We are the Leaves {Open}

Rix McKinney

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‘Cause now I only see my dreams
In everthing I touch, feel the cold hands on
Everything that I love
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Autumn is by far my favorite season. The flare of colors, ignited like flames, helps me to remember the beauty life has to hold. In autumn, I not only see the beauty, but I can feel it too. The soft winds sweeping across the lands, the hum of leaves as they beat coarsely against each other, and most of all: the scent of change. The scent of something new, something foreign.

The scent that pulls me in.

Would it be wrong to say that in the midst of summer, autumn is the only thing on my mind? Change is all I want: something different to base my life upon. Too often, I feel like I am merely dragging myself through life, waiting for the excitement that will never come. The past and the present have no impact; but the future…will it ever be different? Will my life change from green to red? From green to orange? Will it whistle, in synch with the trees? Or will my autumn never come to me?

Looking around at the trees, I am drowning in awe. I can’t even explain anything more beautiful. The colors: they are overwhelming in my head. I close my eyes, wishing that my life could end just like this, with the autumn breeze rocking me to sleep. But then I wonder, who am I trying to kid? Happy endings don’t exist. Maybe in dreams they do, but not in reality.

Nothing lasts forever. Everything ends, one way or another; and that’s what scares me the most. The magnificent leaves that populate the trees wither away with time. Just like I will. Autumn is merely a trick, to give us all something wonderful, before the cold sets in. The leaves die, the frost sets in, and the world feels distant. When Winter sets in, I am reminded my own naivety. When Winter comes, I always wake up from that happy dream, and come back to reality. How could beauty last longer than a few moments? Because truth is, beauty is only a disguise, meant to hide the horrors I'm too afraid to face. For eighteen years, I’ve faced the same horror; and even though I can sometimes erase it from my mind, it never goes away. Wonder and beauty can hide the thought of it, but never will it leave me.

When you look at me, you don’t see a boy anymore. You don’t see happiness, or youth, or joy. Instead, you see a short, deformed boy, who no longer has the ability to stand up, who has to sit in a wheelchair for the rest of his life. Too many people pity me; they look at me in horror, like they feel sorry for my condition. Though, it hurts me even more to see their faces, to know that someone can look at me and feel sadness. It makes me wonder who I could have been, had I not been given over to dismay. I could have had a future; but no, not anymore. My future doesn’t exist.

When I was born, my parents named me Tarix, or rather Rix. Where that name came from, I can’t really be sure, considering my parents are only memories now. They knew something was wrong with me from the beginning, so they gave up. Sometimes, I wonder whether I should just give up the way they did. It seems so easy, yet scary at the same time. To leave Sadie behind, the girl I call my sister, would be unimaginable. However, the only thing I want is to escape the chains that hold me down.

The wheelchair beneath me is my worst enemy. For the longest time, I’ve had to cope with it, for walking isn’t even a question anymore. The wheelchair separates me from the rest of the world. It deems me an outsider. I hear voices every day, whispering around me. They all say the same thing. “Who is he? What’s wrong with him? He has a disease? Why is he so short? What’s the wheelchair for? I feel so bad for him!” The words haunt me every time I hear them; I don’t like knowing that people pity me. I especially don’t like knowing how far I am from normal, and how little I can relate to everyone else. I am barely four feet, I am in a wheelchair, and I am slowly starting to lose my hearing, but I still belong here, don't I? I sigh, all hope lost.

I roll my wheelchair a bit farther; all around me are the trees that I spend so much time thinking about. The Mayor, my guardian, gave me the freedom to come to this little park by myself, without Sadie. For once, I was given an inch of independence. Most of the time, Sadie, the Mayor’s daughter, is with me wherever I go; she has to be with me. But today at least, I have the freedom and the responsibility to get around by myself for a little while. It is rare to see me alone, and in fact, the idea of no one else here to help me, seems almost frightening. Being alone causes me to recall horrible memories: such as getting lost in the supermarket, or forgotten at school, or being left somewhere, and having a hard time finding home. I don't want things like that to happen again. It’s easy to forget me, but conversely, it's pretty difficult to blend in when you are almost fully incompetent.

I inch closer to the trees, watching as a single leaf falls, fluttering serenely to the ground. For a few moments, I merely stare at it, as though waiting for something to happen. A wave of nostalgia hits me, as I look down at the few brown leaves that lie beneath the tree. There’s barely a handful, for Autumn has only begun. Still, they are dead; the coming of Winter has killed them.

I immediately feel like that little leaf that fell too early. I know my end will is coming soon, and I suddenly feel sorry for that leaf, the one that died too early. We are all like the leaves; we live, change colors, and then fall when it’s our time to go. The question is when do we fall? When do I fall?

I know that soon, the horrors in my life will drown every hint of happiness. It’s only a matter of time. Maybe I’ll never get to be an orange leaf, or a red leaf; but for sure, I will someday be a brown leaf, left to decay beneath the branches of my old tree.

I am so focused on my thoughts, that I barely hear the sound of leaves crunching in the distance, the sound that signals another human in the park. I turn my wheelchair around, away from the tree, curious to see who it is. Who's there?" I whisper, suddenly feeling inferior.

But I’m still focused on my thoughts; on the little leaf that fell too early.

I am like a leaf. When will I fall?[/color][/size][/blockquote][/justify]