Armstrong's Don't Cry

“Nor do people put new wine into old wineskins; otherwise the wineskins burst, and the wine pours out and the wineskins are ruined; but they put new wine into fresh wineskins, and both are preserved.”

Matthew 9:17

Prologue:

They don’t know. No one knows. If anyone did, they’d never understand. She sat cross legged on the  floor, fingers rubbing the small metal key with the adjoining little flashlight, staring at the exit in front of  her. Pappa didn’t know that she could reach the key, or even that she knew where it was and how to  unlock the doors. The voice in her head kept promising her that everything would be better all she had  to do was open the doors and pull the trigger.


Ch.1

They don’t know. No one knows. If anyone did, they’d never understand. She sat cross legged on the floor, fingers rubbing the small metal key with the adjoining little flashlight, staring at the exit in front of her. Pappa didn’t know that she could reach the key, or even that she knew where it was and how to unlock the doors. The voice in her head kept promising her that everything would be better all she had to do was open the doors and pull the trigger. She sat there for a long time trying to work up enough courage to open the doors. The purr of an engine shook her back into reality. Heart beating faster, terror running through her veins she reached up on her tippy toes and placed the key back in Pappa’s not so secret hiding spot, before he could notice that it was gone. Footsteps climbing their way up the front porch, having about five more seconds to get into her room she hurried down the hall. The lock turning on the front door, “Hiddie Ho!” Pappa’s usual greeting echoed throughout the house.
“We’re home!” Momma called out, just in case she didn’t hear Pappa. She quickly grabs a book off the floor and pretends to be reading. Momma’s footsteps could be heard as she walked down the hall, the floorboards screeching in protest. “Whatcha,” poking her head through her doorway, “doin’?”
“Reading.” She lifted up her book as proof.
“Okay.” Momma’s footsteps receded going back to the living room.
“What‘s she doing?” she heard Pappa whisper to Momma.
“Reading.” Momma replied.
They would never ask more about the books and if they did, they never really listened or would say it sounded weird. All this little girl wanted, was for someone to ask her about how she was doing and actually look past the outward appearance and, see the lost and grieving little girl inside. No one ever gave her a chance. No one would ever offer comfort to the one who needed it the most. She would always repeat to herself that “Armstrong’s don’t cry.” Pappa would always tell her this every time, she would get emotional and start crying.  So she burned it into her memory, never to be cleared away, and built a wall around her heart so that she could live by the family motto; “Armstrong’s don’t cry.”
 
No one ever starts out in this state of mind, usually something has to happen to put a child into this frame of mind. She used to be a happy little girl, always smiling, and trusting.

Ch. 2

Eileen had no friends to care for her and cheer her up. She lost the only friends that she had that year due to a bad hair do. In truth she felt like she had no one who cared anything about her.
Eileen wasn’t like other kids. After her father got hurt, her whole life changed. One night she fell asleep a child and woke up an adult. She never whined and complained about being cheated of a childhood.  She wouldn’t play with the other kids. She wouldn’t even talk to the other kids, if she could help it. She knew they wouldn’t care and couldn’t understand.
At lunch the teacher’s assigned seats and organized where the student’s sat and what chores they would do. Each seat had a letter assigned to it. Eileen sat in chair B which meant that on Mondays she would take every one’s trash. On Tuesdays, she would wash the table. Wednesday’s were her day to sweep the floor. Thursday’s chairs marked with the letter B would have to mop the floor around the table after the floor had been swept. Friday’s were the day when she would hold the dust pan for the sweeper.
She was the only girl who sat at Table 3 in chair B every day. All her peers would bully her about her hair and glasses. “Why don’t you just mop the floor with your hair Eileen! We could be done by now if you weren’t so stupid!” chair A would mock.
“MOPHEAD!” the others would join in.
“Hey Eileen, you missed a spot!” he would hand me a napkin, “Oh, wait my bad that’s your face!” chair E would mock.
She would be told these things and more every day. She would try and ignore them and not let them see her cry. If they did make her cry the jabs and mockery would only get worse. It was that year when the thoughts first came.
They didn’t start out strong, just as passing thoughts. She would start thinking “isn’t there anything I can do right?” and when she couldn’t think of anything, the small voice would pipe in and say “there is an easy way out! You won’t feel a thing, and everything will be so much better afterwards.”


Sitting on the floor legs aching from sitting with them crossed to long, a little girl sits on the floor surrounded by her toys. It didn't matter how many of those toys that she had out around her , she was still lonely. Getting up she slowly walks to the door that separates their worlds. Hesitant afraid of what she might say, unsure of what she will say. She knocks. It wasn't a loud knock just  a quiet little noise, that Judith would recognize. Eileen loved playing with Judith. Eileen would never admit that Judith was her best friend, her only friend. "It's open."
 Those two words meant the world to Eileen. In those two words she found hope that Judith may play with her! Slowly opening the door, she walks into another world. Judith sat on her bed, her room was surrounded by NSYNC and Brittany Spears posters. The small singular radio sat precariously on the nightstand, Backstreet Boys' song Bye, Bye, Bye.