as I had said them, but it was too late. The monster had been uncaged and the only thing to do was to hold on and pray that it wouldn’t be too painful.
A beer bottle was flung just inches from my bare feet. My body recoiled a bit, in efforts to protect itself from the horrors that would inevitably unfold.
“What did you just say to me?” He hollered. “Did you just accuse me of lying, again?”
This time I was too scared to answer, but he took it as another act of defiance towards him. He reached out and grabbed at my hair, yanking me out of my previously perched state.
“Apologize to me!”
A scream escaped, but was muffled by an intense fear echoing through my bones. Pain seared through my scalp. I could feel individual hair follicles slowly being pulled out of place. My hands shot up to my black mop of hair to try to relieve myself of the torture, but he shoved them away.
“Stop!” I begged, tears forming on my cheeks. “Please stop! Please, please stop!”
For a moment, he pondered his decision. Then, he looked into my eyes. When I looked, I could tell that they were yellowing with rage. I still don’t know what he saw in mine. Maybe he saw a sea of sorrow hidden behind green; or, maybe he saw pain behind the tint of gold. Whatever it was, he decided to let go.
My body crippled to the ground in a heap of wails. I gripped my head, and ran my fingers through my hair.
He looked down at my whimpering body and sighed. “I hate it when we fight. You know that I don’t want to hurt you, right? It’s for your own good. Now collect yourself and come inside when you're ready.”
And then he left, walking back towards the small shack of a house, the white paint peeling from its sides.
I closed my eyes and wished and wished that he would walk past the house, down the street and straight on to a different town, state, country, like my mother did. But, I knew he wouldn’t. He wasn’t as smart as my mother.
She was beautiful, or so I’ve been told. When I was two, she packed her bags and never looked back. For most of my life, I had felt a certain affection towards her, filled with wonder and love. But slowly, over these past years, when my father made friends with vodka and gin, a feeling of abhorrence and abandonment wiggled its way into my life and never left.
A cold breeze washed over my backyard, drying the salty tears on my face. Small bumps appeared on my bare arms. I looked up at the sky, with the white, fluffy, cotton candy clouds. They were moving so fast, like they were late for something really important.
My legs lifted themselves up. The previously clean dress that I was wearing was now caked with mud. But, I was too infatuated with the sky to notice. The clouds could just keep going and leave behind the rest of the world. They were my mother. And if my mother could do it, couldn’t I?
One slow step. Two. Three. Four. Faster, faster, faster! Soon my bare feet were running down the barren alleyway behind my house. Cold, spring air licked my face as I went, drying the tears as they continued to appear on my cheeks.
I kept running, past the corner grocery, past the pharmacy, past the old house rumored to be haunted, the dusk lighting making everything seem so bleak. My legs carried me to the other edge of town, where a willow tree stood tall and broad. There, I stopped and leaned against the trunk for support.
The rough bark scraped my shoulders a bit, making the sunburn a little more painful, but I didn’t care all that much. Here was a better place, where safety could almost be guaranteed. Here was a place without my father.
“What are you crying for?” A husky voice asked from behind me.
I jumped back, stumbling over the roots of the tree and falling to the ground. A tall man stood before me, with a scruffy beard and clothes that were too ripped and torn to really be considered proper garments. He wore a knit cap as well, curls peeking from under the rim.
“Watch yourself. Are you alright?”
Nothing escaped from my mouth. I simply stared back at him, too frightened to speak.
He extended his hand, as if to help me back to my feet. When I didn't take it, he retracted his hand. “My name is Charles, but my friends call me Chuck. Do you have a name?”
Slowly, I hoisted myself from the ground before answering him. “Alice.” I told him. “My friends call me Alice.”
Chuck let out a light, friendly laugh. “Well, it’s a pleasure to meet you Miss Alice.”
For the first time that day, I gave a shy smile. But, no words seemed to find my lips. I stayed silent.
“I suppose that you don’t talk too much, do you Alice?”
I shook my head.
He rubbed his scruffy chin. “Well, some folks are just people of few words. Can’t say that I’m one of them, though. How old are you? Ten? Eleven? When I was your age, I was always getting in trouble with teachers. They’d always tell me to shut up and be quiet, not that that ever did anything. I’d just keep yapping away until they sent me to the hall, or sometimes the principal.”
I took a step forward, with a slight interest in what Chuck was saying. He sounded like he had stories to tell and secrets to keep, a little bit like me. “What would your parents say?” I asked, genuinely curious.
“She speaks!” He exclaimed, his face brightening. “Well, they’d tell me the same as my teachers. The only difference was that my folks would smack me on my head to teach me a lesson. Oh, boy did that hurt!”
“I know how that feels,” I said without thinking.
His smile faded a bit. “That why you were crying?”
Hesitantly, I nodded.
“Sorry to hear that, Alice. I suppose that’s why you came out here, too?”
“Yes,” I replied.
“Rotten luck, I say. I bet you didn’t deserve it, either. What’d they do? Hit you?”
My eyes darted around, a little unsure if I should answer, but I eventually decided I would. “Not this time. He pulled my hair instead.”
Chuck leaned against the tree and slowly slid down. “Can’t say they ever did that to me. I usually deserved it, too. But, I’ll say it again. I bet you didn’t deserve it.”
Did I? This question had haunted me for years. Did I truly deserve all that I had received in my life? Was I a bad daughter, too selfish to realize the fact that I made my father’s life harder?
No, I finally decided. I did not deserve it.
I sat down, too. Then, I crossed my arms. “No,” I told him flatly. “I’ve never deserved anything that he’s done to me.”
“See,” he said. “I’m good at predicting things. You know, the problem isn’t you. It’s them. They’re the ones with the issue.”
“I bet you didn’t deserve it, either,” I told him.
He laughed and placed his hands behind his head, then let out a slow whistle. “No, I did. At least, most of the time I did. The difference between you and me is that I’ve always had it coming, and you’ve just been caught in the crossfire. I was just a troublemaker. You don’t make any trouble. Why’d he do it? Why’d he pull your hair?”
At first, I didn’t want to tell him. Chuck was a stranger. I didn’t know him, and he didn’t know my life; but, it was that reason that I decided to tell him. Sometimes you need someone to talk to who knows nothing about you.
“He forgot my birthday and drank all day. When he apologized, I told him he was lying. It’s true that he was lying, too. He’s done it before. Then he yanked my hair because he didn’t like what I was saying.”
Chuck rested his chin in his hands and hunched his shoulders forward. What little smile or twinkle of playfulness in his eye that he had, faded after I spoke. “You have rotten luck when it comes to fathers, I’ll tell you that much. You’ve got it rough, kiddo. But, I’ll tell you what, and I wouldn’t be saying this unless I’d been there. You’re worth so much more than what you’re getting. You don’t know me, and I certainly don’t know you, but it’s easy to see an innocent person being caught in the crossfire of their parents’ insecurities. None of it is fair.”
My face tilted towards the ground. “No,” I murmured. “It’s not.
“Miss Alice,” he said, scooting a bit closer towards me. “You could let this get to you, or you could fight back. Sometimes I wish that I had.”
Fight back? I had been. For years and years, I fought silently within the dim light that my hope cast out. If I couldn’t beat him, then maybe my mind could defeat me and make my suffering less brutal and raw. But, that light had gotten smaller and smaller, and I was afraid that it was already gone.
“How?” I asked. “He’ll just hit me more.”
“There are times when there is nothing you can do. You’ll be hit, and you can’t do anything or else there will be more to follow. But, there are times when you can fight back, however rare those instances may be. Like right now, for instance. He doesn’t know where you are, I suppose. Isn’t that in a way fighting back? He doesn’t have control.”
I rolled that thought over and over in my mind, trying to figure if what he was saying was true. “Do you really think so?”
“Yeah, I do.”
A small smile found my lips. “But, what now? What I’m I supposed to do now?”
“Go back. Do it one victory at a time. That’s the most that you can hope for. But, the small things add up. Don’t forget that.”
Chuck's words struck me, pinching at my mind and asking to be listened to. I nodded, but also knew that I wasn't ready to go back. Not yet, at least. But, Chuck was already lifting himself off of the ground.
“Where are you going?” I asked, secretly hoping that our short encounter wasn't already coming to an end.
He looked at me, his eyes sparkling. “I have some prior engagements. My grandchildren are expecting their grandfather tonight. Every Sunday I go and tell them stories, and I'm never late.”
“Oh,” I said.
“It was mighty fine meeting you, though. Miss Alice, if you ever find yourself in peril again, just come back here. Maybe I'll be here.”
I nodded. “Thanks Chuck.” That was the last thing that I ever said to him.
Years passed and I went back to that willow tree countless times. Slaps, punches, cigarette burns. Every time, I searched for Chuck, hoping to just listen to his advice and be calmed by his words. But, he was never there. A part of me knew he never would be. I was just a girl who had only spoken to him for five minutes, yet I still felt drawn to him. He had told me what I needed to hear when I needed to hear it.
My childhood slowly turned to adulthood. I left that house, even the entire state as soon as the clock struck midnight on my eighteenth birthday, and I never looked back. I'd like to say that my life was led in a productive, happy way, despite the horrors of my youth, but that wasn't necessarily the truth. The things that Chuck told me under that tree, did, however, help. In fact, I often think about it while I tuck my own children into bed at night. A lot of good and happy things had followed me in life, yet the scars that I received from my father still sting at times and shocks me back to a time when I was young, helpless, and everything seemed bleak. There are times when I have to shut myself away until the pain resides. But, I always look back to that night, when I turned twelve. Chuck was right. There are rare moments in life when you can fight back. You can kick and scream, and sometimes, sometimes you can win. And I look at my children, lying in their beds and think, I did win.
I won.
Before this day, my childhood had been scattered with a mix of bitter dark chocolate and willow branches dipped in blood. Personally, I preferred the chocolate part. That at least tasted somewhat pleasant. But the blood appeared to me more often than the chocolate, and on most occasions, it was my own blood being shed. It would stream down my eyelids, past my nose, and straight to my tongue. The opportunity to spit it out was never given to me. Fate plugged my nose and forced me to swallow.
“There’s no point,” the voice would say.
And they were right. There was no point.
A warm hand placed itself on my sunburned shoulder. I grimaced a little, as the skin was tender and starting to peel.
“I really am sorry,” my father said.
No reply.
“Won’t you talk to me?”
No reply.
He bent down on the grass, his grease stained jeans wrinkling as he descended. His goal was to look me in the eye. I would have rather ripped them straight from my skull before I would catch his gaze. My eyes shot down. He didn’t notice. My father was too busy focusing on ways to make himself feel better than to genuinely be concerned with my pain.
“I can make it up to you,” he said, the lies reaching for me, their arms outstretched. “Next weekend we can go to that cafe you really like. Then we can go on a walk along the river.”
No reply.
The man couldn’t tell the truth. If he was truly sorry, his breath wouldn’t smell of stale liquor and disappointment.
My father’s harsh, sharp features soften into butter as he stood back onto his feet. “Maybe I’ll talk to you later, then. Sometimes I really wonder about you. I said I was sorry.” He turned towards the house behind me and started towards it, attempting to leave me alone.
A part of me wanted to stay quiet. A part of me wanted to hug and forgive him. But, my heart had just been torn right from my chest for another of countless times and the pain seared through me. “You should only say that if you mean it.”
He stopped, suddenly, and shifted his feet back to me. “Of course I mean it. I love you, and I care about you. That means I would never lie, either.”
That right there was a big, fat, solid lie, and we both knew it.
“Wish I could believe that.”
His eyes grew wild. I wanted to take my words back as soon as I had said them, but it was too late. The monster had been uncaged and the only thing to do was to hold on and pray that it wouldn’t be too painful.
A beer bottle was flung just inches from my bare feet. My body recoiled a bit, in efforts to protect itself from the horrors that would inevitably unfold.
“What did you just say to me?” He hollered. “Did you just accuse me of lying, again?”
This time I was too scared to answer, but he took it as another act of defiance towards him. He reached out and grabbed at my hair, yanking me out of my previously perched state.
“Apologize to me!”
A scream escaped, but was muffled by an intense fear echoing through my bones. Pain seared through my scalp. I could feel individual hair follicles slowly being pulled out of place. My hands shot up to my black mop of hair to try to relieve myself of the torture, but he shoved them away.
“Stop!” I begged, tears forming on my cheeks. “Please stop! Please, please stop!”
For a moment, he pondered his decision. Then, he looked into my eyes. When I looked, I could tell that they were yellowing with rage. I still don’t know what he saw in mine. Maybe he saw a sea of sorrow hidden behind green; or, maybe he saw pain behind the tint of gold. Whatever it was, he decided to let go.
My body crippled to the ground in a heap of wails. I gripped my head, and ran my fingers through my hair.
He looked down at my whimpering body and sighed. “I hate it when we fight. You know that I don’t want to hurt you, right? It’s for your own good. Now collect yourself and come inside when you're ready.”
And then he left, walking back towards the small shack of a house, the white paint peeling from its sides.
I closed my eyes and wished and wished that he would walk past the house, down the street and straight on to a different town, state, country, like my mother did. But, I knew he wouldn’t. He wasn’t as smart as my mother.
She was beautiful, or so I’ve been told. When I was two, she packed her bags and never looked back. For most of my life, I had felt a certain affection towards her, filled with wonder and love. But slowly, over these past years, when my father made friends with vodka and gin, a feeling of abhorrence and abandonment wiggled its way into my life and never left.
A cold breeze washed over my backyard, drying the salty tears on my face. Small bumps appeared on my bare arms. I looked up at the sky, with the white, fluffy, cotton candy clouds. They were moving so fast, like they were late for something really important.
My legs lifted themselves up. The previously clean dress that I was wearing was now caked with mud. But, I was too infatuated with the sky to notice. The clouds could just keep going and leave behind the rest of the world. They were my mother. And if my mother could do it, couldn’t I?
One slow step. Two. Three. Four. Faster, faster, faster! Soon my bare feet were running down the barren alleyway behind my house. Cold, spring air licked my face as I went, drying the tears as they continued to appear on my cheeks.
I kept running, past the corner grocery, past the pharmacy, past the old house rumored to be haunted, the dusk lighting making everything seem so bleak. My legs carried me to the other edge of town, where a willow tree stood tall and broad. There, I stopped and leaned against the trunk for support.
The rough bark scraped my shoulders a bit, making the sunburn a little more painful, but I didn’t care all that much. Here was a better place, where safety could almost be guaranteed. Here was a place without my father.
“What are you crying for?” A husky voice asked from behind me.
I jumped back, stumbling over the roots of the tree and falling to the ground. A tall man stood before me, with a scruffy beard and clothes that were too ripped and torn to really be considered proper garments. He wore a knit cap as well, curls peeking from under the rim.
“Watch yourself. Are you alright?”
Nothing escaped from my mouth. I simply stared back at him, too frightened to speak.
He extended his hand, as if to help me back to my feet. When I didn't take it, he retracted his hand. “My name is Charles, but my friends call me Chuck. Do you have a name?”
Slowly, I hoisted myself from the ground before answering him. “Alice.” I told him. “My friends call me Alice.”
Chuck let out a light, friendly laugh. “Well, it’s a pleasure to meet you Miss Alice.”
For the first time that day, I gave a shy smile. But, no words seemed to find my lips. I stayed silent.
“I suppose that you don’t talk too much, do you Alice?”
I shook my head.
He rubbed his scruffy chin. “Well, some folks are just people of few words. Can’t say that I’m one of them, though. How old are you? Ten? Eleven? When I was your age, I was always getting in trouble with teachers. They’d always tell me to shut up and be quiet, not that that ever did anything. I’d just keep yapping away until they sent me to the hall, or sometimes the principal.”
I took a step forward, with a slight interest in what Chuck was saying. He sounded like he had stories to tell and secrets to keep, a little bit like me. “What would your parents say?” I asked, genuinely curious.
“She speaks!” He exclaimed, his face brightening. “Well, they’d tell me the same as my teachers. The only difference was that my folks would smack me on my head to teach me a lesson. Oh, boy did that hurt!”
“I know how that feels,” I said without thinking.
His smile faded a bit. “That why you were crying?”
Hesitantly, I nodded.
“Sorry to hear that, Alice. I suppose that’s why you came out here, too?”
“Yes,” I replied.
“Rotten luck, I say. I bet you didn’t deserve it, either. What’d they do? Hit you?”
My eyes darted around, a little unsure if I should answer, but I eventually decided I would. “Not this time. He pulled my hair instead.”
Chuck leaned against the tree and slowly slid down. “Can’t say they ever did that to me. I usually deserved it, too. But, I’ll say it again. I bet you didn’t deserve it.”
Did I? This question had haunted me for years. Did I truly deserve all that I had received in my life? Was I a bad daughter, too selfish to realize the fact that I made my father’s life harder?
No, I finally decided. I did not deserve it.
I sat down, too. Then, I crossed my arms. “No,” I told him flatly. “I’ve never deserved anything that he’s done to me.”
“See,” he said. “I’m good at predicting things. You know, the problem isn’t you. It’s them. They’re the ones with the issue.”
“I bet you didn’t deserve it, either,” I told him.
He laughed and placed his hands behind his head, then let out a slow whistle. “No, I did. At least, most of the time I did. The difference between you and me is that I’ve always had it coming, and you’ve just been caught in the crossfire. I was just a troublemaker. You don’t make any trouble. Why’d he do it? Why’d he pull your hair?”
At first, I didn’t want to tell him. Chuck was a stranger. I didn’t know him, and he didn’t know my life; but, it was that reason that I decided to tell him. Sometimes you need someone to talk to who knows nothing about you.
“He forgot my birthday and drank all day. When he apologized, I told him he was lying. It’s true that he was lying, too. He’s done it before. Then he yanked my hair because he didn’t like what I was saying.”
Chuck rested his chin in his hands and hunched his shoulders forward. What little smile or twinkle of playfulness in his eye that he had, faded after I spoke. “You have rotten luck when it comes to fathers, I’ll tell you that much. You’ve got it rough, kiddo. But, I’ll tell you what, and I wouldn’t be saying this unless I’d been there. You’re worth so much more than what you’re getting. You don’t know me, and I certainly don’t know you, but it’s easy to see an innocent person being caught in the crossfire of their parents’ insecurities. None of it is fair.”
My face tilted towards the ground. “No,” I murmured. “It’s not.
“Miss Alice,” he said, scooting a bit closer towards me. “You could let this get to you, or you could fight back. Sometimes I wish that I had.”
Fight back? I had been. For years and years, I fought silently within the dim light that my hope cast out. If I couldn’t beat him, then maybe my mind could defeat me and make my suffering less brutal and raw. But, that light had gotten smaller and smaller, and I was afraid that it was already gone.
“How?” I asked. “He’ll just hit me more.”
“There are times when there is nothing you can do. You’ll be hit, and you can’t do anything or else there will be more to follow. But, there are times when you can fight back, however rare those instances may be. Like right now, for instance. He doesn’t know where you are, I suppose. Isn’t that in a way fighting back? He doesn’t have control.”
I rolled that thought over and over in my mind, trying to figure if what he was saying was true. “Do you really think so?”
“Yeah, I do.”
A small smile found my lips. “But, what now? What I’m I supposed to do now?”
“Go back. Do it one victory at a time. That’s the most that you can hope for. But, the small things add up. Don’t forget that.”
Chuck's words struck me, pinching at my mind and asking to be listened to. I nodded, but also knew that I wasn't ready to go back. Not yet, at least. But, Chuck was already lifting himself off of the ground.
“Where are you going?” I asked, secretly hoping that our short encounter wasn't already coming to an end.
He looked at me, his eyes sparkling. “I have some prior engagements. My grandchildren are expecting their grandfather tonight. Every Sunday I go and tell them stories, and I'm never late.”
“Oh,” I said.
“It was mighty fine meeting you, though. Miss Alice, if you ever find yourself in peril again, just come back here. Maybe I'll be here.”
I nodded. “Thanks Chuck.” That was the last thing that I ever said to him.
Years passed and I went back to that willow tree countless times. Slaps, punches, cigarette burns. Every time, I searched for Chuck, hoping to just listen to his advice and be calmed by his words. But, he was never there. A part of me knew he never would be. I was just a girl who had only spoken to him for five minutes, yet I still felt drawn to him. He had told me what I needed to hear when I needed to hear it.
My childhood slowly turned to adulthood. I left that house, even the entire state as soon as the clock struck midnight on my eighteenth birthday, and I never looked back. I'd like to say that my life was led in a productive, happy way, despite the horrors of my youth, but that wasn't necessarily the truth. The things that Chuck told me under that tree, did, however, help. In fact, I often think about it while I tuck my own children into bed at night. A lot of good and happy things had followed me in life, yet the scars that I received from my father still sting at times and shocks me back to a time when I was young, helpless, and everything seemed bleak. There are times when I have to shut myself away until the pain resides. But, I always look back to that night, when I turned twelve. Chuck was right. There are rare moments in life when you can fight back. You can kick and scream, and sometimes, sometimes you can win. And I look at my children, lying in their beds and think, I did win.
I won.
Zoe Lavender resides in a small town in Wisconsin. Due to the sparse amount of things to do, she can often be found daydreaming in a corn field. Two of her short stories have been featured as top stories on the online portion of Teen Ink Literary Magazine. One day, she hopes to become a novelist.