Barrel Scrolls and Broken Souls

She cried herself to sleep pretty much every night. The voices inside her head would never quieten down. She would be laying in her bed with her eyes closed, but her mind had never settled for once in a long time. How did she know that her mind was running way ahead? The tears running down her face showed it all. Ava’s life was way too different. 

Endless nights of wet pillows with muffled sobs and tossing and turning. Will the sun ever dawn on her, she always wondered. Days passed, so did months. Who knew she was having such a hard time battling with her mind. Plastering a fake smile seemed far easier than taking the pain to explain all that she feels only to be turned down as a joke or labelled “crazy”. 

The only way she found to escape her mind was by collecting used pen barrels. Some would collect stamps, some collect coins, some collect comic books and even classic cars. But who thought of pen barrels?

 During weekends, she’d spend all night meddling with her pen barrels. Her mother would peek from the door, look at her daughter sit with papers and pens. Unravelling the mind on to the paper she’d thought but, our girl was different. 

Writing her mind down was something she had a flair for but for an introvert sharing the same was not. Moving into the new school, she walked in with all the nervousness and shivers one would generally have. But little did she know, things were about to take turns. Bumping into Nikolas was never a mistake after they’re beautifully grown friendship that budded from the bump. Nikolas would visit Ava’s family often, the friends became inseparable. Ava was certainly not what she seemed, Nikolas was the living proof to that statement. Ava’s mother was too busy to notice what was up with Ava’s life. But now she had Nikolas, who pretty much covered the shift for her. 

Many months later, Ava decided to show him a secret that she had been keeping from almost everyone. The two of them got together at this diner that they called “their” place. They sat together munching on fries and sipping cola. Ava pulled a blue-green coloured opaque box out of her sling bag. Their eyes met in excitement as they opened the box together to find a massive collection of pen barrels. Nikolas’s eyes brightened as he picked a bejewelled barrel and opened it to try writing on the tissue on the table, except they never wrote.  

He looked up at her sceptically when she slowly pulled the pen out of his hand. She was grinning as she twisted the barrel open to reveal a little scroll of beige paper that fell out of it. He opened it to read one of the most heart-wrenching pieces of writings he’s ever come across. It read, 

“Only if people listened to humans as much they listened to ghosts, there would be lesser ghosts to listen to”

03.05.10

The paper was light in his hand and a few words were smudged, he knew what they were. It dawned it on him as he looked down into the box, all the barrels were opaque and wondered how many treasured thoughts it contained. Slowly, they started reading more barrelled scrolls together. There were too many barrels. So they’d read five barrels every weekend at the diner. It became their ritual. Ava and Nikolas confided in each other. People would have shipped them in school, all the way from middle school up to the senior year in high school. They had a lot to risk if they paid heed to it. It was moreover like a gamble, they’d either have all they would ever want or they’d end up losing everything they had and never wanted to lose. Who knew they might have ended up together. But fate certainly had other plans. 

One winter weekend, Ava reached the diner half an hour earlier than usual. Her mum didn’t notice. She walked into the diner and seated herself at their usual spot. To while away some time, she rummaged through her barrel collection and decided to open one when a little paper peeked out of the cushion beside her. She pulled it out and it was one of her scrolls. Confused, she opened more of the barrels inside her box. Only to find them empty. She froze in shock, it could only mean one thing. She felt like her world had come crashing down, she felt like she was exposed with her writings out in the world unknown.

 She picked her stuff and shuffled out of the diner when she briefly met the last person she wanted to meet. “Get away from me!” she said, as she walked out with tears brimming at the corner of her eye. A little scroll fell at Nikolas’s feet, he realized what must’ve happened. Before he could run to her to convince her, she crossed the road and was run over by a speeding car. The entire world froze for Nikolas. The box of barrels was thrown on the street and the scrolls from the opened barrels flew into the sky. Only if he kept no secrets or if she had known what Nikolas was up to. 

***

At the funeral, after the ceremony, Nikolas gave a handmade album to Ava’s mother who opened the book to find beautiful writings penned down on beige papers which were stuck neatly. Some were smudged and some were scribbled. But a little warmth spread as she saw them all signed. One-piece especially caught her eye. It read, 

To my mother who sculpted me, I may not be exactly like you. 

But I know beneath these flaws lay an etching of you.

-A

As for the writings that flew into the air, a few were published in the local gazette as “The Flight of Thoughts.” The mother saw what her daughter was in little scrolls of beige that was the talk of the town. This time it was someone else’s chance. She saw that indeed it was from her that her daughter had incurred the thoughts. She cried herself to sleep pretty much every night.