D11// Cormac Shaw

cor·mac · sh·aw
(noun) /kohr-mahk/
1. district eleven, seventeen, male
2. i came in spinning on a colour palette
3. broken and in between undefined lines

"In a good bookroom you feel in some mysterious way that you are absorbing the wisdom contained in all the books through your skin, without even opening them."

Blue, the world was once a tranquil place filled with mysteries and new discoveries every single day - that's how it always begins. Everything was once pleasant filled with no expectation, plodding through life as an adventurer tripping over the ship deck as it journeyed to far off places. Discovering light, and colours, and numbers, and animals. That's what was important about life, truly, the immediate nature of learning something new, finding someone new, and latching on with the tightest of grips possible.

Every day, I latch on to the possibility that I'll reach that ever looming bar of expectations, the large melodic scale that rises farther and farther but is always unattainable.

-

"Useless." I hear the yelling.

The backlash. "Moody."

"Stupid." Hear it under the doors, the walls are thin, I can hear everything that you have to say. "We didn't have to take him in, he's fucking useless to us, isn't he?"

Ten, breathe. The best way to go about life is to consume all feelings of the colour red. Nine, please calm down. Red is the colour of anger, and bloodshed. Eight, why is this happening to me? Angst, anguish, pain, evil, all of them predators to all feelings that are trying to arise. Seven, this is what happens when you listen at doors. It suppresses anything that might be positive and erupts through the veins, a monster that never existed before. Six, what a great number that is, about halfway. "He's just so useless, he can't even do a simple job right." I fall down on five. Red covers my olive skin, clenches my ragged fingertips into a hearty fist. Four brings the anxiety of almost being finished. I can feel red breach the walls of my mind, and push through almost seamlessly. Three, breathe again. Scars line my knuckles as they bleed once again, another hole in the wall. Two, it's time to calm down. The screaming starts once again. But, one, I am calm.

I can sink red beneath me, it just takes time.

-

Yellow, I feel her palm caress my cheeks. Despite how hollow and empty they may be, she fills them with a deep maroon of love.

"Tell me what you love about me." I ask desperately, unhinged. Yellow is happiness, but I feel only anxiety - perhaps they go hand in hand. I am happy cusped against her, and yet nervous as to what she might say. If this is what love is, was, then the world may be forgiving in this tragic state of yellow. I appease her needs with my hands, travel along her softened skin - but stop suddenly when I realize my farm hands must be sandpaper to her.

There is no intent to harm and yet I can't help but worry about my scissor hands cutting through her slender skin. "I love the way you touch me as if I'm delicate." She whispers in my ear, I'm careful to not injure her, I am a never extinguishing flame, I must treat everything I love delicately, doesn't she understand? Doesn't she get it? Doesn't she - my fingers trail along her forearm, the warmth of her breath sleeps gently against the back of my neck, it's tiny hairs standing on edge, content. Everything about this is yellow.

"I love your coal eyes, the way they look past everything, and yet lock on to things with such intensity."

Even charcoal burns, my love. I lose sight of what's in front of me and look past my blues and reds. Get lost in universes that are beyond even my understanding. Yesterday, a man surrounded by green took the purse of a young woman surrounded in pink - and I didn't even stop to question it. The trees in the distance were so beautiful, swaying, and calm. Everything about the trees was much calmer than the action going in front of me. 'Help! Help! Someone, please.' I never see light in front of me, that's why my eyes are full of dark, thrown into train compartments to burn and chug along. Get far away from this place and keep moving, keep moving, keep moving.

"Your soft lips."

They're cracked on the edges. Cracked and jagged. Pin pricks pushing forth, each word can cause harm to your very being.

"Strong arms, look at these things." She squeezes my forearm and I feel a jolt of pain seer through my being.

Everything she loves about me is trivial, everything she loves is just a notion of my looks. I am merely a human sex toy, aren't I? She doesn't admit it, but she caresses me still.

I am far away. I look past her silky hair, seductress smile, past the lust and desire that pushes through her every fibre. "Kiss me baby." Maybe, just maybe I am a baby, because I start to cry as she pulls in closer to me, the tears flowing, a stream of never-ending self-hatred and disgust, why am I nothing but useless.

The world isn't so yellow, the sheets I lay on may be. But I'm rocking, rocking back in forth in a sickly forest green.

"Why are you crying?"

**

Today, I don't recognize what colour I feel. It may be orange, or pink. Though I feel as if it's a green and a blue, but I'm not sure of what shade. Perhaps all at once?

Today, I feel brown.

Splurging on emotions that I didn't even know existed within me, but I can feel them. Legs shaking, unsteady and sick, they are green. Chest pounding and pumping with every waking second, it is maroon. Arms angry and hating everything there ever was, they are red. Head swooning and upset, head not knowing, head gone crazy - head is orange and pink. My eyes are blue today, for the sea that they are sinking in.

"Are you fucking kidding me, Cormac? What are you, retarded?"

I cry a little more, please don't hurt me I didn't mean to do it - I didn't, no, no.

"I asked you to do one small thing and this is how you fucking repay me? All I needed was a pack of fucking smokes, you're fucking useless."

I know, I know, my parents tell me all the time. Crying erupts, I can't stop it's as if my body has taken over and it doesn't want to stop, I tried, I really did - I just couldn't find any for you. "I love you though." I whisper gently, just so that she can hear it, just so that she knows.

"No, if you loved me, you would have fucking got me a pack of smokes, wouldn't you have?" And then she hits me, strikes me across the face, a punch that could be heard a million miles away. The world goes black for a bit, I wonder if that's how I feel today. Black instead of brown. But the world swirls back into colour quickly, her face stricken with hatred, I feel brown today.

"I'm fucking done with you, get up, stop crying, and the fuck out of my face."

I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I love you. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry.

**

Blue. Always reaching for that unattainable feeling of being needed, trying to reach the bar of expectation. But I always fall flat. Today I feel blue, but the world looks black, a circle on my face agrees with this.

I'm not too sure how it came to be, but I'm pretty sure it's a reminder of the wrong I did - I should have gotten the smokes, I deserve this reminder, I deserve it.

"Fighting, Cormac? Ripred, you're so full of trouble, get to the farm. When you get home we'll discuss your punishment."

Yes, good, mother, I deserve to be punished for my misdeeds.

What will it take to get out of this perpetual state of blue?