Swings

I am trapped in a dream. Invisible wires wrap around my lungs, breaking off my breathing and leaving me in a stupor of transfixed suffocation. My mind comes to a grinding halt as my friends try to ask me questions and gather me into the incessant chatter that is assaulting my ears and plummeting through my brain, disturbing my thoughts. Smoke billows from an ashtray somewhere in the room while a girl on the corner of a huge overstuffed couch sniffles and heaves sobs of grief. We all mourn together. Doing whatever we can to let our substance of choice overtake our minds and quiet our morbid thoughts. I am chugging clear liquor from a water bottle someone had obviously pilfered off his or her carelessly oblivious parents. Everyone around me is tearful, discussing memories of our lost friend. I am a rock, unmoving and unyielding, my eyes do not water, and my physical appearance utters no sign of the quake slowly rocking my soul to pieces. We discuss the whys and the hows. We trade blame around the room. We try to process what made her pull the trigger. Questions emit from senseless mouths, pouring from foolhardy minds with no filter. Questions bigger than us, which will go unanswered until someone looks to a possible figment of religion or higher power for an answer that is not guaranteed to be correct but offers solace of some sort of response. But guesses are useless. Her memory remains and the rest is deep in the earth, left to decompose and nourish trees and flowers.
My mind wanders and swirls, I am inebriated and forgotten somewhere in the mess below me. I cannot sit here and watch this anymore. I need to leave. There is nothing left for me in this dark room where souls fade and people are turning grey. My heart cannot hold the burdens of all she has left behind. I heavily lift myself from the overstuffed ottoman where I had taken residence and make my way through the crowded room. I do not feel my feet any more, my heart has stopped beating. I am flying, I am lifeless, and I am free. Somehow though, I still move. Somehow, heaven does not open its doors, I do not float into the final resting place. I am crossing the path to the outside now, away from the smoky room, away from the fading souls, away from the leaking eyes and the broken hearts. I am running for the door, hoping that out there, somewhere, there will be solace for my crumbling soul.
There is nothing here. I am walking, stumbling, tumbling forward. I have found my feet, and they are the worst feet in the world. They are tripping me, making me fall. I am landing on the hard concrete below me, blood leaks from my knee. I realize that I must be alive, if I still bleed. Crimson drops onto the pristine white sidewalk as I find my way back to my treacherous feet. I am speeding forward, trying to still my thoughts, running is near impossible but somehow, my mind knows that I need it to focus now, focus on propelling me and keeping me balanced. If I stop, I will crack. I cannot crack.
I find myself at a playground, our playground. She is dead now, and I will swing for her. I remember just a few months before we talked about being secluded and friendless when it came to recess, we would find solace on the swings. She was crying that day. I never asked why, I simply took her to this place, my sacred place. I knew she would appreciate it, the swings. I knew she would understand what it meant that she had been here. She had no swings in her neighborhood, a swanky place meant for adults with fancy cars and no children. I am gingerly running my hands over the cool silver chains, I am using them to support me while I find a way to position myself in the seat. I am finding my center of gravity and pushing off the ground. I am pumping my legs back and forth, shifting my weight to help me go higher. This was always my secret. This is was why I could always go higher than her. She didn’t know how to shift herself the way I did.

I am allowing the breeze to caress my face and dry my tears. I did not realize there were tears. Now they are falling into the sand like raindrops, drifting into the dirt and leaving little imprints, barely visible in the moonlight. Her swing is going too, the wind is accelerating it, making it take off and slowing enough to keep it a steady back and forth, just a little below mine.