Arturo Ancira G. Mila Mendez, English P5 October 2,132
ICARIUS
I put the rope around my neck. The walls were caving in and it seemed as if the carpet was sliding down through a hole on the floor. Light came in slowly through the windows as if my eyes perceived colors faster than the speed of light. I stood up on the wooden stool and with the rope around my neck I analyzed my life. What it had been, and what it hadn’t been. You see when you are at the edge of life and death you start to wonder;
Were the past 17 years I spend on earth productive?
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My name is Icarius. Life has never been too easy for me; meaning every time a problem gets solved life just sends me another one. But when you are a 17-year-old black kid from the Bronx there’s not much you can do.
It all started when my father came home from rehab, (he is addicted to heroin)
My mother is, and always will be mad at him for making our lives revolve around dirty needles, belt straps and heroin. But there’s not much a women can do when her man tells her he will hurt her if she does not let him stay home again.
After months of thinking my mother was the hero and my father the villain I started wishing the police would have never set my father free. About a month later I found out my mother was pregnant, with the neighbors baby. Her hands are now pretty filthy to me.
It’s been a year since my father came home and in about 3 and half months I’m going to have a half brother, which I’m not sure if I ever want to meet.
Every time my parents have a big a big fight I mark an “X” on my calendar. It’s been a hundred and sixty four days straight where I can hear shouts and things being smashed from their room and all the way to mine.
Honestly it was tearing my chest apart. Just the thought of parents not loving each other hunted my head. I was really feeling the anger inside of me and I know I was just missing a small trigger to let it all out. To bad I did not let it out on them.
“Icarius, I think in would be real good if you stopped talking to me for a few weeks at least.”
This was my girlfriend, Simone. For some reason she felt she needed some space.
“What do you mean Simone? I feel this is perfect, the only thing I ever look forward through during the day, I need to keep seeing you.”
Simone looked at me in disgust and grinned.
“Well, to bad Icarius. I don’t know how I ended up with you but I need a break right now. I need to think things through.”
Sure. Whatever. Think things through. It was that Dylan boy, I was sure of it.
“Whatever Simone you can go to hell!”
I turned around and walked towards the bus stop.
Simone was sticking her middle finger up at me while all of her friends laughed.
All of our problems started ever since my parents stopped getting along with each other. It was as if all their negative energy got transferred to me while I slept, but I did not know how to explain it yet.
I sat on the bus stop bench and pulled a cigarette out from the back of my ear. I lit a match and took a long drag, exhaled and repeated the process over and over again.
It took a couple of cigarettes for the bus to arrive.
After a couple of stops I was finally near the phone booth. I walked down the sidewalk with my hands in my pockets. I opened the booth’s door and he was already there, Marcellus, a tall, black, nasty thug. A friend at school talked me into calling this Marcellus and buying some drugs. I had told my friend how my parent’s fighting is really getting into my head and he said all I needed was some cocaine to get my head cleared.
Marcellus was smoking a funny scented cigarette. I doubt it was a cigarette.
“So how much you want kid?”
My stomach turned and I did not know what to say.
Marcellus exhaled his smoke on my face. Now I was sure that was no tobacco.
“How much money you got on you?” Marcellus asked again.
“I-I got 63 dollars”
Marcellus laughed as if I had just told him a joke.
“I’m serious.”
His check bone hardened and gave me a hard look.
“Are you sure you don’t just want weed? This new stuff get’s you a great hi-“
“Marcellus, I’m serious. Give me as much as I can get with 63 dollars.”
“All right, fine. Just do not tell your brother about this? You listening?”
He put his hood up and looked around.
“Yeah I got you Marcellus, I won’t say a word.”
He looked around and then took out a little bag of white powder out of the hole where the change comes out and put it inside my hoodie’s front pocket.
“Later dawg.”
I was not sure what I was going to do with this bag of cocaine. But it was as if my subconscious self was telling me it would make my problems go away.
There is a limit to what a seventeen year old can take; I did not want to go home not ever, not again. A night before this deal took place my parents had this huge fight about who was going to keep me when they can afford a divorce. I do not want to live with my mom, if she was not loyal to my father why would she be loyal to me. And I definitely do not want to be with my dad. He’s a lousy good for nothing junkee who only looks out for his best interest. I told them that. My mother cried and my father beat me down. That is why I have a black eye and some bruises on the back of my neck. The next morning I go to my school (which of course only had a ratio of 20:1 white and black kids) and my girlfriend does not want to talk to me. It is as if all my problems are collapsing on top of me.
“I’m home.”
No body answers but I know they are both there.
I hear the metal hitting against metal from my mom washing the silver wear and I hear the television on and the crunching of cheetos, which I know, is my dad.
“Hey Icarius do you have ten dollars I can borrow?” My dad asks dropping the remote control to the ground.
“Nope. Not right now, sorry dad.”
“What the hell do you mean no? I raised you and I have worked day and night to feed you so you can disagree to lend me ten dollars?”
He stood up and was approaching me with a menacing face. He had a cheese stained tank top and some striped underwear.
“D-Dad calm down I can get you ten dollars j-just relax plea-“
He pushed me against the wall.
My mother just kept on washing dishes and silver wear.
“Give me a god damned ten dollar bill right this second.”
He pulled out his switchblade and started playing with it as if to scare me more.
“Su- sure dad whatever”
I walked to my room and pulled out some cash from my boot under my bed.
“How much you got in that boot?”
Oh, god. As if I did not hate him enough I wanted to kill him, I wanted to exterminate him, so see him cry with pain but there is this thin barrier between love and hate that will not let you hurt those you love. It is as if I either did what he said because that was my way of telling him I loved him or because he had a switchblade with him and he wouldn’t hesitate to slit my throat.
“I have 126 dollars and 15 cents.”
“Jenna!”
I heard the crashing of silver wear against the sink.
“What do you want?”
She yelled from the kitchen.
“Guess who is paying the rent for the next three months?”
He scratched his butt and looked at me with a twisted smile.
“Give them to me kid.”
I bent down, grabbed the boot and smacked my father in the face with it.
He crashed to the wall and then to the floor. 20-dollar bills were flying all over the place and my dad was just snoring. My mom kept washing the dishes and I locked my self inside my room.
I felt this burn inside my body. This force pulling my right side apart from my left side and I did not know what to do. I felt as if I was Earth and suddenly the Moon decided to float on away from me, but it was my, Earth’s, fault.
I grabbed the bag of cocaine and set it on my desk. I had researched earlier that day what the effects were and how much the dose should be. What I should have researched was if it was really worth it.
I poured a line of white powder on my bed and straightened it with my Sam’s Club membership card. I took a deep breath, and snorted the line.
Where was I? I did not know
Time was moving fast
I had a feeling the world was vast
Like a cat in outer space
My heart pumped faster
Than it’s usual pace
As I inhaled air
Stars came in through me nose
It was god’s way of being fair
If this effects were permanent
But I knew what this was
This was too good to be true
Simone, forever and ever
I’ll crave you
I woke up with my check against the carpet. I could feel the carped marked on my face. I had passed out but I did not know for how much time. I felt this deep and eternal sadness inside this cocoon I call my body. How could I be so stupid to think drugs could fix this? It was sadness I had never experienced, sadness I believe no man has ever encountered with. Any man but me, Icarius, the seventeen year old nothing. I stood up and felt as if gravity was rotating from the floor to the wall to the ceiling. I sensed the emptiness all through this house; it was completely silent except for the television. From what I could make from the sounds I believe the Looney Toons were on.
I walked towards the closet door and grabbed the rope I had hidden behind my 9th grade graduation gown.
I made the knot and tied it to a bar I had on my bathroom that I used to use to make pull-ups.
I put the rope around my neck. The walls were caving in and it seemed as if the carpet was sliding down through a hole on the floor. Light came in slowly through the windows as if my eyes perceived colors faster than the speed of light. I stood up on the wooden stool and with the rope around my neck I analyzed my life. What it had been, and what it hadn’t been. You see when you are at the edge of life and death you start to wonder; Were the past 17 years I spend on earth productive?
I grabbed a stool and stood on top of it. I took a deep breath and exiled.
Was it really worth it? Was it I thinking or was it the drugs? Why did I think these sensations would make me feel normal?
I put my hands against me face and let out a cry of desperation.
What the hell was I thinking?
I ripped the rope out of my neck and packed my stuff.
I picked up all the money that had rained on the floor and put it in my backpack.
I opened my door and saw my mom watching television and my dad passed out on the floor.
I walked to the door and locked eyes with my mother.
“Goodbye and good riddance.”
I walked into the cold and for once I did not think of nobody else except for me.
For once I couldn’t care less what my parents life is and was been.
For once I knew I couldn’t let anybody else’s problems influence me ever again.
For once I did not care to comeback home ever again.
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