Waiting for Hope

Crazy Train

Crazy Train - ozzy osborne

Ethan was lost in a cycle of guilt.

Ever since he had left Morro Bay to crash with friends in SLO, he had been on a downward spiral.

Not with drinking. After what happened that horrible night, he wanted nothing to do with the stuff.

He had had plenty of opportunity. The only friends left in town for the summer were a couple of baseball buddies that were in a fraternity. So Ethan had been crashing at the frat house.

The house was pretty creepy, if Ethan was honest with himself. It was what horror films were made of. The thing, which is what he called it, because it seriously looked like a beast, was an old clapboard three story monster. It was probably built in the early 1900's and Ethan wondered how it was still standing. Especially considering its current occupants. A fraternity in this house just screamed disaster. Party porch collapsing, frat boy turned psycho, other worldly spirits, yeah one of those things was bound to happen there.

Ethan had been given access to one of the unoccupied bedrooms for the summer, until the rest of the members returned. But honestly, he couldn't stand sleeping in that room, upstairs, far away from the front door, and potential escape. So he pretty much slept on the couch. And sat on it all day long. Feeling surrounded.

Surrounded by parties and partiers. And he had no interest in partying.

Wallowing. That's all he had the mindset for.

He sat around during parties looking pathetic.

He did find that girls were very interested in brooding, pathetic, non-frat, non-partiers.

Very interested.

Each party had a different set of interested girls.

Some were obvious, coming up to him and trying to start a conversation. Running their hand up his arm to see if he would react to them. A few even tried to whisper, um, suggestions in his ear. He ignored these girls.

No thanks. Not interested.

It was the quiet, shy type that caught his attention. Those girls made his heart ache. They made his stomach knot up. They made him nervous. They made him think of her.

Most of those girls would sit across the room and make occasional eye contact. Sometimes they would give him a small smile. And they were harder to ignore. At least for him.

But he did for a while.

One night, he gave up. He didn't want to be the choir boy anymore. He didn't want to be lonely, missing everyone who had ever meant anything to him.

So he got up from his island, the couch, and went across the room to talk to that night's shy girl.

"Hi," was all he said.

But that's all it took. Then the flirting started. And that eventually led to kissing.

Hey, it had worked for Will, why not him?

And it did, well at least for as long as he was kissing them. He could get lost in it. Sadly, it was kind of like sleeping had been for him. A state of oblivion where all of his trouble could be forgotten. For that moment in time, nothing else hurt him or pulled at his mind. Nothing ate away at his soul.

But, afterwards, he always felt empty. And guilty. In fact, the guilt seemed to magnify, double, increase in breadth and width. How could an emotion feel endless? But this one did.

And it stayed with him until the next shy girl came along. Then the cycle would continue.

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