Quick Sketch of the Day + Surprise!

Hi Guys,

So Here's my QSoD. It's been a while since I've posted just a random bust shot. I forgot how quickly it takes me! This one took me about 4 maybe 5 minutes.














I drew him in a very sketchy way too. Rough lines, rough features... but it's so easy to do and it comes out looking nice anyway.

SURPRISE!!

Okay. So I told you that today was the surprise and I kept my word. What the surprise is: I'm writing a short story for each of the pictures I drew during my 'Music to Art' project. The stories will explain what the drawing is about. This is my story for the first picture: Happy. The name of the story is Memories.

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 “Jason... Jason come on. Jason! Unlock the door!”

Silence.

Jason banged on his brother's door, “Jason! Please...”

The morning began like most mornings typically do: Struggling to wake up... struggling to eat... struggling to face the day without breaking down... life was a struggle for Collin. But then again... who's life wasn't?

Collin was a seventeen year old boy just out of high school. He had great friends, great privileges, a great brother – Jason - and a great mother. His father though... well... he was great. Perhaps the greatest of all. He would have held that position had it not been for that one fateful night. That one night that a careless driver and one yellow light caused. That one night that happened exactly seven years ago.

“Mom. Mom. Mom wake up.” Collin shook at his mother's arm. A sudden wave of fear and memories washed over him. His mother shaking his own father's arm with a pool of blood surrounding him. Collin pushed back a tear and continued in his efforts to wake his mother.

After a while she opened her eyes and stared at him. “You look.. so much like your father...” Collin's mother turned away from him and buried her face in her pillow again.

“Don't...” Collin said barely audible, “You said you'd be strong this time.”

A muffled sob from his mother suggested otherwise however. “I'm... I'm...” Collin's mother lay shaking in her tears, “I'm sorry Collin... Next time... I promise.”

Collin ran out from her room, into the hallway, the kitchen, and out the front door just in time to knock his brother down onto the hot asphalt driveway.

“Out of my way! Move!” Collin got back up on his feet and continued running.

Back on the ground, in the same position his brother knocked him down into, Jason lay still. He was eleven. For one week each year Jason had been going through the same thing: Being stuck in the middle of the depression and the anger anger from his mother and brother. He tried to feel it himself when he was younger – to be able to relate – but he just couldn't. At the time of his father's accident Jason was only four years old. He had pictures of his father, he had recordings, but he just didn't have memories. On this day, each year, there was no heaven or hell for Jason. Only limbo. That was the only place his emotions would go.

Jason limped back into the living room (an injury he held onto from the night of the accident). He grabbed a photo album and flipped it to a bookmarked page – his bookmark. A picture of his father with a one year old Jason – not glued to the album - dropped onto the floor. Slowly, Jason bent down (without picking it back up) and studied the man on the glossy card. No matter how hard he racked his brain... he just didn't know who this man was. Jason didn't remember being the only other person stuck upside down with him in a totaled car. He didn't remember that man pulling him out of that car while the gasoline made it's way to the burning engine. He didn't remember that man shielding him from exploding parts and getting impaled by shards of glass. To Jason... this man was just a stranger.

“Good morning Jason.”

Startled, Jason covered the picture with his foot and swung the album under the couch.
“You were looking at pictures of Daddy?” Jason's mother made a pitiful attempt at a smile and kept walking towards him. “Can I look with you?”

The album reemerged from underneath the couch but the picture under Jason's foot stayed where it was.

“Oh.” Jason's mother chuckled slightly at a photo on one of the pages. “Your father loved that silly old thing.”
At the bottom of the page a picture of Jason's father holding a white teddy bear stirred in Jason's memory for a while. “But... isn't that Collin's old bear from when he was little?”

“Well, yes. Your father gave that bear to him as a present one day. But long before that it was your father's.” Jason's mother sensed a hostility and tried her best to defuse the situation, “Well of course it was years before you were born. Had he had something else from when he was younger I'm sure he would have given it to you.”

Jason stared at the bear until his mother flipped the page. So that's why Collin never let me touch it before, Jason thought to himself. That's Collin's memory... Anger flared inside Jason ...If I had a memory...

“So.” His mother said and the album slammed shut. Jason hadn't even noticed she'd finished. “What would you like for breakfast.” A tear sparkled in her eye.
“Nothing. I don't want anything.” Jason thought for a second, “What do you want? I'll make you something.”

“You're too sweet Jason. Collin wouldn't do that.” Jason's mother smiled, “He's too much like his father.”

Right then and there, a piece of Jason died. Whatever he was hoping he would hear one day - “You're just like your father!” - was gone. Already forgotten. A fading memory... just like his father.

“Jason... Jason come on. Jason! Unlock the door!”

Silence.

Jason banged on his brother's door, “Jason! Please...”

“I don't know what happened to him... we were just talking then he ran to his room and hasn't said a word to me since then. That was hours ago.” Jason's mother stood in the corner of the hallway, concern plastered onto her face.

“Jason why won't you answer?” Collin stopped banging just as the door swung open and Jason grabbed him, pulling him into his room then closing the door again.

Sensing Jason didn't want his mother to hear Collin began in a hushed tone: “Jason what's going on? What's up with you all of the sudden?”
Jason started sniffling, then weeping, then sobbing.
“Jason, what's the matter?” Collin swung his arm around Jason but his brother shook it off.

All of the sudden Collin smelt smoke and the fire alarm triggered.

“Jason what did you do?!”

“I.. I... I burnt...” Jason buried his face in his palms. “Whenever I think of him now... all I'll ever be able to think of is you! I wanted his memory to come back! I wanted him to be there for me.. not for you...”

Collin's eyes widen and he searched frantically for the bear... Where is it! Where is it?! Nothing. It wasn't anywhere to be found.

The scent of smoke still lingered in Collin's nose and he traced it back to the bathroom. There, in the tub, with a box of matches on the sink lay the remains of the tie to his father. There lay what he used to comfort himself for this week every year. There it was... a pile of scorched fluff and ashes.
Collin marched back into Jason's room, fists tight, face red, heart pounding.

Jason curled up into a ball expecting the worse. A punch, a kick, a slap... not that Collin ever touched him before... but he had just done something unforgivable. Jason braced himself for.. for what? ...A hug.

“Jason.” Collin's tears dropped down onto his brother's head, forcing his eyes open. “Jason I know why you did what you did...”

Jason started uncurling himself then, with a burst of emotion, he swung his arms around his brother and sobbed into his chest.

“I'm so sorry! I wanted a memory! I wanted one like you had. Whenever I closed my eyes and tried to picture dad in my head... I always just saw your face... I wanted a memory.”

Collin shook his head furiously “Then let me be your memory! Let dad's love live on through the love mom and I have for you! You don't have to have something that was his before to be your memory. You have your memory right here.” Collin pulled away and tapped at his chest, “And right here,” Then tapped at Jason's chest. “His love will forever be inside us. Even if you can't remember his face, or his voice. It doesn't matter. Your memory is the love he left behind for you. That's my memory. And that's mom's memory too. Not the things that he gave us... but the feelings.”

Jason wiped his eyes, got up, and went into the living room again. There bye the door was an empty vase. Walking into the bathroom he gathered the ashes of his brother's bear and stuffed them into it.
“Here. His love... is inside here too.” Jason handed Collin the vase and hugged his brother.

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So that's it. I hoped you liked my story guys! Tomorrow I will do a story for Sad.

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skiddishart@gmail.com

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~Kassie