My Town in Orange

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By Vincent Burgess

Wed, 12 Sep 2018
  • 984 reads
3 comments
 

My Town in Orange

 
As he looked out the the back window of the car the town was bathed in orange light. The rain was drumming on the roof and the wipers swished the water this way and that. The day had been a monumental fuck up from start to finish and Jake was glad that this beautiful orange hue was all that was left of Wednesday.
 
The town was quiet, the only people around were in the death throws of their working day. Jake thought they looked it too, hunched over, collars up like undertakers they were battling against the rain and wind pulling their umbrellas inside out.
 
How was he supposed to know that he should have stayed in bed? How was he supposed to know that the surprise he had organised for Isla was going to be way more surprising for him? Presumable she and Kenny knew that they were going to be fucking virtually as soon as he left for his job interview. presumably they knew because they had been doing the same thing over and over for god knows how long.
 
He glanced down at the bottle of Moet laying in the passenger seat. It was for them to celebrate. Unconsciously he slid his hand off the gear stick and onto the bottle. He ran his fingers over the label tracing the embossed lettering and along the cold glass. He winced a little as he felt the sticky liquid at the bottom, then looked at his fingers with smears of red across the tips.
 
At the lights he stopped, enjoying the rows of red lights through the centre of town standing proud and defiant against the falling night as the orange faded to black. Slowly almost involuntarily his mind considered the word he had heard so much today. His lips formed the word as he mouthed it, his memory evoked the first smile he had mustered since he found them.
 
As the lights let him continue he turned left towards the dock. The green light mirrored his turn signal, silently drowned out by the drivel on the local radio station.
 
Ahead he could see the darkness, the void of the harbour's water. He remembered going crabbing their as a child and wistfully pined for those simple days that in his memory last forever. Isla and Kenny had destroyed his past today. His memories were someone elses now, useless to him now that no part of his life was worth living any more.
 
At the top of the hill he stopped the car. He closed his eyes and visualised plunging everything into the void. His memories, his hopes, his dreams and everything other piece of worthless crap in his head. It was all broken now and there was no better place for them. His soulmate and his best friend had killed it all with their betrayal.
 
He pulled the handbrake and slowly but certainly the car started down the hill.
 
The car tipped over the edge and with a loud crash fell into the water. A smile stretched across his face as he watched the car bubble and sink down into the water. He managed the smallest laugh as he remembered her screaming, pleading with him not to push her into the boot. Woozy from the blows, pain and anger in her eyes as he forced her in next to the motionless body of Kenny. Eyes wide and still, unfocussed and empty. "I am sorry" she had screamed "I am sorry"
 
He turned and started to walk.
Certificate 15
Story
Stories for Goldfish
Drama
Crime

Comments

Submitted by airyfairy on

Nice twist.  I like the way you build up the sympathy and then...not so much.   The way you show how betrayal isn't just for the present but can destroy the past is also effective.  

Submitted by ronnie73 on

Great story and you told it well.  Very professional.  Certainly deserves a cherry.

 

Submitted by Kurt Rellians on

A very readable and in the end surprising piece. The signs were there in the script, but I did not put them together until after I got to the end. A well crafted and clever piece.