A Description Of A 1:30 AM Walk.

Thursday, February 19, 2015
2:35 AM

I look at my window, the blinds obscuring any kind of view I may have had. I can see slivers of the moon and parts of the street light from my hunched over position on my bed. The air feels hot, and the room smells too much of me. I get a sudden urge to go outside. I just want to sit on the porch and feel lonely for a while. Sit in the biting cold and get some fresh air in me.

I turn off the music playing on my phone and think about taking something to write on with me. The phone's a no-go, my gloves won't let me use the to him screen properly, and my laptop's screen is glaring at me with an error message and a promise to restart itself. It's been like that for the last two hours. I kind of hate it's battery right now. I pad around my room, slipping a pair of warm and baggy sweats on over my pajama bottoms and putting on my jacket and coat over my Assumption Private High School sweatshirt that I'd gotten when I shadowed there. I look around for my gloves, spotting the mismatched pair I'd used…. Yesterday I think? To shovel the snow off of the driveway. Was it even yesterday? I don't think it was today at least….. It still feels like Sunday, to be honest. It actually feels like summer break started early. Anyway, I spot the pair I'd used when I went to shovel snow off of the driveway under a plate with a beaten up roll and the remains of dinner on it. I should probably clean up in here. I eye the various food things and trash littered about my room. I should definitely clean up. Later. I look at the notebook sitting innocently on the floor and can't really be bothered to pick it up. I'll just write when I get back, I guess. I pick p my raccoon-hat and step out of the safety of my room for the first time in what feels like days, but was probably only a few hours, the wooden plates with my name and some cute decorations clinking softly as I close the door.

I pad down the short staircase a couple of steps away from my door, and turn to go down the other one when I spot my mother's boyfriend on the couch. I can't tell if he's asleep or watching T.V, so I stare at him for a couple of seconds. I hear a faint snore and snort softly to myself. It's 1:30 in the morning, even his sleep schedule isn't that messed up (and here I am about to go outside. I don't think I should be talking.).  I stagger over to the back door and spot my shoes on a rug nearby. Someone must have moved them then, they were just haphazardly thrown to the side last I checked. (Then again, the last time I checked was Maybe-yesterday. Tuesday?) I slip them on, not bothering to put them on properly and squishing the heel as I usually do when I can't be bothered. My poor shoes. What did they ever do to deserve me? I open the door and slip outside, Mother's boyfriend not stirring once as I close the door with a soft click.

I smoothly step into the cold air, sniffing a little as a good whiff of outside air hits me in the face. Kinda smells like burnt pigs-in-a-blanket. I bury my face in my coat and stride forward. I stare at the white expanse of undisturbed snow that is my backyard. The only thing interrupting it is the trampoline in the middle. I want to trample it like a small child. Expanse really isn't the right word. Patch maybe? Nah, too small. Ah, well.  I pass the cars in the driveway and turn to look towards the street. I walk down the driveway, pausing only to look at the sidewalk leading to our front door. The snow in undisturbed, and too deep to bother with. Plus the front steps themselves are still covered, and I really don't care for sitting in snow.  I huff a little at seeing the section of snow-covered driveway the adults of the house were supposed to finish clearing and the tracks that the cars have made in it. Well, I still can't be bothered. I finally step onto the street and allow myself a moments hesitation. It's freakin' 1:30 in the morning, decent people aren't out at this hour. But my neighborhood is pretty nice, and I'm only going up the street. I feel like I should've left a note or something.

I start walking, aiming for the top of the little hill at the end of the street. It's utterly silent. The only sound is my own feet on the cleared off and snowless pavement and the distant fwish of the occasional car. Mostly just my feet though.  I don't really think much. I don't think at all, really. I let the silence and the sound of my feet thudding on the street hypnotize me until I'm about halfway to my goal. But being the thoughtful being I am (Pfft) I end up thinking anyway. Not about much. Just about the sounds my feet make, and how this scenario would be fun to write out. Then I end up thinking about how I'd write it and what words would fill the page. It wouldn't be a long piece, certainly, but nothing of mine ever really is. I think my best so far is 2,468 words or so. But I walk on and let the thoughts of how my walk could be described distract me from the absolute silence. It's a common enough occurrence, I'm just not usually walking and the thoughts aren't usually as pleasant. Before I realize it, my feet had guided me to the top of the hill, and I was turning around to go home.

More thoughts of nothing and trying to get back into the trance I was in on the first quarter of my little walk are all that happened in the third quarter of it. Then I started thinking of more descriptions of my walk, less literal this time. It wasn't really a pleasant walk. Kind of scary in all honesty, but it wasn't unpleasant either. The eerie silence and paranoia of a teenage girl outside on her own after dark kept it from being pleasant. Though the cold would probably keep most would-be attackers inside. And now I feel bad for the homeless out tonight. Not enough to do jack about it, but if I encountered one I'd probably give them my jacket or something. Just not the one I'm wearing. This one is my favorite. It's not like I felt any different. Not heavier or lighter, not better or worse, not tired or energized. It felt nice though. Just walking for a while. I do have a headache though. Too much thinking. See, this is why I read other peoples stuff and drown myself in anime. Then I don't HAVE to think. Though this is better than sitting in the darkness of my room, curled up in a ball and working up a nice panic. It's hard having an over active imagination and too few friends to not worry over them at every little thing. It doesn't really help that I haven't talked to many people since Tuesday(Yesterday? What even is time?). I look up and see myself almost home.  I can feel my toes becoming a little numb through the thin shoes and socks I have. My heel is absolutely frozen, hanging out of my shoe as it was. My nose is cold, and my hands are sweaty from being inside both my pocket and gloves for the majority (all) of my walk, but I don't particularly want to be home. Back to being cooped up in my room and living in self-isolation. But my walk of nothing is almost over and I'm feeling numb, both inside and out. I just want to write out my walk at this point.

I turn onto my driveway and don't look up from my feet and I stride forward, trampling the still-pretty-freakin'-pristine snow (I really want to stomp all over it like a four year old.). I still don't want to go inside, but I don't really want to stay out either. I'm almost to the door anyway, and It's not like freezing out here is a favorable option. I open the door, closing and locking it behind me. I slip off my shoes and put them back where I found them. Mother's boyfriend is still passed out on the couch. The stairs are as creaky as ever as I walk up them, and I can't help but feel disappointed. After all most books and things have the protagonists being whisked away to wonderland or some such place when they go for walks, but I'm just here, climbing up short, creaky stair cases to climb back into bed and finally write down the details of my walk. So unfair.

I enter my room and slip out of my outer gear, throwing them into two piles on the floor (Hat and gloves in one, coat, jacket, and baggy sweats in the other) as I glare at my laptop's still error covered screen. I reach over and hold the power button for a few seconds, feeling irrationally pleased when it shut down. It wouldn't do that earlier, I don't think. Or maybe it would've and I didn't try. I don't even remember. I poke the power button again before I turn around and pick up my phone. I contemplate turning my music back on before I decide not to and turn back to my laptop. The booting screen is still up, but I feel like the descriptions of my walk will float away if I don't get them down in the next few seconds so I bend over the side of my bed and pick up the notebook I couldn't be bothered with earlier. I look back up again and reach for pen on my shelf, glancing at my laptop (let's name it Sherlly) out of the corner of my eye. I frown in annoyance as I see the login screen instead of the booting screen and set down my notebook and pen to log in and pull up One Note. I giggle a bit as I see the battery has gone down to almost dead. I pat Sherlly on the top of it's monitor and think "I've trained you well." as I pull up a new page in One Note. I jump a bit as Mother's boyfriend knocks and opens my door, telling me to go to bed (I am in bed, you jerk, I'm just not asleep. I don't like it when he tells me to do things. He is not my mother nor my teacher.). I settle back down and get to writing out my (surprisingly long) description of my walk.  Lovely.