I was born as Jesse Grohl, another slave to their torment. I am not that man now, I am far from it; I am not the pretender. I was a famous hip-hop star before my mind started to wander. I spent most of my time drinking, getting high, and having sex with what ever girls I wanted. That’s exactly what I sang about. I was a preacher, preaching that the life I had was the best. I was wrong.
I found the truth by accident, well, almost by accident. I was looking for the truth, but I wasn’t looking to see the shadows rise up and control people. Most people look at their shadows and think that they control it, but it’s just the opposite. The shadows control us; we mimic its movement. The world is truly backwards. We are all slaves to this torment. You want to see my transformation? Do you want to see the truth as I found it? Then we’re going to go back six months, half a year, to October sixth.
My friend’s birthday had just passed and we spent it drinking and getting high, like every other day. Sounds like a celebration, doesn’t it? Well it wasn’t much of one. I still don’t even know how old he turned that day. I didn’t care back then; it was just another reason to party as I saw it. I don’t even think I know his real name; I just called him “Fox”. The shadows gave me fame, gave me money, gave me power but they couldn’t give me a heart of my own. I only cared for what they did; I was as selfish as them.
October 6th, the day of awakening. As the world fell into a deep slumber, I woke from mine. The very thing that led me to see the truth and fight the lies appeared before me. It was just a story by someone I would have called a “freak show” before. His name was Toby Tessier and he was the first I heard that broke free from the shadows. The story he wrote was of his own. He was born free as a black sheep among white ones. People feared this in him, but then the shadows got to him. He threw his life away, his happiness away, without realizing it. Destiny came calling one day, opening his eyes. He almost lost his life (even if he wasn’t really alive after all) but instead, he broke free from the shadows and became alive. His story showed me the difference between living a life and being alive. Living is just physical, but being alive is something far beyond that, something far beyond the reach of the shadows.
I came across his story by accident. I was bored and my dealer was busy until later that night so I started searching random words up. I got curious about what a black sheep looks like so I looked it up. That’s when I saw, “Black Sheep”, a tale of freedom from the nightmares that haunt us all. At first I clicked on it because I was looking for a good laugh. I later came back to read it over and over again. By my third reading, I came to understand exactly what he was talking about. That’s when I felt the shadow looking over my shoulder, guiding my hand to close the page.
They stood above me, guiding my hand. I knew the truth, and they were afraid. My eyes opened and I saw the darkness creeping towards me. I started fighting their control over me. “No!” I screamed as the darkness begins to consume me, bringing me to my end. My hand broke free, and the darkness retreated. I stood up and tried to walk away, but the weight of it all was just too much for me to handle. I fell to my knees, tears falling down my face. “I almost died.” I muttered to myself repeatedly. But you are not dead. I thought to myself.
I stood up boldly and roared to the world, the train has arrived. “All aboard the freedom train, travelling along the Underground Railroad. We won’t stop until we are free!” I yelled to the world for all to hear. I felt empowered, like I had just broken free from the shackles on my wrists. I would not be the only one freed by Toby Tessier’s story, I had to free others.
The phone rang loudly, and I slowly went to pick it up. “Hello?” I said into the receiver. The room around me suddenly became real, I could see it. The walls were white, pale as a ghost. The room was small, so small that just the auburn desk and chair occupied almost the entire room. The computer sat on top of the desk, a brand new computer with a touch screen monitor. The only light in the room came from the monitor and on the screen was Toby Tessier’s story, “Black Sheep”.
A muffled voice came out of the phone. “It’s me. I got the stuff, you want some?” I scrolled down the page and saw something I missed before. At the end of the story, Toby Tessier left a link to something. He wrote “Listen to these words, my friend.” beside it. I realized who was on the phone and realized what they had said to be something they want me to do. That stuff blinds you, slows you, and binds you to the shadows.
I replied with something I never thought I would have said before. “No, I’ve quit.” Then I hung up without saying goodbye. I already said goodbye to the shadows. I looked back at the computer monitor and decided to click on the link. A video popped up on the screen and at the top of the screen it said, “The Pretender – Foo Fighters”. The guitar started playing and the band members took their positions. The singer began singing.
“Keep you in the dark, you know they all pretend…” I realized that Toby Tessier was not the first to be free from the shadows. The rebels, the outsiders, even the outcasts of society were all free and that’s why we had forsaken them. The shadows wanted us to ignore them, so that they could keep their control over us. I began singing along to the song.
“What if I say I’m not like the others? What if I say I’m not just another one of your plays? You’re the pretender! What if I say I will never surrender?” The men in uniform charged in towards the band and got blasted by some sort of red liquid. I turned up the volume and left the room after I put it on a loop. The song played over and over again as I tore my own house apart. I destroyed everything that represented their hold over me. I grabbed my bong and all the alcohol I had. I charged out my front door to find my red Ferrari F50 parked in front of my massive house. I placed the bottles down and looked long and hard at the bong. It had the shape of a regular bong, but had my face on it. My blood started to boil.
A shattering sound was what came next. The bong collided with the side door of the car and shattered into a million tiny pieces, one for each life I ruined with my blind words. I started throwing all of the bottles at the car like I was a gun shooting bullets, shattering both the bottles and the windows of the car. After there were none left I looked at the car, something bought because they told me to. It was dented and damaged to hell. I looked out past the car and saw my seemingly endless driveway, surrounded by cleanly cut grass, cut by some underpaid person, and saw that despite all that they gave me they really couldn’t give me a heart of my own. A twelve foot gate surrounded the property, my property. No, their property.
“I’m the voice inside your head, you refuse to hear. I’m the face that you have to face, mirroring your stare. I’m what’s left, I’m what’s right, I’m the enemy.” The song sung through my open door. I stormed into my house and found some gasoline. I poured it on everything and took some matches. I lead the trail of gasoline outside and covered their car in it. I lit a match and threw it onto the gasoline. I backed up to watch the whole thing burn. The house burst into flames and the song stopped quickly, on the last line the singer sung. “WHO ARE YOU?” He yelled at me as the house burned to the ground, a mansion reduced to ashes in what felt like seconds.
I started laughing victoriously, and walked away from the things that they had given to me. Sirens sang as the police cars, fire trucks and ambulances came to stop the fire. The red and blue lights tried fighting the fires from the other side of the gate as I walked towards them. They were locked out. The firemen and police were trying to break through the gate without much luck. I stood there on the other side of the gate and smiled at them, then walked away.
-Zero
--------------------------------------------------
This story was indeed inspired by the Foo Fighters' song "The Pretender". Not only was it connected to another story of mine, it is also the first story I have finished in a while. There was a time that I was focusing on my novel that I am working on and I got no short stories done. But then I hit a road block, or a writer's block as we would normally call it. I stopped writing entirely, I actually spent most of my time out with friends or playing video games. I appeared happy, but without the ability to finish a story or even write one, I wasn't really happy. I had to find that inspiration I had back when I was in high school (I graduated this year.) I may be conditioned to slack off in the summer (classical conditioning, something I learned in psychology) and I am more isolated to certain people and environments, but I see no reason why I should have stopped writing. So, as a result, I have decided to stop playing video games as much and spend most of my days writing because that is truly what I love doing. Actually, I'm going into a liberal arts program at heritage college this year. If you don't know what that is, as far as my understanding goes, it's basically english class times a thousand. It is very heavy on reading, writing and philosophy. By the end of the two years I will be spending in this program, I should be able to write thirty page essays easily. Anyways, I feel that I have gone on for long enough.
Until next time, Kuna Zero.
No comments:
Post a Comment