Story Time: Vacant Dreams

Some days I like to write about mountains, photography, and the rising sun, and other days I like to let you into the other side of what I do, and the creative short stories I write and rarely share.

Here is an unnamed story I wrote for a contest a while back that I stumbled upon today. I love finding things I had written in the past, being able to see the transition from then to now. The little things I've learned to focus on like character dynamics and fixing all of the bad grammar I once had, is like a breath of fresh air.

After a little sprucing up, I thought it would be fun to share.

The Unnamed Creative Short Story

I called out to the empty field as if in a dream. She had to be here, I was late enough as it was. She must have been waiting for me.

It was the perfect day for a picnic, golden motes of dust drifted in sheets of sunshine, tumbling about in the air as I brushed past them. I tramped through the tall grass as I heaved the cooler into a better position under my arm. Making my way towards the grove of trees at the center of the meadow, I moved through the tall grass that danced in the breeze.

I dropped my backpack and the small cooler at the foot of the largest tree, a pompous maple reaching out towards the sun, and called out to her again. There was a rustle from somewhere in the thick foliage above me, and a stifled giggle.

I grinned and crept around the tree to where her bare feet were dangling from a branch. I grabbed her ankles and pulled her down into my arms. She screeched in surprise and joy as we tumbled to the ground. I landed on my back with her on top of me. The fall took the wind out of me, but a laugh bubbled up from my heart.

I rolled the both of us through the grass until we rested side by side, half in the sun and half in the enveloping shade of the tree. 

            I gave her a quick peck on the lips. 

            "Hey love," I grinned.

            "You're late," she pouted.

            "Or are you early?"  I asked with a wink.

            She rose eagerly and stumbled into my arms again, kissing me before I knew what was happening. My mouth stretched into a smile and she pulled away giggling. Warmth invaded my entire being, running over my skin like sunlight on the darkest of days.

My world had been dark before this moment, I had been but a pinprick of light in a raging sea of blackness. When they had let me out of jail, my world had been crushed. I had been jobless, homeless, friendless, even my family wouldn't talk to me.

Applying for a job at a random coffee shop, in a random town I’d been drifting through had changed my life. No more was I that lost man, wandering the country like a windblown desperado, getting into bar fights, sleeping in sleazy motel rooms, working odd jobs on farms and washing dishes at restaurants to earn my meager living.

After getting that job I had turned my life around. It had taken a month or two of sleeping on benches and going home with strangers on the weekends to steal a hot shower and some food, but it had all been worth it. Instead of the man who everyone kept away from for fear of their lives, I was the one who was relied on to keep the shop afloat, or fix a neighbor’s leaky pipe. I was out, more than two years now, and the past only haunted me in my dreams.   

            "You better have brought salami," she snarled playfully, chasing me towards where I had left our gear.

            "And here I thought you said I could decide what we ate," I sighed dramatically.

            "You should have learned by now that is not how things work around here. I wear the pants in this relationship," she said, smacking me in the butt.

            "Well that's only when I don't have you out of your pants," I winked at her.         

            She glared at me right back and gave me a playful shove. 

"That's what you think mister."

            I knelt to the ground and opened up the cooler, holding up a salami sandwich and a six pack of beer. 

"Is this up to your queenly standards or should I have brought the champagne and caviar?"

            "Doesn't someone think they’re funny today," she teased as she spread out the thin blanket I had brought.

I sat, leaning with my back against the tree, a cool brew in one hand and a sandwich in the other. She was sprawled out on the ground beside me, her head resting against my stomach, hair pulled into a messy tail over her shoulder. We just lay there in that perfect moment, breathing in the scent of the meadow, watching the clouds drift through time in the azure sky. They always reminded me of myself, roaming the open stretches of nothingness, forming into whatever shape pleased them.

Sometimes I missed that life, being out on the road, but I only missed the freedom, not the loneliness, the depression, or the cheating a man out of his money and his girl. No, it was best I left that life behind, for a comfortable apartment that I worked hard for, a job that made me feel deserving, and a beautiful girl that I could call all my own.

I'd come a long way from that kid who had done a lucky seven for assault and manslaughter. I’d have been in twenty-five-to-life if those other boys hadn't had knives. I'd struck first, and pleaded self defense, and yet still one rested six feet down and the other had been counting sheep and eating through an IV ever since.

I still saw their faces in my sleep. Things were going well enough in my life that I was waiting for the other shoe to drop. I knew it was going to drop. Nothing was this good.

I finished my food first, and sipped on a beer as I waited for her. We lay there for a moment longer before curiosity got the best of her and she started peering into the forest beyond the meadow.

We went for a hike into the woods. I pushed through a wall of cedar at the edge of the glade, holding the branches for her and untangling her hair when it got caught. She screeched playfully as I broke off the twigs and pouted as I laughed at her with her hair looking like a bird's nest. After pushing our way through the almost impenetrable wall of needles, we fell into a wider forest where soft maple and cherry ruled. Before us a wide creek tumbled gently over rocks and meandered around long curves. Trout lurked in the deep pools of clear water, and light dappled the surface. 

She threw her shoes at me while I wasn't watching. They caught me in the stomach while I was enjoying the beauty of it all. Jigsaw pieces of sun fell through the jade canopy above to land at our feet. The woods were still and smell of sweet cedar and growing things.

She winked at me as she peeled off her socks, sliding into the cool, flowing water.  The pool she stepped into reached just above her knees, it would have to be much deeper than that to get those tiny black shorts of hers wet. I soaked my feet in the stream as she chased minnows about, her face lighting up like the sun as she splashed me with cool water.

I couldn’t hold the scowl on my face for long as I grabbed her by the arm, pulling her into an embrace just long enough to muss up her hair and kiss her long and hard. I let the moment soak into my bones, fill my chest with burning life.

It took me forever to get her out of the water, but by the time I did she was ready to head back to my place for my soft, homey couch, a movie, and whatever that led to.

We walked back to the field hand in hand; my rough calluses warm against her smooth, cool skin. Just watching her so full of life made me forget about the world around us.

She let go of my fingers and twirled through the meadow, light catching her sunshine hair. Butterflies, a pretty blue the color of her eyes, fluttered to safety as she danced through the tall grass that was their home. They found themselves caught in the current of her wake and spiraled into the sky, alighting on a bush at the edge of the clearing.

After I had thrown all of our gear and the bike she had ridden to our little rendezvous in the back of my jeep, we hit the road. Beside me in the passenger seat she wore her black, plastic rimmed shades and sang along to the music that gurgled happily out of the jeep. I didn't look away from her until it was too late.

Death loomed upon us. With a shriek of rent metal, my world ended as a truck caught us head on. We flipped upside down and then cart-wheeled into the ditch, coming to a shuddering halt beneath a now flaming oak. I found myself dripping crimson, staring into someone else's vacant eyes. The sounds of screaming began to fade away as if I were waking from a dream. I slipped in and out of consciousness until everything went black.

My eyes opened to a repeating vibration.  What was it, a hospital monitor?  It wasn't, I opened my eyes. It was my cell phone. It had all been just a dream. I rubbed my eyes and picked up the phone.

            "Hello," I grunted into the dark room.            

            That beautiful voice I loved so much unnerved me this morning.

           "Hey love, it's me, we’re still on for our picnic today, right?  I'm riding my bike to that field I told you about."

            My heart stopped, sinking cold and dead in my chest.

            "Can we take a rain check...?"