Seven Sins to Die For

Seven Sins to Die For

Simon had a very large family when he was younger.  He was the second youngest.  His little sister Glenda was borne two years after him.  The other siblings, Gary and Patty were twins, they were three years older. Evan was the oldest by two years.  Of course there were their parents, Linda and Willy, making the family of seven share the cramped little house on the outskirts of town, but they were happy.  The family began falling off of its tree when Simon had just turned twelve.
         It was early July of 2001 when Simon’s parents asked him to take Glenda to the carnival that was in town for Fourth of July weekend.  Although he never got along very well with Glenda Simon agreed to take his little sister to the carnival because he loved the rides.  They sped off into town on their bikes, fueled by the ecstasy of roller coasters and Ferris Wheels. Their parents had given them twenty dollars to buy tickets with.  Since Simon was oldest he was in charge of the money.  Once they had purchased their tickets Simon put them in his pocket and told Glenda that he would hold on to them until it she needed them.  Glenda said that she needed to use the restroom so Simon took her to the long row of green outhouses.  When Glenda was in the outhouse Simon rushed off to the roller coaster and gave the ticket man all of the tickets so he could ride five times in a row, leaving no tickets for Glenda.  She saw her big brother cheating her as she was coming out of the outhouse.  Glenda started crying and took her bike and started to ride home.  Simon never noticed she was gone until he was ready to leave.  He figured she just got mad and went home crying.  That is precisely what happened, almost.  When Simon reached his little white house and walked in he noticed that everyone was either in a state of absolute shock or their eyes wet and their faces red from sobbing.  Glenda had been struck by a car and killed on her bike ride home.
         It had been almost nine months since the tragedy of Glenda when the reaper stuck again, with the aid of Simon of course.  Gary came home from a high school party drunk late one night.  Simon was the only member of the family awake when Gary came home.  He had a big bottle of whiskey in his hand and Simon wanted some.  Gary knew that he wouldn’t tell so he made Simon a deal. 
         “I’ll only let you drink if you help me drink this bottle in ten minutes. Ok?”
         Simon quickly agreed and they began to consume the liquor at a dangerous rate.  Gary was drinking much more the bottle then Simon and he was already drunk from the party.  After a while Gary fell asleep on their bedroom floor.  Simon was sure he was going to be ok so he crawled into bed and passed out.  Simon awoke to the sounds of screaming.  In his room were his Linda, Willy, Patty and Evan.  Also, lying on the floor next to his bed was dead Gary.  He had died nearly ten hours ago of acute alcohol poisoning.  The family was horrified.  Things were never the same, except for the tragedy.  That never left them.
         All of the traumatic events in the past year had a malignant effect on the family.  With Glenda and Gary gone, Linda and Willy had become deeply depressed.  Willy began drinking constantly.  Linda sustained herself not from alcohol but from cheating on her husband.  Things went on like this for about a month.  It had to end sometime and everyone knew it.  They just didn’t know how badly it would turn out to be.
         In the meantime Simon had gotten sick of everyone expecting to live up to his brother, Evan.  It wasn’t Simon’s fault that he was an all state quarterback or a state champion track star.  That just wasn’t who Simon wanted to be and he was getting tired of everyone telling him otherwise.  Simon developed an unhealthy hatred for his brother after this.  His envy was getting the best of him and Simon wasn’t sure what he was going to do.
         It was Evan’s close-mindedness that really got to Simon.  They tried to talk about the problem once.  Simon told Evan exactly how he felt.  He told him that he couldn’t take trying to live up to the reputation that was already laid out for him and he couldn’t go down the path that Evan had already made.  Evan knew that Simon was right but thought that everything he had done was right and how Simon was reacting to expectations was ridiculous.  Seeing his little brother act like this made Evan start thinking.  He lived his entire life doing what people thought he should do, doing things that only made him look good.  Not once had he ever done what he wanted because it was what he wanted.  He truly envied his little brother.  Evan became horribly depressed.  Later that afternoon he drove his car into a fuel tanker north of town on the highway.  He was estimated to have been traveling close to one hundred miles per hour.  No one survived. 
         Before anyone knew what had happened something was brewing back at their house, something bad.  It turned out that Willy knew that Linda had been cheating on him.  He came home from work early one day knowing what he would find.  Willy loaded his small .38 snub-nosed revolver.  They were going to pay for this.  As he prepared to rein his wrath upon the two lovers in his bedroom Willy heard ambulance sirens.  He thought nothing of it.  Willy calmly and quietly opened the bedroom door and fired four shots into the two people under the covers.  They never knew it was coming.  Satisfied, with a grin on his face and a pistol in his mouth, Willy squeezed the trigger and started to laugh as the hammer fell.
         Little did they know it, Patty and Simon were the only family members left.  Their Linda and Willy had just died, as well as Evan.  If they would have know that maybe things would have been different for them in the end. 
         Patty and Simon were at the grocery store picking up some things for dinner.  When they came back to the car it wouldn’t start.  Neither Patty nor Simon knew what was wrong.  It was just getting dark and Simon thought it was a bad idea to walk to the house this time of night.  He suggested taking a bus.  Patty refused.  Her argument was that she hadn’t been on a bus for years and that was for poor people.  In the end her pride was her downfall.  Simon waited for the next bus as Patty began walking away.  After about five minutes of waiting the bus arrived.  It drove past Patty walking just in time for Simon to miss saying his last goodbye. Instead he rolled down the window and yelled:
         “I told you! You should have listened to me!”
         She made a motion to flip him off but a homeless man she had refused to give change to earlier stuck her in the neck with a broken wine bottle.  Simon was shattered.  He was even more so distraught when he discovered the blood bath in his house.  He decided there was nothing more to do. For five days he lay hunched up on the couch.  His depression fueled his laziness, or possibly the other way around.  It didn’t matter.  The corpses began to rot, the phone rang several times and people had rang the doorbell a number of times.  It didn’t matter, he just laid there much like a sloth until he lost consciousness from dehydration.  That shouldn’t have been the way everything happened but it did. That’s it, life to death in seven deadly degrees.         
                  The lust of his wife provoked Willy’s wrath
                While Gluttonous Gary *comatosed* his soul.
                    Patty persisted on pride over patience
                  Greed by her brother killed little Glenda and
                  Envy of nothing destroyed Evans mind.
                    All blame comes back to the last one alive
                Whose ungodly sloth was his own demise.