I'll keep the lights out, I'll tell you fairy tales

It is overly warm beneath tented blankets; soft giggles escaping from below
the shroud of blankets. Beneath the blankets we're hidden from the moon,
from her pale rays of light. I can't see your face it's so dark, so I reach
blindly to attempt to feel your expression.
I almost stick my finger up your nose and you giggle sharply. "Shhh!" I
whisper, "We're hiding from the monsters."
"They can't reach us under the blankets can they?" your quiet voice trembles
slightly with fear. I hug your small frame even more tightly to mine,
remembering that as the eldest I'm supposed to protect you.
"As long as we stay under the blankets and keep the lights out, they'll never
find us," I reply. If only that were so. Daylight will come again and once
more I'll be unable to protect you from the monsters we call adults and from
the beatings I know we'll get, if not tomorrow then in the days following.
I wonder what the stars look like outside, as your breathing begins to slow
down and become more regular. I remember being told that it was light that
could keep the monsters out, back before you were born and I was alone.
Back before the beatings began.
Now that I'm older, I realise that it isn't light that keeps the monsters away
or even the dark. There is no set way to get rid of a monster. Everyone has
their own monster, deep within their skin. My monster is facing the fact that
I'll never be strong enough to protect you.
You interrupt my thoughts with a simple request. "Will you tell me a story?"
I nod, the sounds of blankets shifting fills my ears, before remembering you
can't see me. "I will." I try to think of a story to tell as my fingers thread
through yours.
Our lives had never been fairy tales. There was no prince to save the day and
to ride off with the princess. There were no happily ever afters, at least not
for us.
Let us rewrite an ending that fits
I lick my lips anxiously and begin, "Once upon a time..."
A story unfolds. You listen closely, crying with sadness when the princess is
locked up. Locked up just like us. Just like we do, until our fingers bleed. You
are trembling with excitement while the prince faces the dragon and you
swoon when he rescues his princess and vows his undying love.

I concluded with, "and they lived happily ever after." And maybe we're not
living in a fairy tale, but whos to say we can't make our own endings?
The starry floor
I am sprawled across the bed, my cheek resting on the very edge of the bed.
Gazing at the floor. I remember when I was little and the carpet was a
creamy white. We spent everyday sprawled out on the floor, talking, eating,
laughing so hard we spilled drinks over. Her dark hair contrasted beautifully
with the cream colour of the carpet.
I was furious when my mother told me we were getting new carpet. I loved
that cream carpet, with the red stain from that cherry slurpie we spilled when
we were trying to hide it from my brother. There is a burn spot hidden
beneath my bed where we hid a flashlight one night when my mother came
in to tell us to be quiet.
I loved the cream colour in comparison to the papers we wrote on. We wrote
stories, dreams, thoughts, anything that could exist was written.
Eventually I was forced to pick a new colour for a carpet. White and cream
were unsuitable, my mother said. I picked black, black like her hair. Black
because I if I couldn't have white, then I wanted its absence.
She didn't like it either, she hated it. When she lay eagle-spread on the
carpet her hair blended in. It was like she was emerging from the carpet. Our
notebooks though, they looked beautiful on the carpet. Black writing on white
paper on black carpet.
--She grew up faster than I did. If my carpet were still white there would be
lipstick marks, spilled eyeshadow and blush. Eventually talk turned to boys
and writing was pushed to the side. I still wrote, but never with her. My
dreams were transcribed from only me. They weren't our dreams anymore.
Time passed, she eventually came to like the black floor.
--Then she was moving away. Before she left, she handed me a collection of
notebooks. "When I'm gone I want you to read them and then destroy
them." They were her half of our collection.
I read the entire collection twice. These were our dreams, our childhood. I
knew I should destroy them; the real world has no need or place for these
notebooks full of thoughts. But I couldn't bring myself to do it. The heavy

weight of paper in my hands. Black writing on white paper, first on white

carpet, then on black. Visible slurpie stains, invisible make up stains.
I ripped them up into tiny pieces. Each and every page. They were allowed to
fly briefly, for only one time before crashing and dying.
As I lay on my bed contemplating the mess I realised that they looked like
stars on the carpet. A starry floor. As opposed to a starry sky. I thought that
maybe I could settle for that. I left them there.

grow up and blow away

She stretches herself out on the branch of the tree, arms wrapped around it
almost as if embracing a lover. She likes looking at things from above, hidden
among the green. She likes being closer to the sun. She also particularly
likes having her friend seated a couple branches away, twiddling with his
fingers as he hums some summer pop song.
"I don't want this summer to end," she tells him. Gazing down below at the
gravel beneath the tree. The ground seems so distant, and the azure sky so
close.
His hand idly runs through his hair. "You never want summer to end," he tells
her with a smile. "You like lying here doing nothing, you like sunny days in
the grass, evenings spent staring at the sky, running through sprinklers and
eating an entire box of popsicles in one sitting."
She laughs, "I suppose that's true." Then she sobers, "but I don't want this
summer to ever end."
"You know it will," he tells her.
"Doesn't mean I have to like it," she retorts, sticking her tongue out
childishly. "Growing up sucks."
"And swallows," he adds, smirking when she lifts one hand to cover her
mouth like she always does when she laughs at a perverted joke. She was
brought up in a "good family" so it's almost a force of habit. Plus it's pretty
cute.
"You're such a perv," she tells him.
"I'm a guy," he responds. "We're all perverts."
"True, True." She rips a leaf off a branch and lets it drift to the ground,
fascinated by its attempts to defy gravity. She does this a few more times

before he says anything.

"You should probably stop, it'll be fall sooner than you think."
"Hmmm... I was just thinking how people are like leaves."
"They're green?" he exclaims outrageously.
"Did you read Wicked last night or something?"
She laughs as he nods sheepishly before correcting her, "Technically it was
sometime this morning."
She's silent again. Her face is pressed into the bark, which is probably gonna
leave funny indents on her face, that'll make him laugh until she reluctantly
joins him and they'll laugh until they're sick. On the way back to their house
from the park, she'll probably convince him into playing tag or racing, just for
old times sake.
"You were saying about people being leaves?" He reminds her.
"Oh, just that people like leaves, start from their family, a tree. And then
grow up and blow away."
"And die."
"And die," she echoes. "But they get reborn each year."
He's quiet, looking at the clear blue sky between the green. "I guess so," he
admits grudgingly. He watches as she slinks herself upwards so she can
move to sit on a branch closer to him. Once she settles down and plucks
(yet) another leaf off the tree, which she begins to rip to shreds, does he
begin to speak. "I don't really want summer to end either."
They wait until sunset before heading home. She teases him until he chases
her and pins her to the ground, where she struggles for a bit before giving in
and going limp. He quits supporting himself about then and flops on top of
her. She lets out an 'oof' and then grumbles about how heavy he is.
She stares upwards as stars fill the sky. Her hand absentmindedly trailing
through his hair. Eventually she pushes him off of her, and they race back
home. They lie on their backs in her front yard, asking truths from each
other. Who did you kiss, what will you miss, what do you think is beyond the
abyss?
Why dont you want this summer to end?

Because one day Im going to wake up far away and find that I can never go
back to the simplicity of this summer. She is silent for a moment afterward
and then adds, Im scared. I hate that this house wont always be my house,
that one day Ill remember you as just a name, and that one day I wont be
able to have any summers like this, summers where we can joke about silly
high school crushes and what teenagers think of life, days where I can eat a
box of popsicles until I puke if I want to.
I dont think youll ever grow up, he teases. And this summer will always
be longer and yet shorter than you think it will be. And I think everyone is
scared to finally step out into the world.
She gives a soft hmm of agreement and the two lie in the grass looking at
the stars in silence.
Eventually they have to go to their own separate houses. So they say their
goodbyes, and as she's about to turn towards her own house he shouts down
the street. "Just so you know, people should be green." She waits until he's
inside his own house; before she laughs so hard she cries and then enters
her own house.
So maybe she doesn't want the summer to end, but she'll settle for just
having this summer last as long as it does.

I wrote on a wall, "I've gone ahead."

My bedroom here stands empty, barren of all the possessions it once had.
This room where I lived and grew will soon be lifeless. It will collect dust, and
lie in despair and grief, waiting for life again. I had spent my entire life in this
room, in these four walls. I had called it mine, and in turn it had offered me
comfort and protection. It told no one of the tears it saw, or the silent laughs
it witnessed.
It's weird to leave the place where I grew up, where I spent so many hours of
so many days. In the room where I marked my height, in a room that watched
me change from Disney princesses to young adult. I dislike the feeling of
leaving it, letting it sit in silence for months to collect dust and keep the
memories I'm leaving behind.
But what sad memories, and what joyful ones. Keeping the old memories that
I can't handle anymore. The old photograph of old friends that I only dig out
to cry over. The charming Christmas and birthday letters I keep, each one

bringing joy and yet all of them carrying sadness. Another year, another year
is gone.
My parents will probably use it as storage during the long months Im gone.
Itll sit empty and quiet, yearning to feel the presence of life within its four
walls once again. Its hard to accept that I have to grow up.
I rub my finger over the hole in my wall, which my younger brother
accidentally made. I smile because he still has some room left for growing.
This room has scars, the true signs of living. So I don't think anyone will mind
if I leave just one more.
There's a pen in my hand and suddenly I need to think of what to write:
something deep and thoughtful to commemorate this moment or something
humorous.
The words are decided: I've gone ahead. This is something true, I've left but
I'm not gone forever. I'm going forward and changing. This room has
sheltered me for years, but everything changes sometime. A child grows into
an adult, nothing stays the same forever.
I shut the door and close my eyes, the doorknob still in my hand. Goodbye.