Breathing was becoming more and more of an issue for me. My whole body was taking on the form of a helium balloon defused of its power and skimming dangerously closer to the floor. My neck was rubbery and would bounce from side to side before resting casually on the collar of my shirt for a moment. It didn’t feel exactly like a heart attack, maybe closer to a heart denied of use.
My next move was to fall backwards and close my eyes, but the figure standing before me was silently holding me up with its presence alone. My eyes were falling out of focus and this captivating creature lingering before me was indistinguishable from the harshly lit beige walls behind it. I could feel my elbows shaking and my feet go numb. The only motor function that had yet to betray me was my hearing. The figure spoke.
‘Ian? Can you hear me? Ian, are you ok? Ian!’
I could hear the sorted worry in their voice. The maternal nature of the tone was undeniable. The voice, like a downpour, filled life back into me. She stood for a moment, her brown eyes glassy. I couldn’t decide but she seemed somewhere between taking me up into her arms and rocking me back to consciousness or throwing her eyes back into her head and letting out a profound sigh as she boldly exited the room never to return.
Clearly she was aware of the reaction her not so subtle dismissal of our association had caused. I could sense some guilt in her face, but didn’t want to acknowledge it. The blood was returning to my face and I was starting to feel the floor at the bottom of my feet again.
I still hadn’t answered her request on my wellbeing, instead lingering on the fact that I would be sleeping alone for the unforeseeable future. Strangely I had yet to question reason in her lost feelings; I suppose I saw it coming.
My mind wandered to post break-up actions. Increased hours home alone in a dark room, my first twitter sans girlfriend. A cavalcade of worthless concerns marched through my mind. Her image was again becoming blurry, she was moving towards the door.
Realizing she was actually leaving the situation, born out of my own inability to defend myself, I was settling into the idea of the room without her. I sucked in a single long breath and heard the door quietly shut behind me. I expected it to slam, her last courtesy.
I was waiting for the second wind, my rebirth, but I could feel my blood slowing down, imagining the cracks in my heart gapping now. She was gone, she had her reasons. I wasn’t given the power to stop her. Slowly and without much effort I slid out of my chair, downward, my balloon like body finally touching the carpeted floor. Where was I to go from here?
-By Ian Cahill
![jonesamericana:
We were to be as kings.
Our role models, our parents, our loved ones told us of a time when the world would be ours. We would be healers, we would be arbiters of justice, we would unlock the secrets of existence itself. These talents were inside of us, and there was no force in the world which could keep them contained.
And for a time, we believed all of it.
We walked through this world not as spectators, but as royalty in waiting. Those around us were not our equals, but temporary stewards of our rightful inheritance. We began to view the world as we would have it, as we expected it to be. We did not see opportunity around us, we did not see chance. We saw inevitability.
And so we waited. We waited for our own prophecies to come true. The seeds of greatness planted in our heads as children grew to a forest of entitlement while our ambition withered. This was our world and we lived in it waiting for the expected to happen. At the edges of our city was a wrought iron sign, proclaiming to all who entered that magic would be found inside. We scoffed. Kings had no place for magic.
I know the reality now. I know this world is not ours. I know the dream of being kings was never ours in the first place. We were vessels, tools to act out the lost hopes of a generation before, to realize the greatness they wanted to believe lived within their own hearts. This realization has crushed others, but I see now that the expected is the enemy
Because when all you’re looking for is the expected, you miss the magic of the unexpected. You become inoculated to whimsy, to the random and beautiful mysteries of the universe.
I sit now at the edge or our city. My bones have grown long and then brittle. My teeth have fallen out, grown back in, and fallen out once more. My joints hurt and my vision has become increasingly cloudy. But I sit here and I look at the wrought iron sign before me. The sky smolders behind it, casting in negative relief the words within. The city name, unimportant, rote, expected is small and perched near the top, away from where the eye wants to focus. My eyes fix on the words below, “THE MAGIC CITY.” I stare for a moment, taking in the burning, end of the world sky behind this simple, loaded phrase. I close my eyes and smile as the words, now white and energized, dance on the inside of my eyelids.
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![jonesamericana:
My Father was a God fearing man.
At least I think he was. Once a year, on Christmas, my Mother would drag him to church. He seemed to take some pride in his once a year face time in God’s house. But then the next Sunday would roll around and he would once again be settled into his recliner in front of the TV as Mom would load us up for mass.
He worked the night shift during the week and every night he would come into our room to tuck us in before he would leave for work. He would insist we kneel at the bed and pray. As I got older I began to notice the discrepancy. Why were we bound to religion when he skipped church every week?
At first I would close my eyes and do what I was told. I would pray from Mom and Dad. Pray for my dog and my Grandma, sometimes I would even pray for my Brothers. But in time my mind began to wander. At some point in everyone’s life you reach the point where you begin to question your existence and how you fit into every single action around you. It was during this time that I started peeking during our nightly prayers.
I wouldn’t look for anything in particular, but you could say I was definitely looking for something. I would see my brother’s eyes closed tightly, their mouths quietly moving along with their prayers. I would see my dad, slumped over on my bed taking in the silence of the moment, mentally preparing himself for his nightly work.
It was only after I started letting my eyes scan the room during prayer that I really started to see ‘God in the details’ as it were. Things always look vastly different when you know you aren’t supposed to be seeing it, and for me that made all the difference. As I knelt by the bed, atoning for my sins and asking for forgiveness, it wasn’t a feeling of relaxation but rather a rush of excitement. I don’t think the power of God has ever put on a greater display to me since. Maybe that is how my Father felt as we left the house every Sunday? Surely a God that would allow us the power to disregard him so couldn’t be all bad after all..
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