Hearts Beat Strong
B.M. Fischer
Copyright 2014 B. M. Fischer,
All rights reserved.
Published in eBook format by eBookIt.com
ISBN-13: 978-1-4566-2346-3
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.
Blessed eternity, hold me strongly in your beautiful hands
Fill me with all that is joyous and sparked with creation
Guide my words with the message
And open their eyes so that they may see it
I love, I love
All, which is Good, God, and Love
Chapter I
Gabriel
My name is Gabriel, after the archangel, the voice and messenger of God. I find the idea humorous and laugh audibly to the surrounding silence.
“Fuck God.” My voice sounds out, in the new deeper tones of a seventeen year old kid. What a joke. My father made us go to church when we were little. He stopped at some point; probably when my sister and I began visibly sleeping in the pews during the Sunday sermon.
I’m sitting in my truck, parked at the edge of a pond. The pond was built for stormwater management for the suburban neighborhood being built around it. A few cookie-cutter houses stand, but the development is only a fraction completed. Because of the real estate crash, all construction has halted: a failing of finances. Now the daydream of record profits from the American middle class has turned into an unintended green space; perfect for white-tailed deer, raccoons, or a teenage boy in desperate need of isolation.
She’s the only one for me. She fills my heart where it’s cracked. She knows me more than anyone else. And she wants to break up. Throw it all away. I let one slow tear drip down my face as I stare at it in the mirror. I relish the sadness. If she sees how destroyed I am, she’ll take me back.
I put a cigarette in my mouth and study myself in the mirror. Fuck everything and the world. I look out to the street near where I’m parked and see a car slow down as it passes. It’s being driven by a forty-something year old woman in an SUV. She’s probably a mother of two; a housewife who plays tennis and stays tan and in shape for her husband. Her husband’s probably an attorney or an accountant, a professional who makes money. At least she thinks so. Little does she know, her vehicle is financed, her lovely home is financed, and her husband is so close to defaulting on his mortgage that the suit he puts on every day is little more than a slave’s rags. Quiet desperation, a subtle form of suffering, persists throughout American middle class suburbia.
Darkness falls and the summer air cools down after a long, hard day. The smoke from my cigarette flows out slowly and predictably into the ether. It grazes my skin slightly. Its smooth touch sends vibrations of suicidal ecstasy through me. There are frogs chirping in the adjacent water body. The chorus members of the family hylidae have the sole life purpose of singing pleasantly lonely songs, perfect for the forlorn fools with broken hearts. No one stops to listen anymore, which is why amphibians will be the first taxa to go.
Everything will go, as we slowly realize that there is no God. The summer air picks up and blows a single breeze, moving my shaggy brown hair and caressing me slightly. I think of the woman from the SUV, with her husband who went to law school at some prestigious university. He must be so knowledgeable about the laws and bylaws, the constitution, and the inner workings of courtrooms. But even so, the wise will die as the fools do, for all things under the sun are vanity and a chasing of the wind.
I breathe in for a moment and turn the key to start my truck. Smelling cigarettes on my t-shirt, I reach into the back seat for a black can of spray deodorant. I spray it all over myself, concealing my habitual death wish from my parents. During the drive home, I scan the radio for a song that reverberates with me, but nothing will replace the divine chorus men of the incidental pond.
After 6 months, I know that Bella is my true love. She holds onto my hand like she holds onto my heart, firm and forever, fingers laced, so I know that she won’t ever let go; or at least I hope. I have a need and she fills it, at least when she will be with me. I pine for her when she leaves me, and then when she’s back by my side, I’m terrified that she will leave all over again.
We’re sitting in the den of my parent’s house, watching a movie, or pretending to be. The dark room is filled with the bluish tint of a television. We’re watching some fictional story about aliens landing on earth, but I can hardly pay attention. I’m more interested in things that are real, like my love for Bella. I slowly remove my hand from her grasp and wrap my arm around her like an infant. She looks into my eyes and reads my thoughts.
“Does baby want milk?” She whispers to me. The sound of her voice alone sends a blood rush to my groin, and I desire her more than ever.
“Yes” I moan quietly. I kiss slowly down her neck as she pulls down her shirt and removes her breast. With eyes closed, I take her bosom into my lips and begin to nurse from her. I suck for many minutes, taking in her desire to have me; being her possession. I feel OK, and after moments start to move my hand to between her thighs. She grabs my forearm slightly, and I push on just a little further. She then grasps her nails into my skin, drawing blood from more than one spot on my arm.
“What?” I ask, not understanding what the problem is.
“I just want to do something for you.” I explain. She looks into my eyes and I suddenly feel her anger multiply by 6.
“Are you fucking kidding me? Your parents are home.” She says to me in a quietly aggressive voice. This makes no sense. My parents have been asleep for hours. We’ve had sex plenty of times after they go to bed. Responding to her anger however, my face becomes apologetic. I’m fearful of what she might do. She continues.
“You want your parents to hate me. You want your Dad to think I’m a whore.” She tells me in a forceful tone. Attempting to pacify her, I respond.
“No, sweet heart. They don’t think that. They-” She slaps me hard in the face and pushes me off of her. By the time I’ve regained myself, she’s exiting the door to the den and marching towards our front door. I pursue her. Fear wedges daggers into the cracks of my heart.
My eyes are blurred by tears and my ears are filled with screams as we race in her car down the neighborhood streets. The roads are lit periodically by street lamps, and I see the fronts of houses that face the black asphalt path. She’s speeding recklessly, and I welcome it. This is how our love is, and I need it.
She whips into a vacant lot, fishtailing through the grass. We get out simultaneously and she continues to yell at me.
“Do you even fucking love me? You just say it. You just say it and don’t know what it means: forever. You’re with me forever.” I take in the force of her words and speak with conviction.
“I love you Bella, I love you.” As soon as I get the words out, she shoves me in the stomach away from her. Out of pure raw emotion, I pick up a large downed tree that’s at my feet and throw it. I chase after it and pick it up and throw it again, and again, and again. I feel the muscles pull in my back and I know I am injuring myself, but I don’t care. I am engulfed in desperation, and she sees it, and loves me once more.
She laughs, with 6 distinct giggles. She approaches me, and all I think is how beautiful she is in the dark.
“I love you baby. You are mine. Forever.” She says, as she pulls me into her and kisses me deeply, into my heart, filling the widening cracks.
As