Clock: Chapter 17

Perhaps I should take a brief moment to rewind and go back a little bit to explain how Emily and Carlin got where they were.

Carlin was raised by two very ineffectual parents. For the early part of her youth she had gone to a couple of very nice private schools, but eventually they lost interest and by the time high school came around, she was going to public schools. She never saw much of her father, which I suppose is okay, because he abused her quite often. Her mother was always blissfully unaware of anything happening at any time, as she drowned herself in prescription medication to pretend like reality wasn’t really there.

Emily on the other hand, was raised by somewhat kind, if not overly religious parents. She had only just recently come out of the closet to them, telling them of Carlin, pleading that she’s not some evil creature for being the way she is. When asked if her homosexuality was a choice or just the way her body worked, Emily would always balk and say that she didn’t care.

Her parents begrudgingly accepted her, her brother, not so much. He’s the good boy of the family. He took the religious advocacy a little too far… more on that in a little bit.

Not many people really knew Carlin and Emily were gay, but for the most part they never tried to hog the limelight with it and shove it down everyone’s face. They were well aware that they were “different”, and because of that the world they lived in would not bend to their whim.

If anything, the world they lived in was one ripe with fear and stupidity. Abortion clinics show up bombed and burning on television, and the religious right applaud and cheer, blissfully unaware of the pure irony of it all. Any attempt at a gay right rally in the city a few miles away from where they lived always resulted in violence, and it being an election year and all, the intentional divisiveness in the world only grows stronger. The hurt is intensified, and those causing it, are wonderfully unaware of the suffering.

Riots… feed them to me. Let me bask in the rotting corpses and crying parents.

Anger… let them yell, let the noise grow, but ensure that nothing changes.

The world these people are given is directly related to the world they’ve given away. They make no better place for their children. They fuck up as easily as their parents, make the same mistakes, and hate the same people. Racism, bigotry, some kind of fundamentalist movement, it never inspires people to better themselves. I’ve grown to enjoy it, much for the same reason these people are easily pacified by television programs and films about slaughter… it never changes.

But I’m not here for that. I can’t allow myself to get caught up in the noise. L.E.X is silent, but he is not amused by what is transpiring. He wants to help Carlin, he wants to yell out and scream to her that she needs to get home right away. He knows he shouldn’t, but that doesn’t make it any easier for him.

She’s buying new sheets for her bed. Amazing how something so simple will cause her so much pain. She really likes the new color she’s picked out though.

She’s on her way home, and tries to call the house. She thinks it’s weird that Emily doesn’t pick up the phone, but passes it off as no big deal.

She pulls into her usual parking spot, and L.E.X is so filled with anger at me. Let him be. This needs to happen… even if I don’t want it to. Someone will always be forced to carry the burden of others.

Carlin sees that the door to her apartment is wide open. She thinks that’s odd, but again, doesn’t pay it any mind. She has nothing to do for the rest of the day except spend her time with Emily. So she thinks, anyway.

“Emi, what’s going on?” She asks in such a coy way as she rounds the corner and enters the apartment.

“Oh… oh fuck, oh fuck, Emi! Emily!”

She looks into the apartment and finds it in utter disarray.

Vile words scrawled over the room, hateful remarks, spray painted over the walls and torn furniture, the broken television set, everything.

Carlin dashes to the bedroom, the small joy that she thought she’d have in her day now drained and gone.

“EMILY!” Scream.

“EMILY!” Bleed it out.

“EMILY!” She’s never going to answer you.

The time, the place… it all could have been a poorly staged robbery from her angle at first, but so much of it has been done to drive the point home. Really, for idiots, they wanted to make damn sure their message got through…

For example… what’s left of Emily…

Hah, poor girl never told Carlin about her family. At least not enough to be relevant to this situation… the tragic irony, that the man who crusaded as a fundamentalist had a sister who was gay.

“Was” being the key word, because they decided to do something about that… make an example out of her.

Her curly brown hair covered what remains of a once beautiful face… so much of her torn, so much of her blood spilled. Carlin sits there, not even being able to call forth tears. All she can do is scream.

“You can’t be dead!” Guess again, queer.

“EMI, YOU CAN’T LEAVE ME!” But why is that? Selfish reasoning that she just wants to be happy herself, or does she truly wish that their places had been reversed… was she ever willing to die for Emily? I guess it doesn’t matter much. The era of intentions has given way to the era of consequences.

They were homosexual, thus… they were evil. Primitive minds loosely define what they know of the world by some imaginary standards of ethics and morals. True justice, is the face of true evil.

A foolish brother that clung to gods graven in the image of man, from a time when fire was made by magic, and the world was flat. But in an ironic turn, at least he did something about what he believed in. Carlin never acted upon anything… she couldn’t keep Emily safe.

All she did was piss and moan, but never did she stand up. She would laugh at Emi for ever wanting to attend some of those activist rallies. It’s not so funny now, is it?

She’s dead, and she died for Carlin… died for an apathetic queer that sustained both their lives upon a foundation of hypocrisy. This is so much fun!

L.E.X writhes, he doesn’t like this, doesn’t like what he thinks is injustice. What cruel shape of the word he believes in is meaningless, this is what’s happening, this is it!

Carlin tries to speak, but she just mumbles and cries over the corpse of her beloved. She keeps fiddling with her hands and her hair, trying to act like as though at some point, she’ll wake up and this cruel joke will be over with… but she doesn’t move.

Whatever words she vomits out of her mouth now mean nothing. Words and actions are equally meaningless in an age where consequence is up for debate.

A radical religious group wanted to make en example out of someone… their leader picked his own sister, to die for his cause. Carlin thinks she’s in pain now… just wait until she sees the video of the act put up on the internet.

Monsters… and ones that will be praised as heroes in some circles… the world is now so backwards, that people would cheer for murder. I suppose I can’t pick on the poor girl too much, she had the right idea after all. She was good natured, never tried to flaunt her way of life in public, and didn’t force any beliefs on anyone else.

Monsters… no… ants. Prospective could be their saving grace, instead, it is a curse to them, a burden they wish not to carry.

Carlin just wants Emily to wake up… wants this all to go away.

She already ponders the idea of joining her. So strong is her grief that she seems completely sure that she’d rather be with Emily in death, than mourn her in life. She’s desperate for a reason to live, but… what else is there?