Prodigy

Hey there,

This short story may not be for some readers. it deals with a family's faith being challenged when a teenage girl attempts to commit suicide. Even though this is a work of fiction, depression can lead into suicidal thoughts. These thoughts should not be taken lightly. If you or a loved one is suffering from these thoughts please seek guidance and confide in a friend, family member or spiritual mentor. If you feel the need to talk to someone at any moment, there is a hotline-- National Suicide Prevention Lifeline Phone Number: 1-800-273-8255. For those who want to seek help for their loved ones and don't know where to begin, there is a website that could help. http://www.suicidepreventionlifeline.org/

Remember you are never alone,

<3 ~Ellie~ <3

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Prodigy

Written By Ellie Hart

Copyright © 2105

Bright and warm colors fill my mother’s house as I walk down the hall. I gaze up at the pictures and artwork on the wall. Mom calls Annie’s Heroes-- her students she had helped get into good schools. There are big name artists who got noticed through Mom’s valiant effort to help them achieve their goals. My eyes wander until I came up to his photograph. Dirty blond hair light and green eyes, Ash Jacobson’s crooked smile catches me off guard.I remember this day, it was the last day we spent together before he left for L.A. …

A light flickers at a slightly opened door. “Odd. All I can say is James. Little brother loves to ‘scare’ me. He’s probably playing with the light switch.”

“Oh, little brother,” I call out and stroll over to the door. Pushing the door open readying myself to frighten the little red head, I jump through it. But to my surprise the door isn’t the sitting room, it’s a hospital corridor.

Nurses and Emts rush down the hall, rolling a cot into emergency surgery. “How long was she in the water for?” One of the brunette nurses ask.

“We have no idea. The coastguard said that her friends called 911. Saying she left a video message on one of the social networks,” The Emt hurries his words then through another heated blanket over me.

The crew and the cot passes through my body. I stumble back. My eyelashes blink and frantically pat my jeans and my black cotton shirt. What on earth just happened?

“Annie, how the hell did this one pass by you?” A ginger haired man with deep blue eyes stormed down the hall. His rough hands flexes as they open and close--making fists. His shadow seems to cover the walls.

“Garry, you need to stop pin pointing blame on people, and just be there for your daughter, now.” The beautiful dark brown haired lady with her crystal green eyes delicately dabs the tears away from her eyes.

Arguing with each other and not caring who’s listening or watching, they both pass by me like I wasn’t there. Hey, the oldest child here, who you just ignored because you’re too busy making fools out of yourselves!

“I wonder what got Dad’s blood pressure going?” I sigh. “My mother has always been there for us. I tell her everything. Well almost. I need to break this up before all hell breaks loose.”

I jog up to them in order to settle their tempers or give them a time out. My brother James and I used to say timeout everytime they would get into a heated argument about us.

I have always thought I’m one of the lucky ones. Most teens in my support group have mentioned how difficult it is to have their parents in the same the same room together. My parents are better with each other being in different houses, than living together. Something must of gotten them rattled.

As we enter the waiting room, my family and friends console each other. There is a lot of hugging and crying going on in this little room.

My two best friends catches my parents’ eyes and their head immediately drops.

“Be nice,” My mother whispers to my dad. “They both have been through a rough night.”

Neck cracks and shoulders roll, which means, my dad is holding back his temper as he approaches Elijah and Elena. He squats in front of them and rest his elbow on the striped pattern couch. “Do you mind telling me why we are in the waiting room next to an operating room?” He bites down hard on his bottom lip, making it bleed.

“Addie… She… I could have…” Elena chokes and sniffles.

With a heavy sigh, the brown haired boy looks up to my folks with his crystal blue eyes. Elijah wipes the teardrops from his eyes and becomes straight face. “We didn’t know until it was too late.”

“What do you mean you didn’t know?” My father’s face becomes red, his vein popping out of the side of his neck. I stagger backwards watching him lose his cool. My father has been known for his temper, but when it comes to kids or teens, he’s usually pretty cool with them.Why is he so mad?

“Dad, take it easy.” My hand swipes through his shoulder. Slowly exhaling and inhaling, I examine my whole body, my mind in disbelief, my hand shaking. “This has to be a dream. I couldn’t have pulled it off.”

My mother gently taps my father’s arm. Words that have been spoken between my parents and my best friends jumble. I try to understand what they’re saying by reading their lips, but it’s no use. My body breezes away from the heated discussion to the door of the operating room.

“If this is a dream, I can wake myself up. I will open this door and wake up.” I push open the door and step into the O.R. . The team’s like a unit, any time the doctor calls for clamps or an instrument, the nurses rush around making sure everything is in place.

“Can someone tell me why this beauty would jump off of a 100 foot bridge?” Calm and collective, The good doctor uses some sort of electrical device towards the open chest wound.

“Not sure. From what I heard, she said her goodbyes online.” The southern nurse in the pink scrubs handed a clamp for him.

“Gotta love social media,” he mutters.

“I’m surprised with the fall, she’s still alive,” the nurse utters.

“Bearly. She had an angel with her that I’m sure of.” If the The echocardiogram catches his eyes.

“Shit.” He grabs the clamp out of the nurses hand. “She’s not going on my watch.”

While the place turns into organized chaos, orders fill the air to save a life. I slowly approach the body. With a deep breath, I peer at it. The pale blue body lays on the table with her chest opened as the surgeon cups her heart making the blood flow for circulation. My hazel eyes searches the cuts and bruises of the body, until I reach the face.

What used to be soft red hair is now ratted and lips ice blue cold. Oh my God, it’s me! I look like a ghost.

My hands clasp on my mouth as I tumble backwards to the back, hitting the wall. My eyelashes blink rapidly. This can’t be happening. I wanted to but how could I have followed through with it?

Afraid to watch what happens next, I race out the door and into my bedroom. What on earth?

A CD with a mixture of classical and acoustic guitar plays in the background. The disk I made for the music competition. It sounds a lot better than I thought.

“I remember the first day you put those posters up on the ceiling.” Sobs from my mother punches a hole in my heart. “You were determined that your music would make it to each province that you would visit. I should have known something was wrong when you started to lose a lot of weight. I should have taken you out of that school earlier.” The gracious woman then gazes at the soft lilac wall. Next to the guitar and violin case that rests on the panel are medals and ribbons, delicately pinned in a row. “Addison, I didn’t expect grownups to act childish and teens to follow their suit.”

I wander over to the bed and plop down next to her on the purple flowered quilt my grandmother made me when I was five. I watch my mother while she skims through the social media sites and comes to my home page. She gazes at the old photos and see a video.

“Mom, I thought I could have handled the teasing. I didn’t want you and Dad to worry.” Sadness creeps across my face. My eyes soften as she sits in silence. I look over her shoulder to see the video.

“Here I am you loving teens who put me here!” On the edge of the steel, I hold the camera phone tightly. My soft curls wisp in the wind. Snowflakes fall from the rich crimson blue sky. “Stacy, I want you to witness what it’s like to be vapor.”

“Oh, Addie.” Tears rush down my mother’s face as she gently touches the screen. I reach for her and stop.

I forgot, I’m a silhouette--pure vapor. How can I hold her and tell her I wasn’t thinking and didn’t think they would miss me?

The video continues.

“Addison, don’t!” Elijah screams.

The camera turns towards the black asphalt. Two pairs of jeans run. The shaky hand approaches shadowed faces, my best friends rush to me.

“Goodbye,” I whisper and jump. As I free fall, the camera phone films two shadows, holding each other-- their jackets flap in the wind.

“Addie!” Elena’s voice is all I can hear through the whistling of the breeze.

Splash. The peaceful ripples of the wave up above the camera makes everything seem distant and the hatred--gone. It gently lifts from my fingers and turns.

The lost girl takes her last breath, her hair dances in front of me as her body drifts to the bottom of the canal.

After, the screen becomes pitched black.

Shakily, my mother closes the laptop. Her lips tremble. Her eyelashes blink away the tears.

“Mom.. I’m so sorry.” My head drops down in shame.

“Noooo,” she yells and throws the laptop at the wall. Thunk.

It drops onto the gray carpet.

She curls up to my pillow, crying to God. “Why God? Why Addie? Why my ray of light?”

“Mom, I…” I choke. How could I have been so stupid? I not only hurt myself, I hurt the ones I cared about the most.

My shoulders hunch as I sulk and leave the bedroom. I open the door again and end up in a small chapel. My dad sits on the bench in front of the altar, reprimanding the ol’ mighty.

“You have always found a way to challenge us as a family. You gave my son Autism, it was hard for me to accept. You had your fun when my wife and I got a divorce. You made it difficult when my father died. Now this...” He kicks the chairs in front of him with anger. Clunk, Clunk, Ca-chunk… Like dominos the chairs scattered, fanning in front of him. “You’re trying to take my daughter away from us. What is it that you want from us?” He fiercely rubs his forehead. “Can’t you torture another family?”

Before I could speak up and say I’m sorry and try to console him, a child's voice interrupts, “He isn’t taking Addie away from us, he’s giving her a choice to come back.”

Water builds up under the blue eyed man’s eyelid. “Yeah, Jamie. How would you know?”

“Because I listened to what he had to say.” Something strikes a chord with both Dad and me. It’s Jamie’s innocence. The young boy with his father’s eyes shows heaven, like an angel is guiding my younger brother to give my dad hope. At that moment, the strong man who hardly shows his compassion to others, wraps his son in his embrace.

I clasp on the hardwood floor of the chapel. All of this grief is around me. I thought if I wasn’t here, my family would be able to focus more on Jamie and my parents would be back together. My friends would be able to go on with the rest of their lives instead of worrying about me. A blue door appears in front of me and opens. I automatically rise up and walk through to a hospital room filled bouquets of flowers.

A tall dark haired gentleman pushes away some of my bangs and checks my pulse. One of the male nurses that I briefly remember from the operating room enters with a small assortment of daisies.

“Dr. Greenan, it’s Christmas Eve. You should be home with your family. I can take care of our beauty for tonight.” He places the flowers next to me.

“I told Sarah, I would be home late.” The good doctor lips curve to the side.”You know Sammy, I have been the luckiest son of a bitch. Popularity has always been easy to me. I worked hard at my academics to become something more to help people. Hell, even my wife and I have a relationship that anyone could ask for. But seeing… ” His smile disappears and his sweet southern voice scratches. “Seeing a young beautiful talented girl try to take her life, is beyond me. And the fact that her video went viral really pissed me off. Imagine what her family is going through.”

“You’re in good company,” Samuel answers. “Her family has been praying for God to bring her back to them since the day of the incident. Her father is so determined that he keeps bringing her music and notebooks. He... He told me when she wakes up, she’s going to want to write a song about this.”

“The family is strong. The mother finding ways to stop the bullying from worsening with other children, because of what happened to her own child. She’s having all the nurses on this floor involved. They even have a short leash on their son, making sure he's not going to hurt himself or others.” The good doctor tucks the ends of the sheets like a father does with his own child. “I really could use some help on this one.”

“I’m sure he heard you Dr. Greenan.” The young dark skinned nurse’s borwn eyes rise to the good doctor’s face. “But you’re wrong, you know. A good man is never alone.”

Yelling from the hallway interrupted the conversation. The muffle sound reminds me of a person’s voice that I thought I would never hear again.

“What on earth?” The good doctor questions as he leaves my room. “Sammy stay here. It seems like a couple of teens are trying to see our beauty.”

“Sure thing.” The guards taps my almost lifeless shoulder and talks to me like I’m fully conscious. “No one will leave you alone. I made sure you’re my number one priority.”

I stare at the comforting sight before me. Maybe people aren’t as vile as I think.

The commotion outside grows louder. I scurry out of the bedroom to catch up with the Dr. Greenan.

The security guard has a tight grip on Elijah and Ash. The two hang like limbs as their peacoats dangle.

“I have had it with kids trying to sneak in this child’s room to get photos of her.” The short haired brunette nurse’s nose flare.

“You don’t know us bitch and you don’t have to be a complete Asshat about not letting us see her.” Elena growls and snarls at the guard. Leave it to the dark blond hair girl to swear when she’s beyond angry. “She’s our best friend.”

“Yeah, like I haven’t heard that one before,” the nurse snaps.

“We just want to see her. It’s Christmas for God’s sake,” Spewed the ash blond guy who I fell in love with.

Ash tugs out of the guards grip. Elijah sucks in his cheek so he doesn’t say something he might regret.

“Give me a break.” The oversized guard marches the three of them to the exit.

“What on earth is going on here?” The good doctor approaches all of them with his hands relaxed in his pockets. “Can someone tell me why there is so much drama in the ICU.”

“I will be happy to. Nurse Ratched and The incredible Bulk, won’t let us see our best friend and it’s Christmas.” Tears stream down Elena’s face. “We brought her a gift that I know would cheer her up and may be she would wake up.”

Dr. Greenan peers over to the security guard. “Is it true?”

“Yes. It’s true, this guy is an Asshat.” Elijah’s snivy comment, seems to put the guard in overdrive.

The incredible bulk as Elena calls him launches at him. Ash shoves Elijah out of the way, his fist aiming for the guard.

“Come on, you big tub of larb.” My boyfriend who’s actions are more than his words, smirks.

The good Doctor jumps in the middle of them. “Curtis.”

The guard steps back. He grumbles and leaves. Dr. Greenan pushes his dark hair back and sighs. “Annie told me we might get a visit tonight from Addie’s friends who would do anything to see her. I never thought all of you would go to the extreme.” He lifts his shoulder and turns to the teens. “There are strict rules in that are placed in this hospital for a reason,” he sternly spoke.

The disgruntle teens look at him like they were children with their hands caught in a candy jar.

“However, since it’s Christmas, I think your presence is what she needs,” His eyes soften and nudges his head towards my room. “Come on, Christmas will be here before you know it.”

Confused and unsure of why my friends would act like asses, my head spins as my face drops into my hands.

“I’m never going to be free of this guilt inside of me.” I begin to shake, my palms sweating. I collapse to the spotless floor. A massive light bursts from the tile up the walls. Everything around me changes to a warm welcoming place.

A place where the birds have a happy tune and children laugh and play together joyfully on the jungle gym. The garden’s blossom with white lilies and daisies. One staircase leads up a stone path. At the end of the path there are two doors. I wrap my knees, my chin rests on them. Teardrops rush down, making a wet spot on my the knee of my jeans.

A calming hand rests on my shoulder. Skittish, I jerk. I peer up to a man dressed in jeans and a white button down shirt. He relaxes his hands in his jean pockets. “May I ask why a young beautiful soul is crying?”

“You can see me?” I ask as I wipe away the tears with my sleeve.

“Of course I can,” he says. “As you can see me.”
“Oh, great, just great. The first time I want to be vapor, someone sees me.” I couldn’t help notice but when I seek his soft hazel brown eyes, I find solace, like I’m safe and I could tell him anything.

“AH, yes, the ol’ tease. Everyone wishes you were vapor.” He rubs his scruff on his face. “Well it’s better than being called a fake.”

“I guess so.” I shrug. “Have you ever been made fun of because you were different? Like you had a special gift and kids thought you were a freak because of it?”

“Of course. I was known for the gift of gab.” He plops down next to me. “It was hard to teach people right from wrong. I told stories that could help give them a second chance and have been made fun of for it. I too have been called many names for who I am. It’s hard being a son of a preacher. I ended up getting killed for the beliefs I had.”

“That’s awful,”I utter. “Here I am telling you that my life sucked because of people making fun of me. And you were killed for being a good guy. Man,talk about being selfish.”

“It’s every human right to be selfish once in awhile, Addie. Even the son of God had his moments.”

“No. That can’t be true. I mean you’re talking about a savior and saviors always help people and do what God wants them to do.”

“Yes, but they also can get angry at humanity and become depressed seeing what has happened to the world around them. They too can give into temptation. Breaking a piece of pottery because they were upset or lie to their mother so they won’t get in trouble.” He taps my knee gingerly. “But, they do get caught. That is how they learn. They would never seek the need to end their life. Which brings me to you, my loving prodigy.”

“Well, this is a little bit more than lying to my parents. I felt like I had no choice. When I got the scholarship to go to London, things got worse. All because of a teenage wannabe fan girl hated me for being in love with a guy she couldn’t have.” The side of my head rests on the on my knees.

“I see. Addie, sometimes even the strongest people have a nemice that they have to face. It seemed to me when you ended the life you were meant to live, you were running away from the fear of being excluded.”

“How would you deal with a girl who taunts you and wrote horrible things about you online. Or who have her friends torment you so you don’t want to go to school?”

“I would forgive them.”

“What?” My head jerks up.

He chuckles. “I would forgive them. People who tease, bully, or even torment an individual are alone and desperate for attention. The ones who follow suit are lost. You see loving prodigy, with your gift of music and a heart of gold, people like Stacy begin to question themselves and their insecurity takes over. And when insecurity takes over…”

“They’ll put others down in order for them to feel good about themselves. Can I ask you a question?”

“You have been asking, why stop now?” I have to say for a guy who is kind hearted he can give a sarcastic remark without any hesitation.

“How can a person overcome the bullying?” I ask.

“I will say a person will never forget such horrible cruelty, but they can accept what has happened and move on.”

“Yeah, move on. Easier said than done,” I mutter and roll my eyes.

“I never said it would be easy my loving prodigy, but with a little faith in yourself and others, you can see a miracle happen.” He smiles. His smile is different from any person who I have met in my life. It’s full of sincerity and hope. He’s like a guiding light to someone who’s lost and became dark like me. He rises up.

Guitar music and sweet vocals circles the playground.

“I know this song. It’s an old one. Blue Moon. Ash would sing to me while…while we danced to it in my mother’s living room.” The voice becomes more distinctive. “The voice from the playground. It’s Ash. He’s singing to me right now, isn’t he?”

“He will never give up on you, Addie.” The ginger man reaches out his hand to me. I gently clasp onto it as he yanks me up.His index fingers points to the two doors that reappear on top of the staircase. “You have a choice to make, loving prodigy. Either go back to the life you live and move forward. Or start over to a life that you don’t know what’s to come.”

I glance at the two doors. One to the home where I grew up in, jumping into my parents arms and never looking back on this day. Or the door to a place I haven’t got a clue about.

“Remember Addie. The choice will always be yours. No one can tell you to live or die.” The sunlight from the playground brightens. He strolls away with his hands in his pants pockets. One thing that catches my eye is the peer of leather flip-flops on his feet. I giggle in spite of myself.

Vanishing before my eyes, his words rings in my ear. “Remember Addie, instead of spreading hatred to those who have done harm, pray or help those who have suffered.”

The choice is now mine. I can start over with the door to my right. I slowly walk up the staircase towards it. But what will that prove? Only that I let the mean girls win and if I let them win, they will torment someone else.

If I do decide to go back, how can I help those who have been harmed? All I know is writing music. How could music help them?

I don’t know how long I gazed at the doors, but I knew there was only one door I should go through. One door, that I know would make things better for me. I slowly walk up and open the door.

The clouds swirl and the music weakens as I go into a dark sleep. The machine beeps and the television runs a rerun of Saturday Night Live.

“Are you ready to see your baby girl?” A voice from out far asks.

“Is she?” A voice whispers.

“All ten fingers and toes are accounted for. Her heart beat’s strong. She is just as beautiful as you pictured she would be.”

A light shines through my eyes as I blink.

“Addie, welcome back Baby girl.” My father says. “And Merry Christmas.”

His lips gently rests on my forehead. I feel drops of water dab my temples.

*******

Up on the wall in the Louvre Museum stood an abstract painting that was created by a ten year old blind girl. A man with scruff on his face and different colors in his eyes, seeing the world. His dark hair at shoulder length. His cream color robe neatly falls to his feet. Children stand beside him as his hands touch a young redheaded girl’s shoulder while she’s playing the violin.

Next to the painting was a title-- “The Savior Comforting The Soulful Prodigy.”