Until Forever

Until Forever is a story. It is a book wannabe. In an ideal world, it will someday see print. In an ideal world, you will enjoy reading it.

But for any of that to be possible, I first need your help. You see, this is a work in progress. I’m posting segments of the story as I write them…without the benefit of professional edits or revisions. There is no safety net. I’m pulling down the curtains of the publishing world to expose a raw manuscript. I’m giving you a peek into the murky brain of an aspiring writer.

If you stick around, you’ll watch as an imaginative idea takes root, as the twisting tendrils of plot and subplot branch out into a unified storyline, and perhaps one day you’ll see the whole creative process bear fruit as a genuine published novel. But I need help tending to the inevitable weeds.

And so I extend an invitation to you. Join me. Read each segment as I post it, and provide feedback whenever you feel so inclined. Please. Good or bad, I want to hear from you. If you think it sucks, tell me. But also tell my why you think it sucks. Tell me how you think the story could be improved. If you think it’s the best thing you’ve read since the cereal box on the kitchen table that morning, tell me that too. And tell me why you like it. Tell me who your favorite character is, whether you’re anxious to read the next segment, whether my dialogue is ridiculously stilted.

I stand before you completely vulnerable to your judgment. It’s like writing naked. I’m terrified and embarrassed. But I honestly feel that this self-serving public experiment will help me improve as a writer, and maybe even lead to the publication of Until Forever. I’ll be eternally grateful for your help.

John Schlim Jr.
2009
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Chapter One

Geneva gazed down at the four beads of blood on the back of her hand—a mini-parade of perfectly symmetrical orbs marching in formation from biggest to smallest. Her hand still stung from the injury and tears welled in her eyes, momentarily blurring her vision.

She looked back over at Cleveland the cat, the unexpected origin of her pain, who lay across her mother’s legs with his ears back and his tail snapping like a whip to reflect his horrible mood.

“That wasn’t nice at all, Cleveland,” she said with a scowl. The cat returned a sour look of his own, then turned away as if he couldn’t even be bothered by her complaint.

“I’m upset by this too!” she snapped at him.

In fact, she was more than upset. And rightly so. She felt her chest tighten again, constricting her almost to the point where she couldn’t draw a breath. The pounding drums resumed in her temples, and it felt like the walls of the room were closing in on her like the cheesy effects of a made-for-TV movie.

Cleveland had never bitten anyone before, least of all the 15-year-old girl who had grown up with him. He knew something was wrong and he was clearly confused. Geneva had tried to move him away from her mother because he was in the way, but he didn’t want to leave. He wanted to be left alone right where he was. His wild-eyed look only punctuated the obvious for Geneva…their world had suddenly been turned upside down.

She wiped her bloodied hand across her jeans, then lifted both hands to her face. She dug her fingernails into her forehead, massaging her temples with her thumbs, fighting away tears and the imminent blackness of despair that threatened to engulf her.

“Don’t give in, Geneva…” she mumbled to herself. “Hang on, just hang on.”

Cleveland the cat yowled at her in a tone she hadn’t heard before. It stopped her descent into the endless dark tunnel that had begun to swallow her, brought her back to the not-quite-reality state of denial where she was able to pretend that she could function.

Geneva’s eyes regained their focus and she found herself staring at a huge collage of postcards that hung on the wall. Her mother loved traveling, and was infatuated with the countless treasures offered by each destination. Cleveland was the woman’s birthplace, and thus immortalized as the name of their beloved pet. Geneva was the city where her daughter was conceived, back when the woman was a young art student doing far too much exploration, and so this beautiful city became the child’s name.

And now the child sat on the bed beside the mother. They shared enough features that the teenager appeared as a reflection of the woman’s youth. Geneva took a deep breath, once again slamming shut the mental doors that allowed the real world to violate her thoughts.

“Sorry for the interruption, Mom,” she said quietly. “Let’s see if I can finish this time without Cleveland taking another chomp out of my hand.”

Geneva picked up the mascara wand and finished her mother’s left eye. It was much easier with her mother’s eyes closed.

“There. Both eyes are done now,” she announced. “You were looking kinda creepy with just one done. Like that crazy guy in Clockwork Orange.”

Geneva’s mother was not really one to wear makeup—not a “glitter girl” as Geneva called them—and neither was Geneva herself. But there were occasions when either one of them would impulsively decide to get dolled up, so they were both adept at applying “the look” without appearing overdone. And this was one of those occasions.

Having started with a foundation to even out her mother’s skin tone, Geneva had added just a kiss of blush to her cheeks and a subtle dusting of eyeshadow. Her mother felt that too much eyeshadow looked trashy. Now, after brushing on a heavy dose of mascara (the only makeup Geneva kept with her at all times), she was ready to add the finishing touch with her mother’s favorite brownish-red lipstick.

“Wow. You look beautiful, Mom,” she said as she blotted her mother’s lips with a tissue. She recapped the lipstick and set it on the nightstand before retrieving a hairbrush. She had already brushed her mother’s hair out before starting with the makeup, but she felt compelled to do it again. Her mom often wore her hair pulled back in a ponytail because she was always in a rush, but Geneva preferred when she wore it down. It was long and thick with a natural wave, and the dark color was the perfect frame for her brown eyes.

“I never told you this before,” Geneva said with a forced smile, “but Nate Westmore and Scotty Gregory both think you’re hot. They saw you with your hair down one time when you picked me up at the mall.”

Geneva finished brushing out the hair and took a step back to admire her mother’s beauty, even now.

“I guess I was jealous.”

She leaned forward and kissed her mother gently on the forehead. The skin was cold and clammy to the touch.

Then she packed up the brush and all the makeup into the decorative wooden tray that her mom had found on one of her expeditions. Palm trees and flamingos were painted around the outside frame, but even with those clues Geneva couldn’t remember where it had come from. Key West, maybe.

Geneva set the tray in its designated spot in the bathroom, then went back to get Cleveland to bring him to bed with her. But the cat lowered his ears at her approach, hissing a warning. The only time he’d ever done that before was when she had tried to get a wounded bird from his mouth. More than anything she wanted to curl up with him under her quilted comforter, feel his reassuring purr against her chest and his raspy tongue licking her chin, but it wasn’t meant to be tonight.

“Fine!” she snapped as she reluctantly headed up to her bed alone.

Cleveland’s rejection wouldn’t be the only one that night. The sandman was a no-show, refusing to grant the girl the calming release of much-needed sleep. She tossed and turned for hours, mainly rolled into the fetal position, but her eyes never grew heavy. Instead she stared blankly into the night, viewing a slideshow of memories on her ceiling. Eventually she burst into tears, sobbing uncontrollably in a near-convulsive state that made her abdomen ache. She had no idea how long she cried, though it seemed to last a lifetime, she was only aware that at some point she had suddenly stopped and the pounding drums in her temples had returned.

In a surge of emotionally charged adrenaline, she leapt out of bed and slipped into her favorite pair of Converse hightops—the white ones that her mother had doodled all over in a mesmerizing explosion of color. Her mother said it was a depiction of rainbows mating.

For the first time that night, Geneva had purpose. She knew exactly what she had to do. Her mother was ready for what came next, and now she was too. She strode down the stairs, swung open the front door, and walked out into the biting cold of the night. It was only October, but Mother Nature was sending a taste of winter tonight to remind everybody of the bitter weather to come. It was cold enough for a coat, but Geneva shrugged off the chill that sent goosebumps racing across her body and caused her to shiver. She wouldn’t need a coat where she was going.

She looked up at the glittering display of stars in the quiet night sky, then lowered her head and walked off to face her destiny.

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Chapter Two

Geneva Maxwell was flying.

She was weightless, floating, adrift like a balloon in a gentle breeze. Was she falling? Rising? She seemed to be spinning very slowly, but she couldn’t tell which way was up and which was down.

The first thing she had noticed was the warmth. She had been cold, brutally cold, as if frozen solid. So cold that her body was in agony and she wanted to scream, but her muscles were numb from the frigid temperature and she found herself unable to move or speak. Her body became heavy, stiff, suspended in solidifying space.

But then she felt the warmth. It came slowly at first, like the rising presence of the morning sun. Her body began tingling, reminding her of that strange feeling when her arm or leg would fall asleep. The warmth seeped into her, causing her stiffened muscles to relax, releasing the grimace that made the skin taut on her face. She felt her jaw go slack, unclenching her grinding teeth, and realized that her fingers and toes were flexing.

It felt as if somebody was giving her a transfusion of heated blood. In her mind she could trace the progress of the warmth as it spread through her body, moving much quicker now, gaining momentum until it rushed to her head and flushed her face as if she were gazing up at the sun on a blazing summer day.

Her eyes popped open and she realized that there was a bright light in the distance, beaming at her through a murky haze. Was it a haze? Maybe it was fog? No, it was thicker, and it was…wet.

And then she suddenly realized where she was.

She wasn’t flying. She wasn’t drifting like a balloon. She was floating in liquid! She was underwater, bobbing in the currents.

Geneva panicked and gasped, sucking in water. It burned in her chest, making her feel full to the point of bursting. She remembered gulping an entire can of soda once on a dare. Immediately afterwards, she had felt like she was going to die from the pressure in her chest. This felt very similar, only much worse. Her eyes widened in panic, her heart seemed to stop for a moment, but somehow she stopped the rush of water entering her body and regained her composure.

Her eyes found the bright light again and she began swimming desperately towards it. The water was dark as midnight blue ink, nothing like the clear water in the pool at her apartment building. And the mysterious light shone like a star through the dark blue, a blazing beacon that she couldn’t resist.

Faster and faster she swam, cursing herself for quitting the swimming lessons her mother had insisted on. Her arms and legs flailed in the water, far too much effort for far too little progress. She felt like a little moth flying in a windstorm, struggling to reach the sole star in the night sky.

The pain in her chest grew from a tight knot into a crushing weight that was suffocating her. If she didn’t release the water within her soon, if she didn’t breathe precious air into her lungs in the next second, she would have to stop and die. And she would welcome that. The pain and the panic and the desperation were that intense.

So when the moment came—when she realized that this was the end and she had nothing left to give—she made one last desperate lunge for the star.

And suddenly she was rising from the water, staggering on her feet toward shore. She gagged and choked and vomited as she went, and she fell more than once. Each time she rose again, delirious but determined, until finally she found herself standing on the rocky shore beneath the peeking light of a rising sun. She swayed on her feet, fighting back the lure of unconsciousness, as a small figure emerged from bushes nearby. Her vision was too blurred to see the person clearly. Was it a child?

“The…light,” she stammered. “Where…did it…go?”

“Light?” asked the figure in a very strange voice that sounded more like an arrangement of musical notes.

“I saw…a light,” Geneva persisted. “It looked like…a star.”

“Oh,” replied the figure. “I have a star in my heart.”

And then Geneva collapsed to the ground, surrendering at last to the welcome oblivion of unconsciousness.