Brick Days, A Short Story

Hey everyone!  It has been such a long time since I last posted a short story and I am very excited to share this with you!  

 Brick Days

By Me 

There is a fly in my water.  It isn’t dead, but fluttering around, pushing its legs and body like it still has a hope to make it out.  Flinging my head back, I finish the last swallow of my coffee and set it in the sink on my way out, not bothering to clean the cup or throw the fly outside or down the sink.  

Resting before the front door of my smaller-than-should-be-allowed apartment is my bike.  It’s silver and the best and ugliest bike I have ever had.  It’s not even that ugly, the absence of prettiness doesn’t necessarily leave ugly as the only option.

I lug it downstairs and think at least it’s only one flight.   I have a friend who lives on the third floor, he rides a bike around town too.  

I push off outside my building and wait until the brick ground smooths out to concrete before I situate myself.  I hate the part of the sidewalk covered in brick, it annoys every part of me.  There is no rhyme or reason to why it is there, the irregularity and suddenness of it make me mad.  But it is the path that marks sections of my day.  I leave the apartment and return with the feeling of bricks below me, signifying the beginning and ending of being out into the world for the day or the hour.  

It’s a nice day today, but “nice” has recently become my least favorite description word.  One could use nice to describe the weather but it’s subjective and doesn’t say much at all.  Still, today must be what most people would almost consider an all-around “nice day.”  The sun makes my skin glow and buzz with warmth, it’s still morning and the stage of that morning glow and dewiness hasn’t ended yet.  The immature trees that line the street rustle with a slight breeze.  But it’s a breeze that makes the morning the best part of the day and fades while the sun gets even warmer in the afternoon, that’s why I said an almost nice day- in the middle of August.  For now, I enjoy the buzz of warmth and the rustle of the trees to cool me off.  

I don’t quite live in the heart of the city, but close enough that I see buildings rise taller and taller in front of me.  But that is not where I am headed.  Away, I'm heading away from that and away from that one small brick sidewalk that drives me crazy and that I’m starting to hate.  

I turn a corner and start heading into an even different part of town, one where the trees grow taller and greener and the apartments are older and rustier around the edges.  This is my favorite place to ride to, and I wish I live here but I got what I could when I moved.  It’s strange how fast the parts of the city can change.  From rats in the trash cans and two-dollar slices of pizza to tall trees and rusty flower beds hanging outside of windows to immature trees and minuscule apartments.  There are minuscule apartments in every part of town though.

I turn the corner again, getting closer to a city park,  one with a small pond, lots of trees, geese, and older ladies who never forget to wave at me.  

I am riding fast and not looking where I am going, and rather than there being no one on the sidewalk like usual on a Saturday at seven, I run straight into someone.  Wheels first.   At least it’s not an old lady.  

The person jumps away at the same time as I jerk my bike the other way, right into a fire hydrant.  My bike slams against it and I am thrown off, unable to catch myself or right my bike and I fall on my cheek and shoulder, my legs twisted and scraped up with my bike.  

“Oh my god,” a hushed, high voice sounds like it’s coming from far away and not even directed at me.  But I know it has to be.  

I feel clumsy and terrible because of the way I fell because I couldn’t catch myself and ended up flopping over like a sack of flour.  Feeling clumsy and helpless is my least favorite feeling.  

“Oh my god,” the voice says again and now I can tell it’s a female, maybe even “one in distress,” as a story would say.  I can’t imagine that her voice is truly that high but she goes on.  

“Oh my god, I’m so sorry, oh my god, oh my god. . .”  

I had squeezed my eyes closed as I fell, like a defense against the concrete, as if I didn’t see it, it wouldn’t happen.  How silly that sounds.  

I push myself up with my other hand and pull my legs out from under my bike.  Stretching them out in front of me, and leaning back, I watch the clouds and take a couple of deep breaths.  All before I look at the girl in a probably useless attempt to regain my composure and get my head to stop thumping so that I don’t give her one of my record “stink eyes.”   

She has a short, dyed golden afro, and wide brown eyes.  One of those wide-eyed girls, straight out of a fairy tale.  On dark skin, she wears jean shorts, a tight blue tank top, and short black boots.  She has a round rosy face and a small gap between her two front teeth to top it all off. 

But I don’t notice all that.  All I see upon first glance is her wide eyes, she looks scared and like she cares a lot more than she should.  Her face makes me want to assure her that I am alright and nothing more.  I wish she was a bit angrier or solemn, I felt like yelling or hitting something but her face made that feeling fade and I even forgot about my shoulder for a second. 

“It’s okay, I’m alright,”  I say finally as I turn away and push my bike up to rest on its kickstand.

“Are you sure?  It looks pretty bad.”  She crouches down to my level and her voice seems to drop an octave but it can’t be that much.  I knew her voice wasn't that high.  I turn back and look at my shoulder for the first time.  As I look at it, the pain seems to finally register in my brain.  I close my eyes as my head swims and falls back and I feel as if I am about to pass out.  

After a moment I raise my fingertips to my cheek and they come away sticky and red.  My face is warm and I want more than anything to lay down.  

I manage to move my bike away from the fire hydrant and edge my way over so I can lean against it.  The girl doesn’t say anything for what seems longer than it really was, so I open my eyes a crack to see if she is still there.  I probably would have run off.  How do you deal with someone who can hardly sit up or keep their eyes open when you were the cause of the fall in the first place?

There she is.  She has shifted into a cross-legged position and remains watching me with her wide eyes.   It’s uncomfortable, I’d think it would be for her too but she hardly reacts when I squint at her.  I wait longer for my head to stop throbbing, and can almost feel it as the blood drips down my shoulder and cheek and slowly begins to dry.

I hear the girl cry out and open my eyes in time to see a teenaged boy fly past on his skateboard, coming inches from hitting her and she moves just in time.  The boy turns his head to shout sorry without stopping, but to me, it looks as if he is just mouthing the words.  She shifts over to sit next to me instead.  It all feels like a dream, like I am not really there and just a spectator watching something I am not involved with.  

“You don’t have to wait here,”  I tell her and hope I don’t sound mad but maybe I do because she doesn’t look any less scared from the first time I looked at her.  Great.

“No it’s fine, I’ll wait to make sure you’re okay.”  

I want to argue but my head hurts so bad that I don’t say another word and stare at the brick building across from us.  It’s an apartment building and windows periodically pop up out of the otherwise brick wall.  Continuous bricks, stacked one after another.  I think of the brick ground just outside of my apartment.  I am probably the only one who really thinks about those bricks.  

The quiet chattering city wakes up, getting out and about behind us, and it’s as if I am not a part of it, like the noises and sounds are coming from a tv or radio, and I am just listening in.   

A couple walks by us with arms hooked together.  The woman wears extravagant yellow pants that blend together, almost looking like a skirt, with a white shirt on the top, while her partner wears jean pants and a jean jacket.  They don’t stop but the woman looks back at us once, whispering to the man.  The girl next to me raises her hand and shows the gap in her teeth to say we're alright.  And then the yellow pants and figure covered head to toe in jeans  are gone around the corner.  

It couldn’t be a minute later that a dog sniffs its way around my bike and towards us.  I reach my finger out and it sniffs me too and all I do is bump its nose.  The girl ruffles the little dog's fur and then picks it up and sets him down with his snout pointing around the corner.  Then he is gone.  

Another group walks by us a while later.  I watch the girl next to me, her eyes following the party before I look up myself to see two young people.  A girl and a boy.  In that muddled stage between being adults and teens.  They are wearing plaid pajama pants and loose t-shirts.  The girl is loosely gripping the end of his fingertips.  Lastly, I see what the girl next to me is actually looking at.  A black cat, almost the same color as the boy's shirt, perches on his shoulder.  His claws digging into his shoulder, the cat's yellow eyes are almost bigger than the girl’s next to me.  The people don’t look twice at us, but the cat does.  It can’t seem to take its eyes away and leans far on its perch as they round the corner.  

“I think I feel better now.”  I stand up easily as proof before carefully stepping to look around the corner.  There are the little cat’s big eyes seconds before it disappears out of view behind a tree.  I wanted to make sure it had happened.  

The people and animals that walked by us hardly feel real now.  I had felt as if there was a cloud in my brain that has only now slightly cleared.  I have never seen such interesting people before so I worried, for a moment, that my brain filled in a couple of facts.  But then again, I have never before tried to notice interesting people.  

“Are you sure you’re alright?  You can walk home by yourself?” she asks.  

“Yes, really I am, I hope I didn’t bother you too much.”  Then I tell her, “Thank you, really, for waiting.”  

She truly smiles at me for the first time, showing her wide smile and shining eyes in all their glory.  For the first time, she doesn’t look afraid.  I try to smile back but grimace from the pain in my cheek.  

“It wasn’t a problem, I was glad to.”  

Then we step away from each other, not yet looking away.  I go on down the street to the park.  And she moves on around the corner.  Around the corner.  So seconds later she is gone.  

I sit a couple of minutes longer at a park bench down the road before continuing around the block back to my apartment.  I walk with my bike the whole way.  

I arrive at the bricks on the sidewalk and that's when I know I am home.  Without them I wouldn’t have stopped.  My mind is caught up in the strange encounter with that girl, with the yellow pants, with the dog’s wet nose, and the wide yellow eyes.  And how I never would have waited that long for someone whose name I never even got.  How I didn’t have the best morning but there is still someone who was kind.  How strange it seems that I will never see that person again and how awful that I never asked for her name.  

I wish I could just be angry and not sad, it’s much easier to feel angry and much more painful to feel sad.  I could do it, I could make myself get angry just so I don’t feel so heavy.  I could hit something or yell to release it and then I would be just fine.  But I don’t do that.  

I lug my bike back upstairs, clenching my teeth until I reach the door.  I wash my skin before I go to the kitchen and get a clean glass of water.  

I drink it and as I do I stare at the fly in my cup from the morning.  It’s still kicking around, fluttering its wings, and causing ripples in the water.  I can’t believe it’s still alive.  My mind goes back to my morning.  I go out almost every day and have never before really noticed the people around me.  I can’t believe that girl waited on the sidewalk so long with me.  With the gap in her tooth, her wide eyes, and contagious smile that makes my cheek hurt, then and now.  

It keeps hurting as I pour the fly down the sink and leave the kitchen.  

Thank you for reading!

What did you think? Since the main characters name is never revealed I am very curious to hear what she sounds like to you? Comment bellow!

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