konstantin

I scooted back from the wheelchair to the couch. I had nothing better to do than bum around and watch National Geographic Channel on the TV. Today was the first day I felt better after the horrible flu that was haunting me for a whole week. I hoped Lora could come and pick me up for dinner but she phoned earlier saying, she wasn’t coming until late that night. She had been coming to my apartment everyday while I was sick - making chicken broth and green tea, although she knew I hated green tea. She knew everything about me and I certainly knew everything about her. We were close since the sixth grade - ever since her mom asked me to help Lora with her math homework. I was the geek of the neighborhood, probably because all I was doing was to read and spent my days in front of the computer. My spinal cord was partially severed after a car accident eighteen years ago - dad lost his leg during the same accident when an eighteen-wheeler crossed the divider on the highway and smashed our Nisan Sentra into a ditch. Mom was pregnant with my unborn brother and she lost the baby that day. I was in the hospital for quite some time and although the doctors said that some function of my spinal cord had recovered, I was never able to walk again. I ended up confined at home since the age of seven, flipping books and studying French when other kids were playing soccer and baseball with their fathers. At school, I was the teacher’s pet - skinny, little dude with glasses and a black, automatic wheelchair. My projects were always ready a week before the deadline and my papers were read in front of the class. I excelled in all subjects, but math and physics were my favorite - I started doing college level algebra at sixth grade. That’s how I met Lora. She was flunking math and her mom ask my parents if I could help her. They worked together at the clothing factory and my mom invited Lora home and I did her homework. She started coming to our appartment twice a week for “tutoring” and soon she became my only friend. Not that I didn’t try to find other friends - I mingled with the neighborhood kids a few times but I couldn’t play any sports, nor I could ride a bike or go fishing with them. One day, we were eight grade, my parents made me to go out and play with the local boys. They were worried about me growing up as a loner, staring at the computer screen all day long. I went out on the street and I saw a small group gathered in front of our building - boys and girls sitting on the benches in the park - all chatting and laughing. I rolled my wheelchair towards them and they stopped talking as soon as they noticed me.
“Look, who is here - that freak”, said a kid with a red hair and they all laughed.
“What are you doing here?”, he asked.
“Nothing - just decided to go out and catch some sun”, I was avoiding his eyes.
“You can do that across the street”, the boy said. “We don’t need mamma’s boys around here”, he turned around.
A tall, lanky guy who was kissing his girlfriend pulled a cigarette out of his pocket.
“You wanna joint, Bill Gates?”, he laughed at me.
“Mickey, are you out of your mind?”, the red haired kid yelled at him. “This wacko will rat you out to the principle first thing in the morning”
“No, he won’t”, Mickey said and pulled my glasses quickly, scratching off my left cheek. “Can you see who has the joint now?”
They all started laughing and I couldn’t see anything, desperately trying to reach for my glasses, but apparently he was backing off, waving them in the distance.
“Give him, the glasses, right now!”, someone yelled and I recognized Lora’s voice.
“Oh, the geek’s girlfriend”, Mickey said, “and what will happen if I don’t give him the glasses?”
“Then you’ll have a meeting with my cousin Hank at the school yard tomorrow”, Lora replied.
They all stopped laughing rather quick. Hank was the leader of the wrestling team - six foot and three inches tall, two hundred pounds all ripped muscle and he was Lora’s big cousin.
“Take you glasses skinny”, Mickey gave me my glasses and I put them back instantly. “Now you both get lost!”, he said but didn’t sound too convincing.
“We don’t like your company either”, Lora answered and steered my wheelchair home.
“Did they hurt you Robbie?”, she was cleaning the scratch on my cheek in the kitchen.
“Everything’s fine Lora, I’m not that brittle”
“I didn’t mean that Robbie, I was just trying to help”, she apologized.
“I know and I would like to thank you for what you did for me out there. Are you coming home tomorrow to go over you science paper?”
“I’ll come”, she said and left.
That night for the first time ever, since I left the hospital, I couldn’t sleep. I thought about Lora, I knew I was in love with her. The situation looked a somewhat twisted - in all the books that I had read during the years, the pirate captain or the ragged detective were the tough guys helping beautiful girls, but in real life our roles were reversed. Nevertheless, I felt Lora so close to my heart that I crashed in love with her for the first and only time in my life. We stayed close together during high school and even in college. I could have gone to any place possible, but I waited for Lora to get into college first. I enrolled in a school in the same area just be close to her. We were going to movies and opera together, dining out other twice a week, and I was calling her almost every day. Lora had her own life too - she was very much into sports and dancing and I couldn’t join her in these activities. Although she won a scholarship for swimming, skiing and tennis were her forte. She took me to various tennis tournaments and I was proudly standing in her area, watching her smash the opposition six games to love quite frequently. Lora looked amazing in the white tennis outfit with her mini skirt barely covering her bronze athletic legs, but what I liked the most was when she sat next to me, all warm and sweaty with her dark blonde hair in a pony tail; drinking water and wiping her face with a fluffy cotton towel. I loved the smell of her warm body and I cherished to lick the sweaty puddles on her forehead. Of course, I never said a word because I was afraid I would loose her as a friend. Lora had several affairs during the years and she was telling me all about them. The first guy was a pale looking guitar player with a greasy, long hair and ragged jeans whom she met in a party downtown. Lora took me out with his friends when they were drinking beer and playing music at the beach one night. Oddly enough, I wasn’t jealous - I felt this relationship was a fluke; I knew she was just satisfying her physiologic needs and it would be over soon. Lora dumped him three months later and she was mine again, at least in my own world. Her next boyfriend was even worse - a bolding businessman with a beer belly, three kids and a suspicious wife. He was cheating on his wife and I told Lora that this romance would make her an accomplice to his sins, but she only laughed at me and said that he was only a temporarily solution until she could find Mr. Perfect. The last one I remembered lasted only a week - Lora caught him nailing one of her coworkers and kicked him out of her car, making him hitchhike on the highway. After each of her relationships she liked to come to my apartment, drank tea with me and talked for hours. “If all men were like you, Robbie”, she used to say at the end and would leave me alone dreaming of myself been her next and only boyfriend.
That night Lora didn’t come but she rang on the doorbell around lunch next day.
“Sorry, I didn’t come last night Robbie”, she kissed me and tossed her tennis bag in the middle of the hallway. “I feel so guilty”, she said, “How are you?”, she poured each of us a glass of orange juice while chatting. “You have to take plenty of vitamins”, she gave me the juice. Lora, like my mother thought that colds were very dangerous for people on wheelchairs and was genuinely concerned about my health.
“I feel great, finally the cold is over. What’s going on Lora? I haven’t seen you much this month, except this week, of course.”
“Robbie, I have to tell you something”, she took my hands and looked me in the eyes. “Finally, I found Mr. Perfect”, she smiled at me. “His name is Chris. I met him at the tennis club. Chris is an assistant hedge fund manager. We’ve been seen each other for the last few months and yesterday he popped the question. You should both meet some day”, she looked happy as a little girl, unwrapping her Christmas presents.
“What did you just say?”, I was trying to find my words. “Isn’t this too premature? I mean, you are only twenty four and you barely know this guy”, I imagined her pregnant with her second child cooking roast beef by the stove.
“I am ready Robbie, I met the right person. Don’t worry darling, I will never leave you”, she gave me one of her charming smiles.
I didn’t say a word for a while.
“Marry me Lora!”, I don’t know how these words slipped out of my mouth. “I have a proposal from a software company in London. They are offering a huge salary with a great sign in bonus. We can go together”, I finally found the courage to confess my feelings after all these years.
She looked stunned and confused for a moment.
“I’m sorry Robbie. I should have known how much this will hurt you. I was so inconsiderate”
I felt awkward and kept stirring nervously my juice with a straw.
“May be I should go”, Lora said and took her tennis bag.
I just sat on the couch, staring at the wall for a while. I never felt endangered during her previous relationships but this was different. Lora was in love and getting married and I was about to lose my best friend and the woman I loved. I didn’t hear form her until after the weekend when I called her.
“Lora, I’m sorry about the other day. I want to wish you and Chris luck and I will send you a wedding present.”
“Robbie, you are so noble. I am sorry, I hurt your feelings. You know that you are still my best friend, don’t you?”
“I know, Lora. May be we should have lunch one of these days and you can tell me all about Chris.”
“That will be great Robbie”, she sighed with relief. “Actually, I have a better idea - Chris and I are going skiing this weekend with a couple of friends. I want you to join us and meet with him.”
I didn’t say anything. She was asking for too much.
“Please, Robbie”, she knew how to manipulate me.
“OK, I will come”, I couldn’t resist anymore.
“Awesome, we are leaving on Friday. We will have a great time, Robbie!”
“Certainly we will”, I thought bitterly and hang up the phone, already regretting I agreed to that trip.
Next Friday Lora and her friends - Monica and Jason came and picked me up from home. I had to ride in the same car with Isabel - voluptuous girl with nice breast, dark, curly hair and red, glossy lipstick. Isabel kept talking during the ride and I was just glancing through the window. Although chubby, Isabel was certainly lovable except for the constant blabbering. I thought that if I could possibly screw her, I could get Lora out of my head. When we arrived at the hotel, I was too tired and hoped to go to bed but the others dragged me into a local restaurant for dinner. It looked like they all had fun except me. Chris was the soul of the company - handsome, dark haired jock with a charming smile and an athletic body. He constantly joked and talked about his trips to Taiwan and Slovenia and wherever. Chris was also smart and polite - we chatted about haiku and opera and he was trying to make me feel comfortable. Lora was right - he was so perfect that I couldn’t stand him from the very first time. I went to bed late that night and I finally had fallen asleep when somebody knocked at the door. Lora was standing there in her purple Columbia jacket and snow pants.
“We are going skiing”, she said. “You can have breakfast outside.”
I put my clothes on and sat in the rest area by the main lift. The weather was perfect for skiing - sunny, a bit chilly and the snow was firmly pressed by the snow machines. I watched the skiers while drinking tea and having a croissant. Lora and Chris looked wonderful - they were skiing parallel to each other, holding hands, passing other skiers and snowboarders fast and swiftly. They tried different slopes and were coming to me laughing and making big whirls of snow powder when circling around my wheel chair. At the end, I felt cold and went inside the food court and I saw Isabel flirting with the bartender and joined them for a drink. Soon, Lora and Chris walked in, tired but happy and Monica and Jason came for lunch. Isabel and I were the only ones not skiing; the others were excitedly chatting about the snow, the black diamond slopes and the annoying snowboarders always getting on their way. Chris was teasing Lora that he finished first three times but she was competitive by nature and countered that the only reason was that his downhill alpine Solomon skis were better than hers. He laughed and said his technique was superb, she got angry like a little girl and then Chris gave her a kiss. During the afternoon they skied some more but I preferred to stay in the room and work on my laptop. We had a quick dinner at the hotel’s restaurant and they all went dancing. I rolled back to my room, took off my clothes and lied in the dark. I must have fallen asleep and when I woke up it was already past midnight. I went to the bathroom, came back in the room and turn on the TV. I couldn’t focus on the movie, I kept thinking how happy Lora looked today on the slopes; about Lora and Chris dancing until late in the club; about them having sex and drinking champagne in their room. I couldn’t wait that weekend to be over, so I could go back to my apartment. I decided not to attend the wedding and just send my gift with a postcard and some lame excuse. During all the years I had known Lora, I had nightmares of loosing her and now these nightmares had become a reality. I felt so depressed I had to go out of the hotel and have cigarette. I wished I could catch a pneumonia and Lora would be caring for me again, like when I was sick with the cold. I rolled out of my room into the hallway and headed towards the elevators. Most skiers had lined up their ski by their doors so the rooms wouldn’t get wet from the melting snow. When I passed Lora’s room, I noticed the Chris’ Solomon ski up against the wall. I looked and them and took the left ski in my hands. It was an expensive one - nice material, shaped specifically for downhill skiing. May be that’s why he was so fast today. I took the Swiss army knife out of my pocket and loosened one of the screws of the heel binder. Then I did the same with the tow binder screws and put the ski back against the wall. “If the bastard breaks his leg tomorrow he won’t be that cool anymore”, I thought and felt satisfied that for the first time in my life, I was fighting for a woman. I went back into my room and got into bed. I couldn’t catch any sleep until dawn, analyzing what I had just done and I must have fallen asleep around six o’clock in the morning. Everybody except Isabel and me was gone to some remote slopes where I couldn’t go because the lift wasn’t adapted for wheelchairs. Isabel didn’t care about the slopes and preferred to go shopping in the local mall an hour away from the resort. I woke up around lunchtime and headed to the hotel bar for breakfast and a cup of coffee. Isabel found me there watching the noon news .
“Robbie, hurry up, we must go to the hospital!”, she looked out of her mind.
“Isabel, calm down! What happened?”
“Lora fell badly during a ski accident. One of her ski flew off; she lost control and smashed into a tree. The ski patrol took her to the hospital. Chris just called me. She is in surgery right now.”
I felt like someone was burning a hole in my stomach.
“Let’s go to the hospital!”, I said at last.
We took a cab and rushed to the hospital. I was just looking through the window trying to collect my thoughts together. When we arrived at the hospital, Chris, Monica and Jason were already there. They all looked pale and Monica was sobbing quietly.
“She didn’t make it Robbie”, Chris kneeled down and squeezed my hand. “I know she meant a lot to you”, he was fighting back his tears.
“What happened?”, I heard myself asking.
“We switched our ski this morning”, Chris said, “She was teasing me that I’m faster because my ski are better, so I agreed to give her a chance. Her left one got disconnected and she hit a tree. The doctor said her brain was badly injured”. He paused for a moment “It’s all my fault! I should have checked the equipment before giving it to her.”
I never saw Chris again. Three months later I took that job in London and moved there with Isabel.

credgar20

Interesting. There's a lot of grammar mistakes, but other than that I liked it. The ending especially was very emotional, I liked it. Very sad though.

konstantin

Thanks for reading . I'm not a native English speaker, hence the mistakes. Can you recommend a website/software that checks for grammer/punctuation errors(obviously Word is not enough)?

TheNextOne

Yep, there were a ton of mistakes. And if English is not your native tongue this is to be expected. However, I really liked the story behind it. It's a classical kind of story and it was paced just right.

Even though there were a lot of technical errors I really couldn't stop reading it. I felt bad for the main character losing his only love to something he created. But that's what makes a great story, in the end.

__________________
Some things I've written

Things you probably shouldn't say
Forum Threads and Dreams
Carnival Loss

konstantin

Guys, appreciate your input
Are the mistakes mostly style (word choices, word order, etc.) or more grammar and punctuation mistakes - wrong tense, wrong gerund....or I guess a bit of both?

Drama Queen

Your story is really good. I couldn't stop reading it, either. I love the tragic ending. I'm a sucker for tragic endings.

The only problem I found with it was the grammar errors, but that's to be expected since you said English is not your native tongue. I have always gotten this advice when I ask how I can become a better writer: Read, read, read and then read some more. So, I give you the same advice. Read in English so you can get ideas on correct grammar usage in stories. Other than that, there are lots of grammar tools online you can look up and learn from.

Keep writing. I want to read more of your work.

__________________
"Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask and he'll tell you the truth." - Brian Slade, Velvet Goldmine.

Click here for a little bite from Julianne, the vampire