Distorted Memories Of A Scarred Soul

Sunlight glimmering in the waters of a lake. Its beams like warm kisses on his skin. The laughter of his siblings filled the air. Yet soon enough, in the mind of a child the bright colors of the sun and the sky would turn grey and eerie silence would fill everything.


-

“I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry” he sobbed and cried. His voice a mix of him as a child and as an adult. No one would answer.

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It was awfully exciting to walk these streets he had only heard of. The poor side of the city. It certainly did not smell good. Was it always this tiring to run? and so painful? Perhaps it was the sickness making everything difficult.

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“Percy?” Someone called and eyes fluttered open to be met with grey skies. It’s going to rain. He glanced towards the familiar voice. Their face distorted as if scratched out of a picture. Guilt and pain dances together ever so closely and intimate.

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A woman and a young boy, holding hands as they looked at the paintings on the wall. Later that day he would show his parents a drawing he drew himself. He then would go on to paint and continue to do so for some years. Perhaps that moment in the gallery was when he fell in love with creating.

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“You should stop focusing on such a useless hobby, it’s time better spent studying for when you take over the company” harsh words ringing in his ears as pieces of paper fluttered around him like ash after a forest fire.

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“Art is beauty, never forget that, every painting and every sculpture is a piece of the artist’s soul, Perseus” he had never heard his mother speak of something with such warmth. She looked truly beautiful with that smile. He wanted to paint it. Put his love for his mother on a piece of paper so she too could see how pretty she was in his eyes.

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Fire burned through him, setting him ablaze from the inside. He had screamed and cried in pain the first time. A sister’s terrified eyes made him bite his tongue and stay silent the next time. It hurt more for each time he caught the fever.

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A breeze caressed his hair and skin as it went by. The grass swaying to the unsung melody of nature. Distorted figures sat in the meadow, almost like the hollow spots of a picture when you cut something out of it.

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Death follows his steps, it sleeps in his shadow. At one point it was a knife of guilt, the next it was a comforting friend, now it’s haunting him in his dreams.

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Anger fueled his movements. The pain spreading from his knuckles as a promise. The punch to the face even more so. The fighting was his way to punish himself. Raindrops would kiss his bruised face as he sat there in the alley, his clothes soaked through. The man that showed up made him use his anger for something better.

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The man he saw as his mentor, the last connection to-, was gone. The adults in their life, the ones that made things running, gone. Just like that and they no longer existed and responsibility fell on their young shoulders. It was his turn to be the protector.

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Eternal slumber finds him, he never expected to wake up again.