Trust and Injustice: Lightning Vs. Water Part 2 - December 18, 2010

Continued from Maybe..You Should Talk to Him: Lighting Vs. Water

 Hey! Remember me? I'm the waiter who used to work for minimum wage at The Florence Cafe. I used to have a girlfriend like I told you last time, but she broke up with me right after I lost my job. Tough luck, huh? Well, that's life I guess. You win some, you lose some. As long as you're content with what you have, it's all good. But, right now, I'm having as much faith in my philosophy as I'm sure that I'll see pigs fly one day. As I'm sure that there'll ever be snow in South Florida. But that really isn't the moral of this story. The moral has more to do with what happened to me a few weeks after I met that distressed girl-Aileen, was it?-Aline, I think, and her concerned boyfriend, Yuri. Yeah, you remember them, right? Like lightning and water, weren't they? Like lightning and water...
    Anyway, I was just walking around an almost abandoned neighborhood, hoping it would provide a shortcut to a job interview that I was almost late for and I only had a couple more blocks to go. At that point I would have killed for a car, but luckily for a potential victim, there were none in that desolate part of town. In the distance as I started to jog towards my destination, I could make out the entrance to a run-down park in that part of the city and as I neared it, I started to hear strange sounds echoing from it. The closer I got, the more distinct the sounds became, until I could make out a sound like the cracking of a whip and the crackling of something else, with the sound of chests heaving and feet hitting various surfaces. I also could make out words being briefly exchanged until the cacophony repeated itself.
"I thought you said you'd think it over and choose what was right," I heard a male voice say, an oddly familiar one too. "I did," a second, female voice answered, "and this is by far the most right way to proceed." Then I heard the crack that I was almost certain was a whip followed by something that sounded like the buzzing and crackling of electricity. Then it hit me. Unless I'm not mistaken, I thought, I'm hearing that same couple that I helped out at the cafe! I recalled Aline with her dark attire and striking appeal as well as the spiky black-haired blue-eyed Yuri with a watery feel about him that had the effect of calming everyone's senses. And by the sounds of their current encounter, they were having a heck of a fight.
    The last time I had seen the two, I had helped them find common ground by offering the advice that they should talk to each other in order to resolve whatever was troubling them. By the time I reached the entrance of the park and stared at the scene before me, I figured that my advice had worked in a way. But it had created a whole new situation all together. One that I could hardly believe I was seeing with my own eyes.
    Aline was standing with extraordinary balance atop of a fence holding an ink black whip and looking up at Yuri, who was standing on top of a lampost on another corner of the park. While I was gaping, the two of them seemed too busy with each other to notice me. "Aline, please reconsider," urged Yuri, "what you're pledging to isn't out there to create anything better, only to destroy." Aline just snorted, "You wouldn't know anything about what i went through and what needs to be done because of it. I need to avenge my kingdom's rightful place at the Council of Elders which someone you pledged to turned to shame and ruin!" As soon as she finished saying that sentence, her whip came alive with electricity surging around it and suddenly, it came down on the top of the lampost, with Aline growling because her target had escaped to another position. While Aline landed on top of a monkey bar, the unfortunate part of the lampost that her whip had come down on came crashing to the ground. Yuri, though, had safely made it on top of a playground tower. (You could see my mouth dropping lower and lower as those unbelievable things occurred). I was completely apalled at what was going on and I almost thought I was dreaming. Only, someone who was dreaming wouldn't feel a bruise coming on from pinching himself for so long. Which was how I knew that what I was seeing was very much real.
      "You coward!" Aline accused, "You can't even stop avoiding for a second and come fight!" Yuri shrugged. "Hey, I never said I wanted to fight you. So I'm not going to." Aline narrowed her eyes, "I can't believe you've made it alive this far, Yuri. When I've used my closest to maximum speed possible." The boy shrugged again, "Reflexes?" I could feel the tension building up in the air as Aline gripped her whip with an anger and desperation so great that I wondered how she could contain both those emotions at once. Yuri felt it too and also readied himself for the coming attack. But, I wasn't just going to stand there gaping this time. I remembered Aline's weary look when she had smiled at me saying, "It's complicated," back at the cafe. I thought that my advice would lead her to reconcile with Yuri, but obviously, she'd been tempted to follow her other choice: to betray him in what I guessed was the way she was doing now. I wasn't planning to let her do that. "Hey Aline!" I yelled, "Remember me?" Both of the youths froze and turned towards me, taking a second before finally recognizing. me At first, Aline looked bewildered, but then she regained her bearings and glared at me. "Don't get involved. I follow my own advice, mortal," she spat, "because no matter what I come up with as a means of doing things, as long as the end is met, it can be used." I shook my head in disbelief. "You really belief that trash? Let me tell you this straight: the end never justifies a mean, not ever. I should know because I tried to be like that and look where I ended up. A waiter at a cafe and now jobless, with no friends and no idea where any of my family members are. Is that what you want? To reach your glorious end but realize you have nowhere to come back to?" I felt the frustration with this stubborn girl climb to a peak. "Is that really what you want?" I yelled. Pigeons flew off of a building upon hearing how loud my voice had gotten. Both of the youths fell silent and there was a moment before any of us did anything.
    After a moment, Aline slowly put away her whip and jumped down from the monkey bars she was on top of. She staggered numbly to a nearby bench and collapsed on it. Yuri was by her side in a minute and I made sure to keep my distance even as I came closer. In a second, the tired girl was sobbing into her hands and mumbling under her breath. "I don't know what to do," she breathlessly cried, "I don't know what to do with myself!" I knew exactly what kind of advice she needed at the moment, almost as if someone had planted it in my head, and I delivered it smoothly, "Trust your friends to take care of you."
    As I walked away from the heartwarming scene of Yuri gently holding a girl he cherished most dearly and finding comforting words for her, I realized that I was officially late for the interview. As I sprinted across the pavement, leaving the remaining blocks behind, I swiftly went by a lady as dark-skinned as Aline with the same piercing eyes and black hair. I came to an abrupt stop, thinking I must have been mistaken, and turned around. To my surprise, no one was using this shortcut and I began to wonder if I had imagined the woman. But then, a voice that seemed to drift on the wind confirmed all my uncertainties. "Thank you," it said. "My daughter will be most indebted to you." Throughout the whole job interview and on my way back home, I began to wonder; if Aline was causing so much trouble, because of her dead mother.    
 
-Lady Stormparade