Sometimes, I do short fiction "Yellow Honesty"

Sometimes, I venture into the world of short fiction. I blame it on an amazing creative writing professor. And an amazing Brti Lit professor. Okay, mostly, I blame it on my very twisted, morbidly curious mind. Mainly, my blog has been nonfiction. However, I read a news article, I saw a news report, my soul cringed, and my imagination took off into the worlds of "how" and "why." From such, was born this.

The Color of Silence
By: Brook Marie

            They always told me to be honest with them, that the truth was better than lies no matter how painful the truth might be. “Be honest, always,” said my father in his deep, grumbling voice. “If you aren’t honest we can’t help you,” my mother spoke softly, all the good intentions of a mother resonating on the soft waves of her voice. “What a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive,” quoted my father to me one day: I was seven and had tried to explain away something or other. Tangled web. Tangled. Web. Sticky. Caught. Can’t get loose. Trapped.

            Yellow is a horrid color. Oh I know, people say – don’t ask me which people – that yellow is vibrant and alive and happy and cheerful! They say. They say. They don’t have a clue. My sister loves yellow. She would. She’s the happy child in my family. Always dancing and laughing, her blonde pigtails bobbing up and down, up and down, up and down – I race to the toilet and throw up violently. Outside the bathroom I hear my parent’s concerned voices.

            “We should take her to the doctor.” It is my mother. She thinks everything can be fixed with a Doctor’s visit.

                                    Mom, my heart is broken/

                                                The doctor can fix that dear/

                                    Mom, my soul is crushed and ripped open, a gaping hole/

Oh, sweetheart, let’s go see the Doctor! I’m sure he can help/

            My father’s voice follows. “It’s just the flu. That time of year again, you know. Winter is setting in wet this year and everyone at work has been getting the flu. It’ll pass.”

            The cool porcelain of the toilet kisses my cheek. They don’t know a thing. They can’t fix a thing. They asked for honesty. They asked for truth. The truth is, I hate yellow. And my sister is dancing about in a new, yellow dress.

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            When I was six I begged to ride the school bus to school for first grade. I was a big girl. In my mind, the world was something I could conquer with tea parties and sword fights. My mother and father smiled fondly, a touch of sadness in their eyes (“Our baby is growing up”) and agreed. Take your lunch box. Be safe. Sit up front near the driver. Be safe. Don’t run around while the bus is moving. Be safe. Don’t distract the driver. Be safe. We love you so much. Be safe. Mommy will be right here at the bus stop waiting for you when you come home. Be safe. Be safe. Be safe. Be. Safe. Safe.

            At church my parent’s best friends had children that rode the same bus as me that year. They smiled fondly when my mother boasted, somewhat sadly, about how independent I was becoming. My father rubbed her back and nodded, looking over my mother’s shoulder to wink at me. I grinned back and then ran off to play tag with the other kids. How innocent was the world I lived in!

            When we were leaving, my mom looked at me and said, “Drew and David and Elizabeth will ride the bus with you. Drew will make sure you don’t miss your stop for the first week or two; just until you get the hang of it.”

            Inwardly I scowled. I was a big girl. I didn’t need Drew to help me. He was twelve. He would be bossy. Outwardly I nodded, afraid to disagree lest my parents change their minds about letting me ride the bus. They smiled at me, satisfied that they were making the right decision.

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            Drew held my hand the first day, and helped me down the steps of the bus. Through the window, Elizabeth waved cheerfully. She is one year older than me and she is my best friend. Was. She is not my best friend any longer. My mother thanked Drew and I pulled my hand away. The bus was warm and smelled funny but I had reveled in the sense of “bigness” that swept over me when I rode it.

            Field trips on the bus were always fun. The cracked leather of the grey seats itched my bare legs that stuck out, skinny and white, from my new shorts. Elizabeth wasn’t on the bus. David wasn’t on the bus. Drew wasn’t on the bus. Only first graders. We were going to the Pumpkin Patch. I loved the bus, that day. The Field Trip monitors and the teachers cracked all the windows at the top. Autumn breeze came in cool and crisp like an apple. Field Trips were the best bus days.

            Winter and my mother was worried. There was ice and snow on the road. My father said there wasn’t, my mother argued there could be. Perhaps she had better drive me to school. But the bus pulled up to the house and away I went, my mother calling out as the doors squeaked shut, “Be safe!”

            Outside the bus, the world was grey and frosty, winter had come and the world would soon be white. Now it was only cold and dreary. Inside the bus I was warm and safe and Elizabeth sat beside me and my new scarf was soft and warm and long and wrapped like a hug around my neck.

            The next day Elizabeth and David were home sick and the rain poured down. My mother again called out, “Be safe!” adding, “Drew, make sure she doesn’t slip and fall or get pushed getting off the bus.”

            I didn’t slip. I didn’t fall. But I have yet to get back up.

______________________________

            I loathe yellow but my dreams are filled with yellow. I crave honesty but honesty is harder to find the longer you wait. My tongue swells up when the truth threatens to come out and my throat gets thick. My mother smiles at me, worry and concern etched across her face. My father frowns at me, confusion over my attitude creasing the corners of his mouth. And the truth lodges tight in my chest, catching my breath in a painful grasp of ugly nettles. It’s too late. Too late. Isn’t it? The truth is ugly. Honesty is supposed to be the kindest thing you can give someone, but it only looks tainted and black to me.

            My little sister is in the kitchen, crying. I have snapped at her. She is so small and the world is so bright for her and I have spoken harshly to her, cracked a portion of her sunshine. Mom’s voice carries softly, “Oh sweetie, that wasn’t very nice of her. Here, you come help me finish dinner.”

            The last time I was asked to help finish dinner, my mother pulled out a bag of shiny, yellow bell peppers. I screamed and howled, an animal set loose in the kitchen, and threw the repulsive vegetables across the room. I tried to find words for my torment. I was seven, then, and knew my words but my words no longer knew me. My mother sent me to my room. She never asked me what was wrong. She couldn’t have known to ask me. That’s what I tell myself. But she should have asked me. I was her child.

            Her child. No one else’s child. Hers and my fathers. They should have known that honesty was inside of me, trapped in a web, poisoned by a spider. But they didn’t ask because…because. I spilled paint purposely on my yellow shoes that Grandma sent me. Taking out the trash, one day, my father found all my yellow building bricks in the garbage bag. When I was eight, my mother received yellow flowers for her birthday. I cut the heads off. When she asked me why, I tried to tell her but how could my child’s mind find the words to explain that yellow cut me open and watched me bleed out? Sometimes honesty has no words.

            Now my father is yelling at me. I deserve it. I made my little sister cry. I shattered her perception of me, the protector, the bigger and better and stronger. My father never yells. He is a man of low, grumbling, soothing voice. I needed him to yell sooner but sooner came too late.

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            Today the sun came out, through the wintry grey of an overcast sky, and the cold, filtered light made my stomach churn. Little sister has on a pink snow coat – our mother stopped buying yellow clothing a month ago. It took her years to figure out that yellow destroys me, destroyed me, and she still hasn’t asked why. Elizabeth’s mom called my mom. She and her husband are going out of town and can my parents watch Drew, David, and Elizabeth? Why would my mother say yes? Why would my father agree? I haven’t been friends with Elizabeth in five years. Drew is old enough to watch everyone but his parents will be gone for two weeks and don’t want them alone for that long.

            They have been at my house for two days now. I cannot sleep. I lie in bed and grind my teeth, hoping the grating noise will drown out the wails inside of my head. Elizabeth has tried to be kind to me but kindness is a farce in the face of disowning honesty. I was honest with her and she turned away. I spilled out my brokenness to her and she silenced me.

            There is movement from the next room and I freeze under my covers, my hands gripping white on my chest. Everything around me slows down to a painful tick of each second on the clock by my bed. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. Go. Away. Go. Away. Go. Away. The silence is loud, so loud! How can no one hear the silence? Tick. Tock. Go. Away. Silence is death. Death is the yellow glow of the hallway light that briefly flickers as honesty finds its way to my room. Tick. Tock. Time is running out.

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            There are no words for despair. Alone, now, in my tiny apartment, where I have painted the yellowed and aging walls a vicious green, I remember. The clock never stopped that night. The questions were never asked. The bus never slowed down. The screams never came. But honesty came.

            Lying naked on the shower floor, seventeen, a bottle of pills in my stomach, a patchwork of scars and cuts, old and new, revealed at last, my parents found me. They found what was left of me, the shell of me, the bottled up, broken, withheld honest part of me. I hated that hospital room where I recovered. Cheery yellow paint to wish the patients well again. In that hospital room, with a complete stranger, honesty came. She was kind and soft and understanding. Things were set in motion. But it didn’t matter. It doesn’t matter.

            The damage is done. The break was final. Honesty only destroyed those around me when it finally came out. When I was a child, I couldn’t find the words for honesty. When I was a teenager, I choked on the wall inside of me and buried myself beneath it. As an almost adult, I let it out and watched with a detached numbness the catastrophic fallout around me. This was the result.

            This is the result. I look around me. Pristine. Clean. Neat. Spotless. Orderly. Safe. Haven. Safe. Be safe. Make safe. Isolate. Withdraw. Precaution and contain. They can’t touch me. That is the result. They won’t touch me. I am broken, beyond repair.

            The sun is coming up. Another day. Yellow light streams in a thin line through the crack in the curtains. Stand up. Walk over. Seal the curtains shut. Outside, a school bus rumbles by, a yellow coffin singing my death.