Monday, February 2, 2009
The Balance
By Elizabeth Sweet
The cold December night air rushed over her face; her short, dark brown hair stinging her ice blue eyes. She looked around at her bleak gray surroundings. She sat on the cold cement, trying to remember anything she could about what had happened, but nothing came to mind. Suddenly, a barrage of images flashed in her mind rapidly. She fell forward onto her knees, grasping her head in her hands; her mind being rushed with unwelcome painful images.
She clinched her eyes so tight that all presence of the dim alleyway light was eliminated. In her mind, pictures of sterile white rooms, metal bars, hospital gowns, and files flashed by at rapid speed. Her ears were filled with the imaginary voices hundreds of people whispering, “Lucy…Lucy…”
Overwhelmed, she rocked back and forth, trying to shut it all out. That name resonated in her ears. She couldn’t grasp any of these memories, but clung to this name; it had to be hers. Lucy slowly released her hands from around her head as the images eased and then faded completely. She looked around at her surroundings. A few apartment buildings with dirty windows, an empty city street, and three or four street vendors. There were people walking up and down the sidewalk, but she didn’t recognize any of them.
She walked down the alleyway towards the opening that met up with the sidewalk. It was dark, but the streetlights provided dim guidance. She gazed up at the night sky; it’s darkness softened by a blanket of smog and city lights and the stars nearly invisible. As she passed by the people traveling down the street she bumped arms with a passer-by. He was tall and masculine, with short grayish black hair. He had scowled down at her as if she had hit him on purpose. He stood there with a displeased expression, but Lucy didn’t feel as if she needed to linger around any longer.
She looked at the ground and started walking briskly away. Suddenly, she felt a rough hand grab her arm. She whirled around to see the tall man, seething, looking like the devil himself. She tried to escape his firm grasp but it was no use. She tried to yell for help but the second she opened her mouth her head was instantly flooded with the incapacitating memories again. This time flashes of handcuffs, men in white lab coats, and more sterile white rooms with barred windows passed through her mind.
Her eyes were clinched tight, and the only thing she could hear amidst the haunting whispers in her head was the muffled, distorted, voice of her aggravator, yelling at her to respond. The voice slowly got quieter, and it seemed to be joined by another voice; a female voice. She felt the hand release from her arm and she dropped to the hard cement. She instantly grabbed her head and cradled it in her hands, rocking back and forth, trying to shut out the voices and images. She could no longer hear the man’s voice, or the whispering. Instead, she heard the faint noise of a girl talking to her.
Slowly she regained consciousness and released her hands from around her head. She opened her eyes with hesitation, only to be met by the dark blue eyes of a girl similar to her own age. The girl’s platinum blonde hair shined in the streetlights like a white halo. She smiled sweetly and offered Lucy a hand. Lucy accepted it and slowly got up to her feet. “My name’s Mariko,” the blonde girl said, “I noticed that you looked like you could use some help.”
Lucy’s heart stopped when she heard that name. It was so unusual, but yet so familiar. She snapped out of it and shook Mariko’s hand. The bustle of people walking down the street had subsided to one or two occasional homeless people. Mariko retracted her hand and asked sweetly, “So, what’s your name?”
Lucy stammered, “Um…Uh…Lucy?” She looked at the ground.
Mariko giggled, “You aren’t sure??” She put her hands in the pockets of her jacket.
Lucy’s cheeks flushed red, and then she looked around and realized there was no sign of the intimidating man from earlier. She whirled around, surprisingly concerned at the lack of signs of his existence. She looked down the alleyway that she was standing by, but there was no man. She paused, breathing heavily, wondering how long she had been in a catatonic state. She was unconsciously panting for breath and looking extremely panicked. Lucy quickly remembered Mariko standing a few feet behind her and whipped around to see her looking down at an angle, her eyes covered by her hair, a grim smile on her face.
“There’s no need to worry,” she said, her sweetly macabre appearance unchanging, “he won’t bother you again.” She giggled.
Lucy was almost taken aback by the way that she spoke, so sweetly and elegantly. Lucy remained silent, staring at Mariko, who had yet to lift her gaze. “What did she mean?” she thought, “So there was a man?”
Lucy shook her head, knocking her hair back off of her face. Silently, Mariko turned and started to walk away. Lucy felt the urge to follow her, but couldn’t explain why; after all…she was a stranger. Suddenly, Mariko stopped in her tracks and turned her shoulder towards Lucy, without making eye contact, and offered a hand. “Come with me,” she said.
Lucy remained silent, she didn’t know if she could trust Mariko, or if she could trust anyone. She didn’t even know what had happened to her up to this point in her life, except for some painful mental patchwork that had yet to be deciphered. There was an inner struggle, but eventually the curiosity got the best of her and she followed Mariko, but kept her hand in her jean pockets, not accepting Mariko’s hand.
They walked, in silence, down toward the end of a dimly lit alley. Lucy kept walking briskly, and then noticed that she didn’t hear Mariko’s footsteps anymore. She whisked around, expecting to see Mariko, but she saw nothing. There was no one in the alley with her. Her thoughts raced, “Did she leave me here in the alley?” “Did the man come back for her?” “Where did she go?”
So called out Mariko’s name, but there was no answer. She quickly observed all of her surroundings, an instinct she couldn’t explain. There was a thick atmosphere of angst and fear in that alley. She quickly scanned the ground and the walls; she was next to an old doll shop with a dirty window and a cement apartment building. All of the sudden, her ears were filled with the whispers again. She spun around, examining every dark corner and crevasse of the alley. Suddenly, the whispers quieted as she heard heavy footsteps approaching.
She could tell they weren’t Mariko’s. They were too heavy, and too brisk. And wait; there were two sets of footsteps? She braced herself, looking for an exit, but the closest thing to an entrance or an exit was the dirty window of the old doll shop. As the footsteps approached, she saw two shadows materialize at the end of the alley. Then suddenly, from the direction of the shadows, she heard voices, similar to the voices in her head, calling, “Lucy…Lucy…”
She stumbled backwards, horrified, and tried to make out the figures. She froze as she recognized one of the figures as the man from earlier. He smiled grimly and pulled out a gun. The other figure was a tall, stout man in a white lab coat. At the sight of his white lab coat, Lucy’s head was once again flooded with the images from before.
Hear head flooded with emotions and she stumbled backwards and fell back on her arms. She scrambled to her knees, holding her hand over her mouth to keep herself from screaming. As the two men walked towards her, the man in the lab coat straightened his glasses and took a pair of handcuffs out of his pocket. Lucy gasped and shuffled backwards as fast as she could, not knowing how much alleyway she had left. Suddenly, she backed into a pair of legs and quickly looked up. It was Mariko. She gasped, “But how?” she thought as she stood up quickly and took a step back.
Mariko stared at the ground in front of her, her sickly sweet smile still glued to her delicate face. At this point, Lucy didn’t know whether Mariko was going to help her, or pull out a knife and stab her point blank. Then Mariko giggled and pointed at the two men walking slowly in their direction, “They can’t hurt you if you hurt them first…” she continued to smile as she pulled a gun out of her pocket.
Lucy froze and sucked in air through her fingers. She could never kill another human being…could she? Her heart raced as Mariko tossed the gun in her direction. Mariko giggled again, never lifting her eyes, “It might not kill them,” she said sweetly, “it might just hurt them enough to give you a chance to escape…it might not. But they’re going to hurt you. You don’t want that. Do you?”
Lucy’s eyes filled with hot tears, brought on by fear and adrenaline. Her eyes were wide and burned as the cold wind whipped her hair in her eyes. She stared at the gun, not Mariko, trembling as thoughts raced through her mind. Almost on cue, her ears filled with the haunting whispers again. This time, the whispers were joined with the voices of the men, and Mariko. All of them chanting, “Lucy…Lucy…”
The men got closer and closer, and Lucy heard the man in the overcoat cock his gun. She looked up at their faces, both of them dark and sadistic looking, with their grim smiles. Then she looked at Mariko, who still looked at the ground, her smile equally grim. Sweat ran down Lucy’s face, even though the weather outside was freezing, and the sound of her heart pounding almost drowned out the voices. She struggled to swallow and looked back and forth between the gun, the men, and Mariko.
The men got closer and closer, and Lucy felt her hand shaking as she held the cold gunmetal inside of her fingers. She closed her eyes tight, “You don’t want to do this,” she thought, “You wouldn’t take another person’s life…”
Her eyes opened as she heard Mariko’s voice, “They’re going to hurt you Lucy…hurt them first so they can’t hurt you…”
Lucy’s head was rushed with every thought, feeling, image, and emotion she could imagine. She turned towards the men, leaning on the dirty doll store window for support because her legs felt like they could give out beneath her at any moment. She slowly lifted the gun towards the men as she looked at the ground. The hot tears still streamed down her face, completely torn. She might miss, she might hurt them enough to escape, or she might kill them…none of those options seemed any better than the one before it.
She put her finger on the trigger and all at once the whole alley fell silent. She saw the men freeze and the voices in her head stopped. The thoughts that were whirling in her head ceased completely and it was almost surreal. Lucy felt like she was in a void, with nothing but the gun and the two men, who she believed wanted to do her great harm. She turned around to look at Mariko one last time, to give her enough reassurance that she was about to do the right thing by pulling the trigger. She gasped when she didn’t see anyone in the alley behind her. She pushed hard away from the dirty window and whirled around, looking everywhere for Mariko.
Mariko was nowhere to be found. Then out of the silence, Lucy heard her voice, coming from the direction of the doll shop window, “Lucy, do it. You know you want to. You don’t just want to, you have to. They want to hurt you.”
Lucy trembled and slowly took a step towards the window. Her hand shook as she reached towards it; Mariko’s voice continued as Lucy gently wiped the dirt and dust off of the window. Lucy’s mouth dropped and she staggered back, as she saw the reflection in the window. It was Mariko, still talking to her. She was Mariko. Mariko was the side of her that would do anything to survive, anything in her best interest, no matter how wrong it was…her evil side.
Lucy stumbled back and slipped on the slippery cement, hitting her head on the apartment wall behind her. She lay on the cold ground, the light slowly fading, and the sound of footsteps approaching again. As her eyes slowly closed, she saw the two men standing above her and heard the click of handcuffs.
Later, Lucy opened her eyes slowly, to be greeted by piercing rays of sunlight. She sat up straight and looked around. She looked down at the hospital gown she was wearing, and at the sterile white walls. She looked at the bars on the window, and the people walking around outside her room in white lab coats. She got up and looked out the window sighed as she read the sign outside on the lawn that read “New York Institute for the Mentally Unstable”. She sat back on her plain white bed, and knew she was home.
