Page Four: Depression
“This is your seventh consecutive novel to hit
number one as soon as it was published. How do you feel to have
obtained such a success, and at such a young age too?”
Gon remembered that his pager vibrated silently
then, as soon as the talk show host had asked him that simple
question. “Well, I don’t really know.” Gon had laughed as he
answered, his mind still thinking about the pager as he talked.
Nobody knew his pager number except for Kara, and she wouldn’t
bother him now unless it was an emergency.
Right after the show, he had called the number his
pager recorded. He had cried loudly when he received the news,
when he had heard about her jump into the subway lights. The
colors had slowly faded away then, until they became no more
than the bland ones he saw now, the ones that weren’t even worth
mentioning at all.
That was what went though his mind as he heard about Danny’s
death on the news. “Danny Naoieurth, age fifty-five, was
murdered along with his family in their New York apartment.”
That was how the news anchorwoman had described it, as Danny’s
tired face was shown on the corner of the television screen,
before the camera jumped into a recorded footage of the inside
of Danny’s home, showing the police trying to keep the cameras
out of the crime place.
“The police found fingerprints and hair strands, yet could not
match them to any person…” The anchorwoman had continued, but
Gon could hear her no more, as his heart beat faster and faster,
one thing capturing all the senses of his mind. The dirty walls
of the apartment were filled with phrases, repeating themselves
over and over again, painted in the bloods of the dead: “tHE
HeavEns anD Hells aRe Full, now tHE stoRiEs aRE tHE sPiRits only
ReFuGE”.
* * * * * *
Danny’s death
didn’t exactly devastate Gon, yet it shocked him. He skipped
school for a few days after Danny’s death was announced on the
eleven o’clock news. Gon just sat around his house, thinking
about Danny, and how he was the one who published Gon’s first
works, and made Gon the famous writer he was now. Gon didn’t
know whom to call, considering that he didn’t have to consolate
Danny’s wife and children, for they too were murdered along
Danny, and Danny didn’t have any other relatives besides them.
Danny was an orphan, left on the footsteps of a New York church,
never knowing who or why they had left him there. It was pretty
impressive the way Danny had fought from being an abused child
in the orphanage, to the powerful publisher and agent that he
was before his death. Yet Gon didn’t know if what Danny had told
him before, about his hardships before becoming an agent, were
true or not, for Danny was just that kind of a person. You never
knew if he told you the truth or not. He was just that kind of a
guy.
Lynn came to Gon’s home more often now than before, ever since
Danny’s death was announced officially on television screens
around the country. She comforted Gon with soft words and warm
hugs, kisses on the forehead that encouraged him to leave behind
his sadness, and concentrate on what he was doing. He was
writing the untitled, and he was going to finish it.
The untitled
has now slowly progressed into a dramatic romance novel. The
story now had Gon Guree meet a girl named Kara White, a girl
whose beauty captivated Guree’s every feelings. As much as Guree
was in love with her, he couldn’t bring himself to tell her
about it. Yet, she became a new inspiration for Guree, who were
now fueled by the power of love, and using that power, he
started to write romance stories. The stories were themselves a
reflection of Guree’s fantasy, and of how he dreamed his weird
love relationship might end. Some of them ended in tragedies,
with either the main female character dying, or the main male
character confessing his love in his dying breath. Yet, some of
them were melodramatic ones, where they both live happily ever
after, or at least know what the other one really feels.
Lynn was
kind and unselfish throughout Gon’s depression about Danny’s
death. If it weren’t for her, he probably wouldn’t have been
able to continue with the untitled, and lost his writings once
again to sadness and depression. Gon wasn’t sure about it, yet
he felt like he was falling in love with her.
She insisted to go with him to Danny’s funeral in
New York, and Gon was fine with that, for he didn’t want to be
away from her either. The drive to New York and the funeral
itself didn’t impact Gon as much as he thought it would. Maybe
because Lynn was there to comfort him, to accompany him.
Danny had a pretty nice funeral, his pale body in a shiny wooden
casket, rainbow-colored flowers surrounded him with floral
perfumes, as if to cover up the odor that will slowly decay out
of him. Gon didn’t cry in the funeral, even though he thought
that he should, for everybody should at least shed a tear for
every death of a human being. Yet he couldn’t, he didn’t know
why, or what to do about it. Every one who attended the funeral
was either workers from the publishing company, or authors that
Danny was an agent to. There were no friends, or people who
cared enough to just come to honor his death. There were just
people meeting here because they had to, and because of this, no
love or grief were felt in the room. Just presences, presences
that occupied a space in a room, something that could happen
anywhere, no unique feelings for this man. Danny was nothing
more than a statue to watch.
“I
heard that his wife and kids are gonna have their funerals
somewhere else.” Gon heard someone whisper in the bench behind
him, a man’s voice that he did not recognize as someone he knew
or remembered.
“Guess no one wants to be with Danny,” some other unidentifiable
male voice responded, also in a whisper, to the comment made
from the other guy. “Or be affiliated with him, even after
they’re dead, huh?”
Silent snickers, silent chuckles. Probably from voices that
didn’t match their face. Everyone was such a hypocrite.
Everyone seemed
to be in the funeral for the free food, for everyone started to
leave after the food was gone. Gon including. There wasn’t
really anything about Danny that could be said or told, anything
good or appropriate that is. Danny just died a shell of a man,
someone that nobody understood or knew, someone that nobody
cared. Gon only looked back once at the casket, and there he
didn’t see Danny at all, but just a casket and some flowers.
“Let’s go.” Was all that Lynn had to say to get him going, for
there really wasn’t anything to hold him there. Danny wasn’t
anyone important in his life, Gon realized that now, just some
person he met during the course of his life.
“Yeah, let’s.” Gon replied, as they headed out of the
white-walled church, heading back toward the Empire Hotel, the
place they were staying at during this brief visit to New York.
“You see,
there are three kinds of writers: The ones who write for money,
the ones who write because it gives them joy, and the ones who
write because they’re forced to.”
Nate had cried that out in some Christmas party, as
Kara rested her head on Gon’s jeans-covered legs, drinking
eggnog out of a cocktail glass. “’Forced to’?” Gon had replied
as he relaxed on the creamy green couch. “What do you mean by
‘forced to’?”
“The writers who are forced to write are those who
get these flashes of scenes and images in their minds, bits and
bits of character that pops out into the writer’s mind. Over a
period of time, the bits and scenes slowly join together to form
a story and a world in the writer’s mind. Now, the writer can’t
get all these images out of his mind, and because of them, he or
she can’t feel peaceful or in control. So, in order to get them
out of his mind, he is forced to write them down on paper, to
which the images translate to, and they leave his mind.”
“That sounds just like Gon,” Kara giggled as she
said this, finishing the last of her eggnog. “He’ll get hyper
once he’s got a story in his mind, and he won’t stop until he’s
finished putting it all into paper, even if it is at three in
the morning.”
“That’s great, Gon!” Nate yelled out as he let out a
drunken laugh. “That’s the true writer’s instinct, that’s what
separates a true writer from the rest.”
That was the last time Gon had seen Nate alive. The
next time he saw him, it would be at his funeral. An automobile
accident had taken away his life.
The
rain woke Gon up a little now, the coldness dispelling the cloud
inside his mind. The scenes had returned once again, images of
the untitled, characters that spoke on their own, as soon as his
pen touched the blank pages of a notebook. He was now writing
once again, the relationship between Lynn and him had given him
the strength to continue. Just as the wizard had said before,
Lynn was now his new charm.
Yet, he felt no joy throughout the month, as he continued to
work on the untitled. In the past, he always felt a lot of
happiness when he was writing, as if the creations of new worlds
and characters fueled his heart, making him feel as if he’d
accomplished something. That wasn’t the feeling that the
untitled gave him. He felt more and more depressed as each page
was completed, sadness that not even Lynn could take away. The
untitled only made Gon think of Kara, of all the times they had
spend together, or the way her blonde hair used to wave in the
summer winds.
He
didn’t even have a title yet, the words Untitled still
staying on the top of the first page. “The only reason
that your story is without a title,” Nate had said once, “is
because it’s unfinished. If your story is truly finished, then a
title should easily surface into your mind.”
Maybe Nate was right. The untitled truly was unfinished, for the
images and scenes have not yet revealed the ending of the piece,
but only gave him enough information to continue onto the next
page.
“Gon…”
The
whisper startled Gon under the rain. He looked around for the
source of the voice. He was still
alone on the
roof of the Empire Hotel, nobody to be seen anywhere in the
falling drops of rain. Maybe Danny’s funeral tired me more
than I thought, Gon wondered as he looked down from the roof
again. Everybody seemed so fake when you watched them from the
thirty-fifth floor of any hotel. He should be resting up now.
Tomorrow was going to be a long trip home.
“Gon… It’s me…”
The
voice came around again, as Gon let out a scared gasp, his eyes
looking around. Nobody else was there with him.
“Gon…”
That’s when he saw her, on the far corner of the roof, standing
barefoot on the concrete roof. “Gon…” She whispered, a smile
drawn up on her face, the long blonde hair dancing in the
pounding rain. Gon felt his breathings get faster and faster,
heavier with each intake of air. It was Kara, her blue eyes
still smiled in the way they always did. The white robe she was
wearing seemed to shine off in the gray day. Her arms now slowly
raised, signaling him to get closer to her, to be with her, to
smell her scent again.
Gon
felt his body involuntarily walk toward her, slowly, as if
floating in a dream. He didn’t know what to think anymore. He
didn’t care. “Come with me, Gon…” Her beautiful voice called out
to him as he followed her, her figure moving away from him.
She
seemed to walk on the air, effortlessly, floating on some unseen
bridge. Gon was now at the edge of the roof, looking down at all
the fake-looking people walking along the soaking-wet streets.
“Come with me, Gon…” Her right hand extended out toward him,
white skin inviting him to take it, for them to be together
again.
Gon
felt the raindrops falling on his skin, as he raised his right
hand, ready to take it, not caring anymore.
“Gon!”
His
head snapped around when he heard another voice, a familiar one,
yelling at him from some other end of the roof. He saw Lynn,
waving at him from the exit of the roof, smiling under her
rainbow-colored umbrella. Gon quickly looked back to where his
eyes had been. She was gone. Kara was no longer there.
“So here you
are.” Lynn’s voice approached him as he slowly backed away from
the edge. “I couldn’t find you anywhere. I was starting to get
worried.”
Gon
saw that her smile dropped once he had turned toward her, and
was replaced by a worried expression on her face. He just looked
at her in silence, confusion and fear reflected in his eyes.
“Gon, are you okay? You look so pale…” She asked in a worried
voice, as she quickly neared him to cover him under the
umbrella’s reach.
He
cracked. He didn’t know why, it just happened then, as he
quickly embraced Lynn, tighter, tears sliding down his cheeks,
no longer able to hold them back. “I don’t know anymore, Lynn!”
He cried as he held her tighter, his body shaking as sobs rose
out from underneath him. “I think I am losing my mind…” |
