Innocence
#3 of The Insistences of Gabriel
Song used: ‘Stay Awake' by Lydia. Lyrics have been slightly altered.
The neglected statue's base is my niche for three hours as I pad the strings gently with my claws, whimpering a small hum as I silently acquaint myself with the recent purchase perched delicately in my paws. In the few hours prior to your arrival, I had say myself down in the center of a spacious field â€" a park. A path meanders in front and behind the statue, circling around out of my peripheral vision. I tune out the rest of the world around me and manage to learn what worked and what didn't with the guitar.
I shift my weight a hint, the grass soothing against the sensitive, yet neglected pads supporting my foot paws. Using the pick given to me in our last brief interval, I turn the knobs to the strings â€" I had barely noticed they had out fallen of tune once again.
"Look, Mommy!"
I'm startled at the small voice as it yelped, my muzzle pointing up to find a cub â€" a feline boy in a green shirt with a soccer ball on it and jeans and little sneakers â€" tugging on his mother's pant leg as their trek along the path slowed. "What's that guy doing?" His finger shoots out towards me. "What's that thing he's holding?"
"Jason, it's not polite to point." The mother glances at me, scolding her son quietly and tugging gently to lead him along. The cub breaks free from his mother's grip, running up to me and eyeing my guitar suspiciously.
"Well, hi there. Where's your coat? It's pretty chilly outside." I smirk, amused.
"I don't need a coat! I'm a big kid, and big kids don't wear coats.
"Jason...!" His mother calls after him, a hint of exasperation in her tone.
"What is that?" The cub asks bluntly, seemingly unaware of his mother's summon.
The mother took longer strides to catch up to her son. "Come on, Jason, we need to get home." She smiles apologetically at me. "Sorry about this."
"Oh, no, it's not a problem." I smile back, reassuring her.
"What is that?!" The cub points again, standing up on his tippy toes to extend his reach and further assert the question.
"It's a guitar." I turn my gaze down to the cub.
"What's that?" He asks, making a confused face. "Why's it got strings? What's it do? What's a guitar?"
"Whoa, slow down there." I chuckle, struggling to keep up with the questions given on rapid fire. "Jason, you said your name was?"
He nods vigorously, awaiting my explanation. "Well, uh..." I rest a paw on the back of my neck. "It...makes music."
"Like on the radio?"
"Uh huh." I smile.
"Can you play any songs?"
"Uh...Yeah, sure, but â€""
The mother intervenes, pinpointing and aiding my hesitation. "Jason, why don't you ask him to play something you know?"
"Mooooom!" Jason says urgently and turns to shush her. He directs his attention back to me. "I don't wanna hear any little kids stuff! I'm a big kid now. Play me a big kid's song!"
I look up to his mother. "You got time?" I ask, smiling.
The woman shifts weight, giving me an impatient shift in her weight. "I suppose." She mutters, a bit put off.
Jason has a likewise frown on his muzzle, only his is a bit more perplexed, as if he's jumped to conclusions already, as a child should. I stare into the cub and see the innocence and exuberance that I could never attain as a child.
The kid, like most children, is persistent, but who am I to deny something as simple as music to something so innocent as a child?
That was my initial thought. And if he wanted a song he most likely wouldn't understand, then so be it. I see no harm in the song.
This is one of the biggest mistakes I could have made.
You fool.
How can you assume?
"This won't take long, I promise." I've already begun to pad at the opening strings to the song in mind gently as I spoke.
"Live it up, live it up..." I murmur the opening words, my fingers sliding up to the next position on the neck of the guitar." Or just come back home. Yeah, ‘cause these city lights are too much for you alone, but being alone sounds quite lovely...And so I'll just wait for your call....I promise, I promise and wholly lonely..."
The two felines share a look of confusion, clearly expecting something with a more positive ring to it.
I go into the bridge, still plucking gently, so blissfully unaware of what I was starting to do.
"So stay awake, and stay...I try and go, but your game...It waits for me and you, love, so cover up for...."
I slam down on the strings in a forceful strum to bring in the chorus, voice showing no strain as I go an octave higher. "The rain! You see way too much safety...'Cause I don't stand a chance... Any longer than you do my friend... 'cause we should know best, now that you're gone..."
I continue into the second verse, gently plucking the same pattern as the first verse with a coo on my muzzle.
"Cause I can't breathe, with these words on my tongue... but being alone still sounds lovely...‘cause he swears he still loves you, he still loves you. Come, lonely..."
The cub sits, staring into the ground as he listened, really listened, for the first time. His mother, despite being in a skirt, does the same, gently plopping herself to sit cross-legged next to her child, the same concentrated look on her face.
"So stay awake, and stay...I try and go, but your game...It waits for me and you, love, so cover up for...."
The cub's ears spay a bit as he listen. He's confused, I'm sure of it.
[I think it's weird. Guitars are weird. Big kid songs are weird.
I think this song is weird.
I don't like it.
I don't know.
I don't know.]
As the song goes on into the second verse, I notice the bright glint in Jason's eyes start to fade. It was this moment I realize what I'm doing â€" this is a point of no return for the cub. It wasn't the lyrics, I could tell - his basic understanding picks up the somber emotion that the song conveys as I recite it, and his brow furrows into a likewise feeling.
He's known no true sadness up until this point. He could never go back now.
I've forgotten what this feels like â€" to lose your innocence.
Or maybe I haven't. I find myself wincing as I stare with a thousand apologies in my eyes as I continue the song.
A third verse rears its head eventually, and I murmur its words, pouring salt into this wound.
"It's still in the way that I think, ‘cause nobody's watching, yeah, nobody's watching..."
And, with that, I stop. I'm done. I can't bring myself to finish it. There's no room for deliberation. I've done enough damage.
The mother smiles politely, sensing my inability and misconstruing it for her own reasoning. "Well, um... That was a good song. What did you think, Jason?"
I beg silently not for the cub to look at me for the answers, for my eyes gave none â€" only a pathetic downcast of a frown. He stares and he stares and he says it.
"No...that was a stupid song."
The mother scolds her child for being so rude, and I say nothing in response. They hurry down the path, the cub gleaming at me gently, still looking for some sort of clue as to what just happened.
I look away.
I never forgave myself for that day.