Weekly Fic #1: Giving up on a dream

Title: Giving Up on a Dream

Genre: Slice of life

Word count: 552

The guitar's been lying in the corner of my room for a while now. I pause and try to recall just how long a 'a while' is, and wince. It's been longer than I thought. I want to go right over there and start making music, but I can't. I have somewhere to be.

It's been like this for a long time now, me putting everything else in front of my music. I can still remember the times when I would stay up all night, with my parents safely asleep in their room, trying to come up with a tune to capture what I was feeling. It didn't seem to matter if the next day was a schooldays, ir even if the day held more than that, like an exam or a competition, I felt like I just had to play, and that's all there was to it. It's strange, that I've always been called lazy or doesn't apply herself in school, but when it came to teaching myself the guitar, learning to compose, crafting lyrics and reading poems, I've never had to force the concentration. It just came naturally. That's why I had those fights, when all the adults around me told me that a musical career wasn't worth it, wasn't, in fact, even possible for me. And that's all I wanted to do.

"Play for us."

It's so common now, something like a usual refrain, that I only blush and stutter and wave it aside. I haven't played for anyone. Never. Sometimes, I like to let people hear me play, when I'm already practising. Most people don't understand, though. How do I expect to be a musician if I don't allow anyone to hear my music? I don't tell them the truth, that I've been putting up my music on MySpace forever, ever since I listened to the other amateurs, back when I was a kid. And I didn't get much recognition. A few fans, here and there, who asked me, almost immediately, to fan them back. And the truth is, their music sucked. So yeah, I never thought I was anything special back then, and I was right. Listening to it now makes me laugh. The crap I put up. Of course, there's still some of that in my music today.

"Are you free today?"

Yup, not a thing to do. Was planning to just compose and weed out most of the crap today, but I can always postpone that, to do something totally fascinating, like walk along the lake, chatting, with you. (Do I even know you?)

The guitar's been lying in the corner of my room for a while now. I pause and try to recall just how long a 'a while' is, and wince. It's been longer than I thought. I want to go right over there and start making music, but I can't. I don't have anywhere to be, or anything to do. But I still ignore it and walk out of the room.

Now the bitter truth hits me, that it has nothing to do with my other commitments, that the fact is, I can't face my guitar anymore. Nothing comes out, or if it does, it's stilted and unsure. I'm unsure.

Do I give up on what was, after all, a lifelong dream?