Pendulum

She gagged on the concrete, as she heard the glass door hammering behind her. Hearing it like it was in slow motion. Twice her weak stomach wretched and plummeted, trying viciously to expel the filth she had just swallowed. But no words came out. Her eyes seemed to involuntarily pivot to the window, where they saw her mother's concerned face. A vein must be connecting her eyes to her feet, for she ran, socked feet feeling none of the rocks or vines or thorns beneath them, neither slowing when she heard her mother's calling. Her feet led her into the woods behind the back yard – the place the place she had lain so many times after punishing herself for her tears. Not now. No, she could not stay here. Any set of presumptuous eyes could spot her, and further questioning was unneeded. She fled further; deeper into the brush, mind dizzy and heart trying to catch up with the flowing blood and mechanical lungs. She collapsed on the pricking pine straw; eyes drowning themselves in a horrid catch 22. From her vantage point she viewed stately pines. Their solid bases deposited around her tired body, while their free tops were weaved by the wind. Their green crowns surfaces and receded like waves colliding with the shore before taking back their angry words. But such and act was expected. No one lectures the waves for their rudeness. They apologize in advance, and it is accepted. Like 70 degree weather and 1 ½ children. “So many wasted days come and go like ocean waves. Hits me like a freight train. Now I can't get off my face.” She stayed in the position for a long time. Just reciting mortal thoughts of life's unfairness. So selfish. Her cat, Little Little, purred her way over, nudging Deirdre to see if she were still breathing. She circled several times until at last circling herself around Deirdre's feet. “Oh, that I had wings like a dove, for then I would fly away and be at rest.” Oh God. GOD, make the sky cry because I can't. Tiny particles oh H20 fell on her face, feeling more like frozen needles than water. It let like little freckles painfully being added to her skin. It felt like Chinese water torture. She could feel the rain before she felt it. It chimed into the bushes making whispers come out. It fell, swirling onto her pale skin and mixing with the hot bloody tears that had soaked into her matted hair. The sickening combination only made her cry. Sob and heave like a trembling leaf. Then, as hurriedly as the tears came, they departed. She faced upwards once more, resolving to be silent so the rain could go on uninterrupted. Little Little trotted away, but Deirdre stayed, staring into the drops that fell on her. They quickly glistened before descent, and fell seductively onto her cracked lips. I want to die in the rain. Not here, not now, but someday. I want to die in the rain, just like this. The trees approved in hushed tones as they swayed to and fro in an unprecedented manner. Like a clock's pendulum, ticking back and forth to time gone by at an unsteady rate.