Empty Shriek of Siren

Tick, tock, tick, tock. An empty room of icy air. A room, left behind, without its owner. Three days have past since her death. Yes, her death. Just in case you haven’t realized yet, she’s a dead girl now – cold and still beneath the very ground you are standing on – all because of YOU. Or me. Or both. Whatever. I was, at least I think I was, her friend.

We were neighbors ever since I moved to this town. We were 5 years old – young and naïve. She first gave me a hand, when I was sitting alone in the corner of the playground. I would come over to her house after school, munching chocolate chip cookies and jumping around on the trampoline. We would roll around her bed, even when it got small for the two of us to fit in. All those sweet memories swirling around the empty room, and boom. Just the ticking of that old stupid table clock, is the only thing that reminds me the cold reality.

She wrote stuff. Poems, novels, short stories… But she would never show me any one of her works. I gave her a typewriter I found in one of the garage sales I’ve passed by for her sweet sixteen. It’s still there, on the corner of her desk, clean and tidy as usual. She would lie on her couch, with her pillow on her back, typing something. The clicking of the old typewriter, and a cheerful ding. I would try to peek on her writings, and she would smirk at me and put it away.

Now I can see her pieces. No peeking, no smirks. No more clicking or dinging. Just blank paper with ink blots and scribbles. She wrote a poem. At least she tried to. She couldn’t put an end to her piece. Blocks of stanzas, was all that she has left. Such a gift, wow. Thanks.

Empty shriek of siren penetrated the white

gleaming red befouled the blankness

as there was none but light

when I stood amongst loneliness.

Escape, a scream from the middle of the room

the movie goes on, a black and white story

old Hollywood drama of a bride and groom

that makes my heart throb in all its glory.

I don’t remember why we stopped talking. We went to the same school. We didn’t really have classes together though. I was a biochemistry nerd, and she was a literature geek. A nerd and a geek, what a fantastic duo. She had her own friend group, and I had mine. I still murmured hellos as we passed by in the hallway. She used to smile back, but then she stopped all of a sudden.

I didn’t hang out with her as often. To tell the truth, we seldom did. I never knew she was lonely. She never asked me out. NEVER. I blamed her, that it was all her fault that we don’t talk anymore. Mom would ask me if we would go camping with her family, and I said no. I made up silly excuses.

“Mom, I have homework. Mom, I told you I was going to Courtney’s that day.”

Mom, mom, mom, mom. And my ridiculousness reached its peak.

“MOM, I don’t hang out with her anymore. She hates me. Just leave me alone.”

“Don’t ask me why. Ask her. It’s her who started it.”

It wasn’t really you. It was me. I didn’t have the gut to reach out. Like that first day in kindergarten, I wanted you to reach me first. Stupid, stupid, me.

Love is the knife I turn inside myself,

but life is the rope I hang by tight

hoping that you'll see yourself

as I wander by day and night.

Empty shriek of siren penetrated blank space.

I try not to care, but approach upon the window.

Looking out with a blind hope, and something...

Damn.

Damn. Damn. Damn. You could have told me. You could have reached me out. Sorry. Sorry for being a bystander. Sorry for not looking into your mind. Sorry for all you had to go through. Sorry for not acting out. Sorry for leaving you alone. Sorry for everything. If only, if only we could go back in time…

A limousine with a newly wed couple crashed -

ambulance rush, and there is Red.

A color so vivid that makes me astonished

while there still is that couple smiling in the old drama.

There was red. Red everywhere. Crimson flashed and sifted around your feeble, floating body. Red spots stained the floor. Red overflowing its container. And there you were, dressed in white, stained in red. A meager smile worn on your sweet face. That smile, that you have never shown for two years since sixteen.

I screech out at the sweet couple, 

tears rolling down the cheeks as they stab my heart

encompasses my senses as the scene double,

as it fades off into the dark.

I screamed. Something blurred my sight. Maybe it was steam. Maybe it was tears. And everything blackened out.

Empty shriek of siren penetrated nothing.

Love was the knife I turned inside myself,

and life was a rope I have previously hung,

yet all are

Gone. Like you were. Gone and lost, forever. You never finished that sentence. Maybe because you knew what you would do when you finished it. Empty shrieks, Emily. Never heard your shrieks, although it was so vividly alert. It was me. It was me blind.

Emily.