tristan

Prologue

     Tristan stood in a back corner of the Abnormal Psychology classroom, watching people as they walked in and sat down. He looked like an animal preparing to pounce on its prey. His clothing, all black, seemed to emit waves of darkness that absorbed the light around him in the bright fluorescent room. This darkness left writhing wisps of shadow that danced around him on the white walls against which he stood. His fire-engine red hair barely touched the collar of his black silk shirt. From his long black coat to his Dr. Martins, everything was black, with an occasional silver accent from the jewelry he wore. A pair of black sunglasses was almost permanently welded to his alabaster face. It was rare to see Tristan without his shades. When someone saw him without the sunglasses, it was difficult not to stare into those beautiful hazel eyes. They mesmerized the victim like the hypnotic eyes of a dancing cobra, with their changing colors ever swirling with shades of green, brown and the occasional hint of gold. It was difficult to tell if he was serpentine or feline in nature, but Lucy assumed it was a little of both. Aside from Tristan's eyes, the next most beautiful aspect of him was his melodic voice, though people rarely heard it. Lucy and her fellow classmates rarely saw him speaking to anyone. Tristan drew curious glances through his quiet darkness.

       Once, following a particularly grueling Abnormal Psychology class about Personality Disorders, Lucy followed Tristan outside and attempted to speak with him. They stood against the cold off-white brick building as the rain began to fall. She did most of the talking and quickly became flustered. She soon began to ask ridiculous questions to which he politely, but tersely responded. He had looked at her as if she were odd space creature or an interesting science experiment. Bitter amusement showed in his eyes as she struggled to retain her composure. It was the one-year anniversary of Kimberly's death. Kim was the final death of three within the past year. These deaths among friends and family members had left her very depressed and angry at her losses. She knew she was quickly nearing her breaking point. She had already begun the descent into a major depressive episode. She'd chosen this day, a cold and windy day with rain drizzling from the heavens to talk to Tristan. The sadness of the day, along with other negative feelings and memories of happier days like this one had caused her to release some tears in the rainfall. Crying in the rain was a wonderful thing, but not when done in front of a total stranger. The brevity of his responses and the uncomfortable silence in conversation bothered Lucy so much that she eventually returned to the dry warmth of the Psychology building.

       Lucy's inquiries to friends yielded no new information. None of her friends seemed to know anything about him, if they even recognized his name at all. There were a few wild speculations, such as the rumor that Tristan was metal rock band musician, or that he was really a girl. Many people mistakenly took Tristan for a girl at first glance. He had such beautifully styled and stunningly colored hair, clear pale skin and fashion sense that it was an understandable, although incorrect conclusion. Tristan rarely, if ever smiled, which had reminded Lucy of herself during the tumultuous days of high school. She felt a strong need to get to know him better. After her failed attempt at communication, she looked up his name online and successfully ran across a link to his personal website. On his homepage, he displayed his disturbing works of oil and acryllic paintings along with a few depressing poems to go along with each painting. Tristan's artwork reached Lucy to the core, as she recognized many of the themes and ideas that he weaved into such beautiful imagery. She began to understand the inner workings of Tristan, but never realized where it would lead her. The awakening of that which Lucy felt was long dead within her had begun. The past returned to her.

                                                               * * *
Chapter One

       Lucy was no stranger to depressive episodes. She experienced these episodes frequently since early childhood. Falling asleep was always difficult. She was lucky if she could get to sleep by five in the morning. When she did fall asleep, she didn't want to wake up. It was often three or four in the afternoon before she'd crawl from her warm bed. In sleep, the defunct were still alive. They visited her dreams often, sometimes decomposing, more often just really pale and sickly looking. Sometimes they talked to her, sometimes they just stood at a distance and watched her. Waking up was disturbing, reliving the fact that they were no longer around, that she would never see them again on the physical plane. Sometimes it took hours before realizing why the dream was so disturbing to her. Sometimes, it was just difficult to see why it was so important to be alive. Living hurt.

       There were many factors which lead to the depression, among them were a slew of poor relationships, and growing up with an abusive old demon for a caretaker. The caretaker had no qualms about breaking down doors, kicking and hitting children. This abuse lasted many years for Lucy and her siblings, until it was discovered and the demon was removed from her environment. Lucy became more and more gloomy the older she got. Depression was always quick to rise for any occasion. All she wanted to do was sleep, wear black clothing and strange jewelry. This tendency partially receded toward the end of high school, when she was introduced to the worst thing that could possibly happen to her.

       Bright prospects loomed for dark little Lucy as her grades were fairly good and she passed the SATs with flying colors. She was in the top ten percent of her class, and the opportunities were looking bright. She had a part-time job which she hated, although she did love spending time with her interesting co-workers. These young people were some of the best and most honest people she would ever meet. They appeared to be so free. Free to make their own decisions. They seemed so alive. Lucy never really felt alive. Her friends often teased that she was a vampire. She rarely, if ever, smiled. Her skin was a pale, translucent white as her numerous medications had caused her to develop an allergy to sunlight. One evening, a gorgeous new blond and physcially fit crew worker showed up. He was very nearly a modern Adonis.

       Lucy had seen this boy in school. It seemed that he was a transfer from New Jersey. His golden hair and ocean blue eyes that saw through to the soul were beautiful accents to his firm body. He'd been a football player at his former school, son of a military officer. His nose was slightly crooked as though it had been broken, his face strewn with small scars that added to his mystery and animal magnetism. Lucy felt physically drawn to him. She never had paid much attention to him as he seemed so far out of her reach.

       She was surprised to see him working behind the counter of Wednesday's fast food restaurant as she came in for an evening shift one Thursday. She walked past the front counter boys and went to the storeroom to check the duty list. Tonight she was assigned to salad bar and hostess positions. Big surprise. She went out to the salad bar area to clean up the mess the previous shift had left behind.   A few hours into her shift, as the restaurant calmed down the boy came out to the salad bar and began talking to her.

       "So, what do you do for fun around here?" He smiled at her, a beautiful bright smile. His voice was soft, with a slight lisp, probably another injury of the car accident that had caused his other scars and imperfections. She really couldn't think of much, it was a pretty suburban area and she was practically barricaded into her house with the responsibility of looking after her younger brother and following a lengthy set of strict rules set by her divorced mother. After some thought, she answered him.

       "There isn't anything to do around here. Hiking maybe, over at the state park." Her sarcasm was inching toward the surface. Lucy couldn't understand why he would be talking to her. He kept trying to make her smile for some strange reason. She hated when people told her to smile.

         "Smile!" He commanded from the customer side of the salad bar, leaning closer.

         "Maybe I don't want to smile."

         "Sure you do. Come on, smile!" He demonstrated, with something looking more like a grimace. She volleyed his shot with an exaggerated frown.

        "So, what do you do when you're not working?" He prodded as she wondered why he was still hanging around.

        "School. Read. Hike." She said in a monotonous voice, trying not to smile, becoming annoyed at his continued attempts.

        "We should get together sometime. We both seem like a couple losers. Hey, we could form a Losers' Club!" He suggested.

        "Don't see why."

        "Oh, come on, it could be fun." He extended his arm under the sneeze shield and poked her arm. He walked around the side of the bar to the swinging door in order to have better access and added privacy.

         "Don't really see a point to it. Why are you bothering me?"

         "You seemed sad. I wanted to see if I could get you to smile."

         "Love those difficult challenges, don't you?" Despite Lucy's best efforts, she was unable to stop a half-smile from sneaking into her lips. She wondered what the hell this guy was doing. Why would someone so good-looking bother with her? Nobody else ever did.

         "Can I have your phone number?" He smiled his most attractive knee wavering smile and handed over a piece of paper towel and a pen.

        "I guess so, mom doesn't mind me getting calls. It's everything else that's off limits. Still don't know your name." She wondered why she'd agreed, but wrote down her number anyway, feeling weird fluttering bugs trying to escape from her stomach. Lucy figured he'd never use the number. She was wrong.

* To be continued...

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