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Fiction Friday #47...Unlucky for some.
Mar. 21st, 2008 | 12:10 am
This weeks Fiction Friday theme; Have your character give thirteen reasons why they should learn a new language. This is my take...a mother's monologue.
Kyle bounced and bundled around the room with the kind of unbridled and infectious excitement that only a five year old can muster...especially when he's ready, willing and very impatient to fly off on the holiday of a lifetime.
"The taxi's here mummy...and I'm all ready to go...are you nearly finished?" His sweet, but shrill voice resonated throughout the tiled ground floor before drifting up the stairs to where I was checking drawers, cupboards and the most unlikley nooks and crannies in search of that damned Italian phrasebook.
I definitely had one...Mark had bought it for me on our honeymoon in Rome...didn't have much need for it really, we rarely left the hotel as I recall. Three years later and Kyle was born...shorthly after that, Mark and I split, or rather he left me...left us both as it turned out.
I put the book away with all the other crap he'd given me...I knew it was somewhere in the spare room and probably still in pristine condition because I'd never so much as flicked through the pages since the day he bought it...reminded me too much of him and his Latin good looks.
I had always wanted to learn Italian...not just because my maternal grandfather had hailed from Genoa...but also because it seemed such an expressive, emotional language conjuring up sensual images in my head of romance and warm sultry nights...good food and sweet Red Wine...and of course those sexy Italian men. Sadly, I never got around to it...not even one lesson. I suppose I was just plain lazy...we didn't have to speak any other language really...didn't everyone speak English anyhow and if they couldn't...well, that was their problem.
I heard the cab driver honking impatiently outside the house...I looked at my watch.
" Dammit...!" I cursed quietly. The phrase book would have to stay behind.
We had to load up and get moving...it was normally only forty five minutes to the airport but in mid-day traffic you could add another thirty to that...but the journey just flew by. I was never happier than when I was with Kyle...he lit up my life. I swear at times I could just stare in to his dark eyes and time seemed to stand still...he entranced me...my beautiful son. He had the most striking bone structure, from me of course...and gorgeous sparkling eyes, full of mischief...too much like his father's. Kyle was a looker, that was for sure. I used to dream of the man he would become...tall, strong and handsome...he was my Prince and I was so very proud of him.
Two hours later and we were sitting on the plane...Kyle's nose pressed against the window, his little face aglow with wonderment at the cotton wool cloud blanket just beneath us. Everything was so new to him...so fresh...so much for him to see and do in his life.
I swore I'd always be there for him, even if his father wasn't.
It was raining in Milan...seemed to me just like another typical summer storm...the air was warm and humid. We picked up the hire car and I decided to head down to Genoa right away despite the storm and the gathering gloom. I was a confident driver and it was only a hundred miles or so of good quality roads to the city, so I guessed my lack of the language wouldn't be too much of a hinderance.
An hour later and we'd only travelled thirty miles...the black sky was illuminated randomly by lightning strikes and the rain was battering down so hard that the wipers could barely keep up...I was beginning to wish we'd stayed in Milan. Kyle was asleep in the back and I could easilly have climbed in there with him...I should have stopped then.
Three times the signs had lit up as we passed them on the freeway...warning of flash floods apparently...I didn't recognise any of the words so it meant nothing to me. I was too busy just struggling to drive through the storm and paid little attention...the night was dark and murky and I guess I was too tired.
I found out later that the local radio stations had been broadcasting throughout the night...warning motorists not to drive unless it was absolutely necessary. Oh, yeah...I heard the reports on the car radio just fine...it may as well have been Martians talking to me...I just tuned to a music station to help stay awake.
Even if I could have understood them, I didn't even see the 'Road Closed' signs as I sped towards the bend. I rounded the curve too fast and we hit it almost immediately. The river had burst through the bank and was flowing in a torrent across the carriageway...we began to slide. After that...everything is just a blur, brakes screeching, engine racing, the car skidding and turning...and Kyle screaming.
A sudden thudding impact...and then the silence...just horrible, eerie, deafening silence.
My life ended that day...or might as well have done because my Kyle was gone at five years old...a life ended before it had begun and it was all my fault...mine...his mother. On this earth I had just one task...to protect him but I let him down. I've regretted that day every waking moment since...more than four thousand days and nights of torment...a hundred and fifty months of pain and lonliness. Why him? Why not me?
Thirteen years ago today my beautiful son was taken from me...thirteen years of torture...thirteen years of pain...thirteen years of guilt-ridden dreamless sleep..
And thirteen reasons why I wish I'd learned Italian.
The End
Kyle bounced and bundled around the room with the kind of unbridled and infectious excitement that only a five year old can muster...especially when he's ready, willing and very impatient to fly off on the holiday of a lifetime.
"The taxi's here mummy...and I'm all ready to go...are you nearly finished?" His sweet, but shrill voice resonated throughout the tiled ground floor before drifting up the stairs to where I was checking drawers, cupboards and the most unlikley nooks and crannies in search of that damned Italian phrasebook.
I definitely had one...Mark had bought it for me on our honeymoon in Rome...didn't have much need for it really, we rarely left the hotel as I recall. Three years later and Kyle was born...shorthly after that, Mark and I split, or rather he left me...left us both as it turned out.
I put the book away with all the other crap he'd given me...I knew it was somewhere in the spare room and probably still in pristine condition because I'd never so much as flicked through the pages since the day he bought it...reminded me too much of him and his Latin good looks.
I had always wanted to learn Italian...not just because my maternal grandfather had hailed from Genoa...but also because it seemed such an expressive, emotional language conjuring up sensual images in my head of romance and warm sultry nights...good food and sweet Red Wine...and of course those sexy Italian men. Sadly, I never got around to it...not even one lesson. I suppose I was just plain lazy...we didn't have to speak any other language really...didn't everyone speak English anyhow and if they couldn't...well, that was their problem.
I heard the cab driver honking impatiently outside the house...I looked at my watch.
" Dammit...!" I cursed quietly. The phrase book would have to stay behind.
We had to load up and get moving...it was normally only forty five minutes to the airport but in mid-day traffic you could add another thirty to that...but the journey just flew by. I was never happier than when I was with Kyle...he lit up my life. I swear at times I could just stare in to his dark eyes and time seemed to stand still...he entranced me...my beautiful son. He had the most striking bone structure, from me of course...and gorgeous sparkling eyes, full of mischief...too much like his father's. Kyle was a looker, that was for sure. I used to dream of the man he would become...tall, strong and handsome...he was my Prince and I was so very proud of him.
Two hours later and we were sitting on the plane...Kyle's nose pressed against the window, his little face aglow with wonderment at the cotton wool cloud blanket just beneath us. Everything was so new to him...so fresh...so much for him to see and do in his life.
I swore I'd always be there for him, even if his father wasn't.
It was raining in Milan...seemed to me just like another typical summer storm...the air was warm and humid. We picked up the hire car and I decided to head down to Genoa right away despite the storm and the gathering gloom. I was a confident driver and it was only a hundred miles or so of good quality roads to the city, so I guessed my lack of the language wouldn't be too much of a hinderance.
An hour later and we'd only travelled thirty miles...the black sky was illuminated randomly by lightning strikes and the rain was battering down so hard that the wipers could barely keep up...I was beginning to wish we'd stayed in Milan. Kyle was asleep in the back and I could easilly have climbed in there with him...I should have stopped then.
Three times the signs had lit up as we passed them on the freeway...warning of flash floods apparently...I didn't recognise any of the words so it meant nothing to me. I was too busy just struggling to drive through the storm and paid little attention...the night was dark and murky and I guess I was too tired.
I found out later that the local radio stations had been broadcasting throughout the night...warning motorists not to drive unless it was absolutely necessary. Oh, yeah...I heard the reports on the car radio just fine...it may as well have been Martians talking to me...I just tuned to a music station to help stay awake.
Even if I could have understood them, I didn't even see the 'Road Closed' signs as I sped towards the bend. I rounded the curve too fast and we hit it almost immediately. The river had burst through the bank and was flowing in a torrent across the carriageway...we began to slide. After that...everything is just a blur, brakes screeching, engine racing, the car skidding and turning...and Kyle screaming.
A sudden thudding impact...and then the silence...just horrible, eerie, deafening silence.
My life ended that day...or might as well have done because my Kyle was gone at five years old...a life ended before it had begun and it was all my fault...mine...his mother. On this earth I had just one task...to protect him but I let him down. I've regretted that day every waking moment since...more than four thousand days and nights of torment...a hundred and fifty months of pain and lonliness. Why him? Why not me?
Thirteen years ago today my beautiful son was taken from me...thirteen years of torture...thirteen years of pain...thirteen years of guilt-ridden dreamless sleep..
And thirteen reasons why I wish I'd learned Italian.
The End