Musings

Wherein we are introduced to our protaganist, a nameless immortal pondering his existence, wrestling with his issues, ready to move abroad in the night. (First chapter, preliminary work).

I: Musing

 

Sometimes I forget how to be human.

 

Which is funny, because I used to be so good at it. Moving among the throng, acting the part, playing the fool. I suppose I was a wolf in sheep's clothing, hiding in plain sight. After a while the clichés all start to bleed together, you lose track of the inanities in a sea of...Well, bullshit. Stop me if this all starts to run together.

 

My name is unimportant at this juncture. Pleased to meet you. At this very moment I'm sitting on the edge of a car park roof, heels hitting against the dull grey stone, tapping out a little drumbeat of disaffection. I'm tallish, brown hair to my shoulders, blue eyes, pale skin. It's been like this for a while now, the appearance not the situation, and I'm starting to wonder if I should change. We can't just crawl into a cocoon and emerge as sparkling butterflies, of course. That would make us all shiny happy people. People would be much happier with wings, after all, better that than mortgages, tax returns and global warming.

 

I digress.

 

Sometimes I forget how to be human. Little things, like breathing or looking at people as though I'm interested in more than just food. You have to teach yourself to regard them as more than snackpacks or pets, you learn to look at them on an equal footing, rather than down the bridge of your nose. You walk the fine line between arrogance and predation. It's not easy, in fact it's the thing that catches most of us out when we have our first crack at things. Wolves aren't meant to move among the flock, after all, they're meant to stalk the edges, pick off the weak. How lucky we are that “drunk and easy” are the new hobbled lamb.

 

I might have lost you by now. You might be wondering who I am? What I am? Why I'm on this roof? Will I jump? It's all rather complicated. I have this friend, a brainy sort of guy who would likely scoff if he knew I was giving him this much credit, he'd chuckle wryly into his drink and mutter on about imitation being the most sincere form of kissing his arse. Anyway, this friend, he tells me that life is all about escapism, that true living, true freedom, is being able to leave at a moments notice. He tells me this and I laugh to myself, I tell him it must be wonderful not to care, and he's none the wiser to what I am or what I do.

 

I've been around for so long that if birthday cakes were bonfires, they still wouldn't be candle-chronologically accurate. I'm sitting on a roof and I'm gazing at the stars, and I'm marvelling that only one distant ball of gas wants to kill me, and that it's reflected light actually works quite well with my look. I bang my leather booted heels against the slab again, and turn my sight downwards, down towards life and light and civilisation. You take it for granted when you stumble through it, you don't really appreciate the intricacies of city living, of being insignificant next to your own creations, like a parent whose child ends up with multiple degrees while they never even went to school. It's sad, it's almost criminal. We think of cities as belonging to us, of being ours but we're slaves to the system, we're ants caught in a farm, rats in a maze, desperate and reliant for salvation and succour.

 

Sometimes, that makes me a little sick. Sometimes I think I should keep my thoughts to myself.

 

I watch them, and I take the most intimate pleasure in doing it. I let my eyes glide across their lives, skimming the surface of people I've never met. I can hear them, smell them, practically taste them even from so far away. It makes you realise how far they've come, how diverse it's all got. I can remember days when it was all one people, uniform and unremarkable. Now we live in a place where they can sample a dozen different cuisines, a handful of lives and cultures. Entire worlds are encapsulated in so small a space, wrapped up in concrete and confusion. The little things seem to matter then, sparkling diamonds in the rough. You distract yourself with the day to day mundanities and pray that they make it worthwhile. They don't. You shouldn't sweat the small stuff, but you do, because it hurts. It eats away at you, viruses are small things after all but they can bring down civilisations, tear empires apart. Problems are like that, concerns are the pathogens of the mind, hobbies and family and friends...Bacteria, teeming through the corpse that was your life.

 

Sometimes I wonder if I was a cynic before I died, or if she made me this way when she crossed me over.

 

She's out of the picture for now. Different cities, different lives. I meander around here, watching, waiting, and she lives the high life with her society friends. She flits from ball to ball, entrancing strangers like she was the princess, flitting off before they know quite what's hit them. She's the drug in the champagne, the one-drink-too-many, the reason they can't remember how they got there or why they're so dishevelled. She's got dressing down high society pegged to a fine art, a rebel in fine black silks. I don't envy her. Not her lot anyway. She's welcome to the upper class, sprawled like a car show model across their gleaming plastic façade. I don't need the baggage; she imprinted enough of that all by herself.

 

Again, I've wandered off topic. I'm old, we covered that, and I've a rather jaded outlook on my human cousins. I wasn't born this way, I was crossed over, turned by she-who-doesn't-get-a-name. A rose by any other and all that jazz. She certainly has her thorns, I'll say that much of her; my maker, my muse, my mistress.

 

B***h.

 

Don't get me wrong, I'm grateful. Well, I'm grateful now. Things like killing you and turning you into a walking hungry corpse do take time to sink in, for you to come to terms with them; but we get there eventually. It's not that I hate her. It's more like when you eat the same thing over and over again. Dirty imagery aside, she became routine, I grew accustomed to her, so of course I had to get away. 

 

Much like I need to get away from here. I trust you'll join me? I let my mouth twist into a little grin, kicking off the roof, heels tapping against the concrete once more before I'm falling, flailing, tumbling through air and aethyr. I feel the rush of wind, cold against my colder skin, I let my arms raise, eyes closing as I near my destination. Gracefully I land, like a cat, like an animal; a predator in gentle leather and nice aftershave. I sniff the air, my senses keen and honed against the cold of the night, alert and active and hungry; always the hunger, prowling in the back of my mind or clawing at my concious thoughts. The bestial edge to my mindset, flooding into what remains of the human aspects of my mind, a wave eroding rocks over time, clawing away the sand of my sanity.

 

Sometimes I forget how to be human. And sometimes, I welcome that lapse.

 

Author's Note

Feedback welcomed :)

Reviews

[Bachman]

I completely pictured a guy writing this down before jumping of the edge of a building. Hating everything in his life and hating his girl for sure or at least the one his heart wants. I really like this, good good job. I never expect anything less from you anyways.

I see there is a flip side too. I saw a guy killing himself, but also a gentleman vampire. A man that's become a vampire and remembering his human self. You're damn good a bringing in the reader, giving them a mental picture of what they're reading. I'm surprised you haven't been published yet. You really should compile everything you write into a 'short story collection' book. www.lulu.com is a great publisher. I've eye-balled them for years so I remember them when I'm ready for my big day of breaking out of the mundane.

It's amazing, absolutely, do you do erotica too? I bet you'd be very very good at it.

[Twilight]

Very original, and with a distinctive style. A style which is very appropriate, for the theme chosen. I have the impression, that your protagonist could be a werewolf. Or, did you have some other creature in mind? It's certainly a piece of writing, which may be worth continuing with. I look forward to reading more of your writing, in due course. Thankyou, for sharing this with us, and entering my latest Contest!

[Nathina Outright]

HOLY COW! THIS IS ABSOLUTELY AMAZING!!!!!