The Journey
Chapter 2
By Sunshine Boy
Dan sat in his room in front of his computer listening to his music and typing a new story. An adventure was building on the screen in front of him. Strong confident heroes, evil villains and a journey like no other. He sighed and removed his earphones. Gazing at the screen he mumbled, "So this is my life; just music and words." As he gazed at the screen he remembered what his English teacher had said, "Don"t forget, words are only squiggles of ink on paper, nothing more, it"s the people who write them and the meaning that they convey that matters." Dan stared at the digital squiggles on white pixels on his screen. There had been times when he was younger that he had wanted nothing more than to become a character in one of his stories. Not only to have a meaningful and beautiful life but also to be assured that in the end, no matter how trying the difficulty, he would always win, always come out on top, and always live happy-ever-after. Truthfully, he still had that fantasy but now he was very sure that it would never come true.
He closed the file and sat for a moment then grabbed his favourite blue bottle from his dresser and left the room. He was back a few minutes later with the bottle full of hot water. Dan grabbed a tea bag from a box on the counter and dropped it in. "You are so weird." His brother said as he walked by Dan"s open door and looked in.
"Shut up, your just jealous cus you don"t have the ingenuity to even think of having a tea bottle."
Slamming the door shut he grabbed his blue glass tea bottle and carried it over to his bed trying to avoid stepping on the many things that littered his floor. It was weird but he truly did love drinking tea from a bottle and not only that but a very attractive stained glass one.
Dan dug around the bedside table until he found his print out. The journey was from Vancouver to Calgary. Calgary was the city he lived in, the city he was born in. With a population of around a million people and a reasonably good location in the prairies of Alberta Canada, the city boasted a well off group of people supported by the several major oil companies whose main offices were located there. Geographically, the city site was well chosen; it was built around the convergence of two rivers; the Bow and the Elbow. The city had room to grow and was safe from natural disasters other than occasional mild drought. While driving his mother around town, Dan sometimes wondered why a city with one of the lowest population densities in the world would have roads that were so narrow and so poorly designed.
Dan stood up and looked out his basement bedroom window at the night sky. Beau would often wander the city at night, just walk wherever he pleased. Dan was secretly jealous of this freedom that he knew his parents wouldn"t allow. His mother had a policy of having a good reason to leave the house and not at night unless it was the apocalypse. "Don"t Beau"s parent"s care?" "Of course they do mom they just know that he"s old enough to take care of himself and he"s a human being who"s free to come and go as he pleases." "I bet Beau wonders if his parents care because they just let him leave the house at all hours of the night like that."
Sitting back on the bed Dan sighed deeply and drank some tea. He pulled open the drawer on his bedside table and pulled out the envelope that contained 15 new crisp one hundred dollar bills, they where the new mint, the ones that made Robert Borden look like a visionary of Canada"s future rather than a dusty old Prime Minister who appeared to have a cactus up his ass.
Dan fanned the money then slapped himself in the face with the bundle (he had a secret fantasy to have enough money to slap his brother with it. Next he would have to save enough money to go swimming in it like Scrooge McDuck.)
Dan looked around at his messy room, the stained glass bottle in his left hand, and finally at the empty queen sized bed stretching out all around him. 'Beau"s right, this won"t work, Mom and Dad would never.... but what if they did?" Dan sat and dreamed for a while longer then snapped back to reality. Staring at the money he sighed, 'It"s a lot of money...but guaranteed love.... it"s worth it. Walking a thousand kilometres is a lot of work...it"s worth it though." Dan drank the last of his tea, put his money away and decided that tomorrow before leaving for his last day of school he would tell his parents his intentions. They would probably say no and talk him out of it but it would be worth trying.
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