Yellow Tape

They had all sat down to dinner, eating silently, repetitive motions of the spoon to the bowl, scoop up some of the soupy liquid, bring to the lips, swallow, repeat. The mother reached for a napkin. "We drove past there, the place where they found the skull, the road was a huge hole in the ground, and it was sealed off by yellow tape." The youngest looked up, "oh yes, because yellow tape is going to keep everyone out." The mother laughed "You're so sadistic, Meaghan. There was also the railway post, you know, at the corner of Paisley? Yeah, that one, it was knocked over, must have been some accident. Dee and I drove past it, didn't we?" The oldest looked up "Yes, it too was covered with yellow tape. Wonder if it would have been hit if we had wrapped the tape around it beforehand?" A small chuckling arose from around the table again, fell, and became silent once more.

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She sat on the floor, rustling through papers for a project she had been putting off but finally forced herself to do. She felt tired, her bones, her muscles, her body refused to move freely. Her mind, however, was racing. Traveling outside of her body to anywhere but where she was right then. In a graveyard, dancing with a masked stranger, climbing the stairs of ancient and abandoned ruins, scrambling through the pipes of the underground in the city. Walking freely around the sunlit meadows of a valley, walking through the moonlit forests of the mountains. Her dreams took her to these places, but her body was stuck in the same wretched place day after day after day. She didn't know how long she could stand it. She had felt this way before, the isolation, the wishing to be free, the call for change. Always in the fall did the feelings come. They lasted for what felt like forever right up until the spring came and liberated her from her inner limbo. The effects of these longings were fatal to her everyday life. They kept her distracted, itching to move, daring to sleep. Anything to escape to the life that lay just upon the boundaries of her imagination. She felt something wasn't right, maybe something wasn't.

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She sat in her chair and tapped the keys in front of her. She felt empty. Her life was escaping her, she didn't know how to gain it back. She thought of him. Never has she felt so complete before he had entered her life. She felt, for once, like she could truly breathe. She kept that ability, even long after they had gone their separate ways, though now she thought of him and her heart leapt. Something else, sensing this disgraceful action on the heart's behalf, grabbed the beating thing and held it tight. Though it continued to pump the blood throughout her body. Ba-dum, ba-dum, ba-dum. The heart relaxed, and the hand, or whatever it was, let go. She knew they had missed their chance. Both very much still attached, the moments shared between them could never be the same again. Too much had changed. Though she would continue to dream of him, and he would continue to hold his breath when he thought of her. Life was never a happily ever after. There was always a story after the story, but they never let you in on that.

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All the restrictions to be out done, all the hate to be forgotten, all the rules to be broken, are as simple and as easy as crossing over the yellow tape.