"Starting Over"

Greetings,

I ventured pretty far outside my normal 'Fantasy' genre with this week's story. In fact, I'm not really sure what genre this story would fall in at all. It was written for my short story group's recent prompt: "Starting Over". It is always interesting trying to write something outside of one's normal type of story. I'd love to get some feedback and find out what you think.

The English Paper's Inspiration

by James J Meadows III

Damien extended his foot, placing it firmly upon the road, with a confidence missing to his head.

No, that was a lousy opening. Grabbing the scrap of paper in his hands, Justin squashed the page into a crumbled white ball before launching it at the trash can, missing by about half-a-mile.

“Good to know I suck at two things,” he groaned.

Justin rose from his chair, resigned to the inevitable act of crossing the room to pick up the sheet of paper. He grabbed the rolled up paper ball, cramming it with all his might on top of the trash with the plethora of other attempts he had made on the story, each as feeble as the last.

His English assignment for the Christmas break involved writing a short story about “starting over”.  Such assignments always acted upon Justin’s normally imaginative mind like some perverse form of kryptonite, draining away all traces of creativity, originality and motivation, leaving him little more than blank-minded zombie, fumbling through a selection of story ideas capable of making his mother beg for mercy.

Why did teachers make them do stupid things like write stories? It wasn’t like he was some sort of famous author, or would ever be a famous author for that matter.

Justin plopped back down into the chair, running his hands up his forehead and through his hair, praying that some inspiration might strike him. Unfortunately, inspiration rarely operated on demand and it certainly wasn’t doing so on this occasion.

The chime of the family clock echoed its familiar Westminster theme, proclaiming the arrival of 8:30pm. Sunday night football was about to start and Justin’s favorite team was playing against a division rival, with playoff implications on the line. He wanted to be in there watching it but, if he didn’t get this assignment finished before tomorrow, he was going to be dead-meat when his parents saw his English grade.

He gave a long frustrated groan, leaning back in his chair, arching his back and stretching his hands toward the sky.

“Starting over, starting over, starting over,” he mumbled to himself, as if simply repeating the words might solve the challenge of find a topic. “What sort of things start over?”

His junior year might start over from the beginning if he didn’t get this paper written. He wasn’t going to write about that, though. Relationships started over; though, apparently not his relationship with Megan, his long-term girl-friend, whose departure last week had done little to help his concentration or fuel any enthusiasm for writing the paper. As a matter of fact, he didn’t have much enthusiasm for anything. Even the football game, as much as he wanted to watch it, had lost some of its appeal, since he had spent every other game this season watching with her. Watching the game alone would be a real drag.

Sitting upright, Justin shook his head, trying to clear his mind, and retrieved his badly-chewed pencil to begin another round of failed attempts.

Damien stepped foot outside the rehab clinic for the first time in over a month, savoring the fresh air as though it were nectar. He couldn’t remember the last time he had felt so free: Free from the clinic, free from his past, and free from the marijuana which had so long controlled his life.

Justin placed the pencil back on his desk, staring blankly at the words upon the page. Marijuana – the source of all his problems. He didn’t do marijuana, of course, but it was marijuana that had caused his breakup with Megan.

Megan had made the cheerleading squad for the first time this year, quite an accomplishment in a school of over five thousand students where only ten made the team. She was eager to impress her fellow squad members, who had treated her as an outsider most of the season, and especially excited when she received an invite to attend their ‘private’ New Year’s Eve party. Neither he nor Megan knew, or even suspected, that they would arrive to find an unsupervised party, without any parents or adults, characterized by half the girls and their boyfriends getting stoned beyond recognition.

Justin had refused to stay, wanting nothing to do with the scene. Megan, however, was afraid of what the other girls would think or say. She wanted to stay, a decision which quickly dissolved into an all-out fight between the two and a black-eye from one of the cheerleader’s boyfriends when Justin threatened to call the police. In the end, Justin’s promise, that he would drive straight to Megan’s house and tell her parents if she didn’t come back with him, was the only thing that got her to leave. She hadn’t spoken to him since and he was too nervous to call her. Both of them had said some unnecessarily ugly things to each other during the fight, and she had made it quite clear their relationship was over.

Snatching the paper from his desk, he crumbled this new paragraph into another ball of trash, to join the rest of his attempts. He didn’t want to think about marijuana, cheerleaders, Megan or any of that stuff right now. He grabbed his pencil, beginning again with fresh enthusiasm, determined to write something to take his mind off Megan. Video games, he thought. Surely he could write about video games without thinking about Megan!

The words, “The End” flashed their bright white letters across the black television screen, adding emphasis to the musical dirge ringing from the video game’s console. Damien frowned; slamming his fingers against the reset button for what must have been the hundredth time.

Why do I keep using the name Damien? Justin wondered. Surely there are other names out there that are just as good. Oh well.

The entry screen flashed back to life, providing the now familiar option to either enter a save code or start from the beginning. Damien selected the beginning. Save codes were for wusses.

Justin paused, staring at the words for a minute, before slamming his head down on the desk. This had to be the lamest story, ever! Who wrote stories about dudes playing video games? Closing his eyes, he took a deep breathe before burying his head in his hands, as if hiding from the assignment might make it go away.

“Oh, don’t you dare look back; just keep your eyes on me…”

Justin’s fingers parted, revealing his now opened eyes, as an eruption of music sounded from his nearby cell phone. He knew that ring tone! His eyes darted toward the phone on his desk. It couldn’t be! There, smiling up at him from her picture on the front of his phone was Megan’s face.

His hand drifted toward the phone, shaking uncontrollably. For a moment, that seemed like an eternity, his hand hovered over the green answer button, seemingly unable to complete the normally simple task of sliding it over. What if she was still angry at him? Gritting his teeth, he pressed down against the green touch screen and slid the marker to the side. Picking up the phone, he held it to his ear.

“Hello,” he said, his voice sounding slightly higher than he remembered it being.

“Hey,” ventured a shaky voice at voice at the other end of the line, as though it were even less confident than him. A light tremor in her breathing hinted that she had been crying.

“Hey,” he responded, too dumbfounded to know what else to say.

There was a moment of silence.

“Are you watching the game?” Megan asked.

“No,” he replied. “How about you?”

“No, I’m not. I mean…I’d like to but…I mean, it’s…I…it’s just…not the same without you.”

The last words were blurted out as though they took all the strength she could muster to say them.

“Look,” she continued. “I’m sorry for the way I treated you. It’s just…I mean…I wanted them to like me, you know. And I didn’t…I mean, I wouldn’t…It’s…oh, God, I sound like an idiot.”

There was another moment of silence. Justin could hear her fighting off sobs. He didn’t know what to do or say. Something told him, he was better off not saying anything. He followed that instinct and, after a second, she spoke again.

“You were right about everything,” she said, her voice sounding more composed. “If I have to hang around drugs for them to like me, then they aren’t worth being friends anyway. I mean…you are worth more to me than a hundred of them…you know. And…what I’m trying to say is…I’m really sorry…and, you know…if you’ll forgive me…I mean…I’ve really missed you.”

Her voice lost its composure toward the end, cracking completely with the last words. Justin jumped in, eager to console her, unwilling to risk missing this opportunity.

“I’ve missed you too!” he said. “And I do forgive you. I’m sorry too, for all the things I said!”

“So, we can start over again?” she asked, her voice growing a little brighter. “You still want me?”

“Of course, we can start over,” he said. “There is no one else in the world that I want!”

“Thank you so much,” she said, her voice cracking into sobs again, this time much happier. “I’ve wanted to call you for days. I just didn’t have the courage.”

Justin sat upright in his excitement. All his weariness seemed to melt away as his lips curled into a smile, his face brightened, and the sparkle, missing from his eyes for so many days, glistened through the budding tears of joy, which he fought with all his might to restrain.

“I’ve wanted to call you too!” He said. “Did you want to come over and watch the football game together?”

“I’d like that very much,” came the soft response.

“Great!” Justin said, jumping to his feet. “I’ll grab the car and be right over to pick you up!”

“That sounds wonderful,” she responded. “I’ll get cleaned up and meet you out front when you get here! See you soon!”

“See you soon!” Justin cried, unable to control his enthusiasm any longer. He hung up the phone and shoved it into his pocket, diving across the desk for his keys and wallet. As he did so, his eyes fell upon the partially written paper on his desk. Tossing it aside, he grabbed his pencil and scribbled down several new sentences, on a fresh piece of paper.

Still reeling emotionally from his recent break-up, Damien’s long session of dejected moping atop his bed, was interrupted by the ringing of his cell phone. Answering the phone, he was greeted by the voice of his recently parted girlfriend, asking if they could give their love another shot.

Justin looked at the words, smiled, and raced from the bedroom, eager to see how the story would finish.