ORWELL, carson issac

no one can say “they don’t know what happened to him”. that is for people that suddenly turned over their good leaf and transformed into something else. his was slow, he was a slow turner. he did not change overnight but his final transformation was drastic. it was not a simple good boy to bad boy, there was forward steps and backward. he sometimes changed his mind about who he was becoming, saw the evil in the truths of his antics but then, it sucked him in. we know what happened to him, everyone does. the look in his eyes as he stared at the casket was not even as detrimental as the day that his mother informed him of her impending death. “everyone is meant to die, we live to die..” is what she told her four children. she was no longer a mother after that but she tried to be. the cancer just absorbed her life and eventually, she was an entity that carson would kiss on the forehead hello and goodbye before his life continued on the way it was. he had a good life before that. these are the titles that no longer apply to him.

a brother: he was the eldest brother, the second oldest. up until he was seventeen, he was a decent brother. the male was sometimes responsible in getting the younger kids up because sophia was not always in the house in the morning depending on her schedule. he would shake them away like an earthquake was rocking the bed and they would giggle as their eyes slowly opened and they came to life again. he would smile at them, ruffle their hair and then proceed to get himself ready for the day. dinner was sometimes his responsibility as well, he would cook the most basic of meals and this continued into his mother’s illness. he used to sing while stirring the pasta in the pot, humming along to his favorite song of that week—it changed weekly. his siblings would sing along with him if they knew the words, and even when the illness struck and his mother was put to rest, he still tried. but eventually, the alcohol made him sleep longer making both of himself and the younger siblings late for school. the drugs began to make him irritable and he snapped at his siblings for the smallest of things without his daily fixes. it was ecstasy and marijuana that had did him in, or was doing him in. his oldest sister, he resented her because of the role that she tried to play. sophia tried to be a mother and a sister to him but she failed miserably. he used to take her advice with the brotherly attitude, dismissing her playfully. he did not mind her in his business before it all happened and then she started to pry. sophia was the first to notice the change in her brother. the gradual aggression, the lack of attendance at family dinners—without his mother, it was not a home. it did not feel right and he shed the brother title and just became that person, the one that slept in the house and ate the food but never really contributed. he has not sat and talked to his siblings in two years, since the final step of his transformation was made. so the aspect of his life, an important one was stripped away by his newly developed habits.

a son: naturally, this stripped away from him when his mother was being lowered into the ground. his father stayed the same even after their mother passed. he never turned to alcohol, he never became depressed, he had an obligation and with that thought, carson gave up his own. he was a mommy’s boy. he was dependent on his mother from the start and without her—he just wasn’t the same. the world was not the same and because of that, neither was carson. he changed drastically and his father did not take notice until the end, until it was too late for him to things around. his father stopped trying, the last parental guidance that could have saved the boy was defeated and he was free of the ‘son’ title. his father never shut carson out though. he still welcomes the boy with open arms but never opens his mouth to anything that carson is doing in his life. he has not hit the critical point but he’s close to the red zone.

student: he’s no longer one of these either. he finished high school with mediocre grades, nothing that would help to move forward. it’s not lack of intelligence that stopped him from progressing. it was a lack of interest for life, for being something when everything in the end perishes in a bitter end—in his mind. he wanted to start living but did not realize the requirements of life that came with doing that. he knew that a million dollars was not going to appear out of thin air, but it was not going to come with a degree either. work was going to be needed, a lot of time and energy that he saw being put elsewhere. his intelligence is actually quite high, he could have made something of himself if he had actually put his attention and devotion into something other than living backwards. his party ways stopped him, the addiction halted all advances and now he is nothing. he doesn’t have the funds for school and the grades that are under his belt will never get him into the program that he once wanted to be a part of.

soccer player: it’s cliché to say that he was destined for greatness, but the coach had high hopes for his left forward. he was a senior, a seventeen year old when everything crashed around him. but this was a part of him that stayed around until the very end. he clung to this with a firm grip, as it was the last thing that he had. but with his partying came the drugs, came the ecstasy and the weed. it made him high as a kite, put him on cloud but in the end, it cost him yet another title. this was the only thing that carson held onto with an iron grip. he did not want to lose the small high that soccer gave him but when he found something else that gave him a high—it was over. the random drug test that was administered made his heart race, knowing that he had something in his system but could not even remember what it was. his head was pounding too much to think, but he took the test and failed. he was off the team by that afternoon, forced to turn his jersey in and give up his co-captain title. a school star, a promising athlete had been knocked to his knees and everyone was in shock. they had seen the slow transition, they finally took notice of who he was becoming but it seemed that soccer was not even a good enough title for him anymore as he practically handed it over when he put the white pill on his tongue.

boyfriend: it was not his intention to lost this title. he blamed it on the new lifestyle but maybe it was more than that. it could have just been the need to turn over everything in his life, start clean—and included having a single status. he met her, beth, in his youthful days. the times that he would go the local city park and kick the ball around with his friends. she was new and one of his kicks happened to be too strong and collided with her stomach as she walked the path. he apologized more than dozen times, afraid of a lawsuit that his family could not afford. she dismissed his worries, dispelled his concerns and introduced herself with a soft tone. friends was how they started but in high school, they both developed in look and emotion. the emotions allowed them to escalate their relationship int something other than friends. they took things to the next level and then things began to happen. his loyalty lasted from grade nine to grade eleven. when his mother was diagnosed, things changed for the young man and with it, the dynamic of his once peaceful relationship began to change too. he wished she had pulled away instead of trying to be a support system. all he did was shove her away, push her into a corner and try and cover his ears when she told him “everything was going to be okay” because he knew it was a lie. it was just words meant to be comforting but caron knew the truth. he knew what was to become of his mother, he could see it already happening. in the end, she wished for the same thing he did when alcohol and drugs gave him the option that he never really saw. he loved her, he did. cheating had never been in his thoughts but the door swung open with the influence of substances. he took another girl to bed and did not even confess it out loud, she just knew. he finally gave her the final push that he needed to be free of his final title and gain that single status that he desired.

those title are gone but he has new ones, less respectable ones. everything was replaced, building himself up into a whole new person.

alcoholic: it’s not a surprise that all that alcohol has turned alcohol into a crutch for him. he needs it to numb the truths that he won’t face. he won’t admit to it, he doesn’t want to but it’s not hard to see. he’s inebriated by the end of the night, hugging his pillow or his company. at a party, the beer is the first thing that he goes for despite being underage. alcohol has aged him, makes him sleep longer but not as peaceful giving him raccoon eyes. he has tighter skin. he just won’t admit to the problem, he will not openly say that he is an addict or dependent on alcohol. it just is. he knows it, he just won’t help because with it, he’s just an addict on drugs and a sad, lonely boy who needs helps. to him, he doesn’t need help—he needs a drink. he’s not an aggressive drinker, he’s not confrontational, he’s just himself. it’s become who he is. he used to get happy with alcohol at a party, kissing the neck of beth but now, he stays the same, calm, level headed guy that he is. it’s just a part of who he is now.

waiter: he has had this title since his mother was given her fate. he took up a job to help with the bills and now, he uses it to pay for what he needs in life. none of his cheques go to the well being of the family, but he sometimes puts a bag of chips into the cupboard for everyone to enjoy but no one really knows it’s him. he knows that this is his only means of living and therefore, he is actually pretty responsible when it comes to work. it’s getting up for the shifts that he is difficulty with but he lies through his teeth to his employer who seems to have this understanding that he is a brother helping to raise his four siblings and sometimes, they require his attention. it’s completely a lie, he just needs a sob story to excuse his own fault in sleeping through his alarm clock. but he is a hard worker, he takes orders without much gripe about the customer. he has very little complaints either, being as friendly as he can be and that means being as quiet as he can be. he tries not to create too much of a relationship but the regulars, they know him and they don’t his existence.

womanizer: the title of being single stopped working for him when more doors opened to alcohol and drugs. he had a whole new pool of female bodies to pick from in this new world. beth was always that good girl, good grades, good life, bright future, and he was just dragging her down and she was the final weight holding him up above the choppy waters. they both let each other go and now, carson doesn’t mind the new picking that he has to choose from. they are easy, they are simple, they are not dependent on anything else but the comfort of another—same as him. he is not looking for love, he is not looking for lust or a relationship, even friends with benefits, it’s just someone to remind him that he is not alone in this fucked up world that he created for himself.

roommate: naturally, the rent of an apartment in the town is a little too high. just barely out of reach for him to maintain with the little money that he has left over after partying and his drug payments. so he put an ad out and found lewis, a boy that seems to be in the bedroom or the library more than he is actually interacting with carson. they have been roommates for only about a year, just taking the space because lewis filled out the information for the dorms wrong. he’s young and carson’s influence is not all that great. the male has started to introduce the young, blind-to-the-world boy about partying. he has gotten him drunk for the first time, got him to lose his virginity too. carson and lewis are becoming friends, they are both tidy and don’t mind opening the doors to guests. they get along to a degree. lewis with sometimes lecture carson about his wasted potential, especially when carson is the one editing lewis’ essays and quizzing on information that he seems to just absorb.

drug runner: after having kicked the habit that involved the white pill, the boy is still very much linked to alcohol, cigarettes and the occasional joint but he's become further in-depth into the drug ring. he's a runner now, it's a recent gig, something that he picked up after talking back to a person three years older than himself as liquid courage had unknowingly come into play. it's something that he had never really thought of doing but the money is better than the tips at the diner and he really needs the funds to prove to everyone who doubts that he can stand on his own two feet.