Everyday Canvas

Charlie

Prompt: "Such a shame. That boy had such promise." Shaking her head, she remembered some of the times she'd seen him... it's creative Saturday have fun.

Charlie

She shifts her head on the pillow. watching the diffused light from the mid-autumn moon. As long billowy curtains blow into the room from the open window, she can’t help but recall the fun times they had in summer...Charlie’s spontaneous laugh, his ecstasy when he played tricks on other beach people, the way he poured himself on the sand with his butt tucked inside his green Euro briefs… “Good-time Charlie,” her grandmother would have called him, had she been alive.

Then, why this sudden gravity, this Messiah fix? And why had he abandoned her and lost sight of what real life was about? Did I do this to him? Did I make him become a monk all of a sudden? No, definitely not. Her expectations were for him to continue as he had been, to stay with her forever and ever, and to keep on being the partying guy in fall, winter, and in any season, for he had such promise to be the fun of the party...

Every step a booby trap, every second a time bomb, she thinks because she isn’t used to guys instantly changing like that into monk outfits, humming praises to the Creator, and turning into bearded heretics. This is a calamity, and it shocks her. Her rage drones on into her nightmares as she closes her eyes.

In the neighboring state, in a hotel room, Charlie gets out of his monk suit borrowed from a seasonal theater, thinking, Such a wonderful time I’ll be having in Aspen on the slopes. I have to protect my life from clingy people. Lucky, I got rid of her for good, and he congratulates himself for being the possessor of some unique brilliance.