A Melancholic Black Series (Book 1): The Red Door

Title Page

Dedication

I

II

III

IV

V

VI

VII

VIII

IX

X

XI

XII

XIII

XIV

Author's Note

Call to Action

The Red Door

A Melancholic Black Series

R.J. Scriber

Copyright © 2016 R.J. Scriber

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
All rights reserved.

For My Friends, Bo & The Chef

I

May 10th, 2003.

Before… when it made more sense.

If you ask any woman about the one day they have always dreamed about, as far back as they can remember, they will give you the same two answers: Disney World and their wedding day. Preferably, back to back. It’s no different for Nell Gray. She wanted a man that looked like Jonathan Taylor Thomas, sang like Brian McKnight, and wooed her how Cameron James wooed Bianca Stratford.

As for the wedding itself, it was simple. Outside ceremony, near a waterfall, although not necessary. As long as it
was
outside. She had visions of the warm spring air gently blowing her hair, almost in slow-motion. Flowing back and forth, gently caressing against her soft, but toned shoulders. Enough to drive the man who awaited her hand absolutely wild with anticipation.

It would be sunny. Not that it needed to be. Overcast was fine. There would be hundreds of people. Most of them she wouldn’t even know. She didn’t care. Passerbys would see her beauty and need to crash it just to get a glance of this stunning maiden. Men would ask themselves;
How can I get someone like her? I need her!

For just once in her life, she wanted to be the center of attention. She needed to be the prettiest girl in the room, even though she always had been. It was a modest life she’d lived. She never saw her worth, but Rodney did. Of course he did, he’s a man. He saw her physical beauty as all men have and still do, yet it was her inner beauty that drove
him
wild.

If there’s one thing he knows, everything Nell does, is done out of love. No matter how morally wrong it may be. How else can he explain the ring on his finger?

She gave Rodney a chance to win her heart, which he did. Although it was the pain he had been going through that broke her heart just enough for him to sneak in. He was JTT; he was Brian McKnight; he was Cameron James.

To her.

In reality, he was none of them, not even close. He was a nerd. Not by “nerd standards” of being savvy. Just a title by people who never understood him because he was weird and peculiar. Nell never cared.

In fact, Rodney thought it was a joke the first time Nell asked him out. He figured she was just being cruel. There had been so many before him who had tried and failed to win Nell’s hand, why
wouldn’t
he think she was lying?

“
Some of my friends jest, saying I’m as weird as Rodney Gray. ‘You’d make a good couple,’ they say. They were kidding, but they aren’t wrong. Wanna go out some time, maybe?
”

Word for word, that’s how Nell asked him for their first date. Imagine the look on his face when he realized she was being serious. The dumbest smile, but she thought it was cute. She never understood how anyone could be so stupidly happy from her asking them out.

Poor Nell never knew her worth.

Without a doubt, he wanted to shout, “
Fuck yeah!
” Instead, a simple, “
Sure
” sufficed. Best decision of his life; easiest, too. He always just thought she made a mistake, and he was grateful for it. Nell has been nothing but unwavering and loyal. Something he, along the way, had forgotten himself.

Perhaps it was cockiness, now that he had Nell on his arm. She was a catch, a woman other women were jealous of, just from looking at her. Which was a very serious problem and the one main reason she has no friends. Some people—
most
people—are just plain intimidated.

No secret.

She was naive some times, but not stupid. She saw the jealousy ooze from their iris’ most times. At heart, she’s just an exotic girl-next-door type, who would rather just stay home in pajamas or blue jeans with a messy white shirt than to go out and dress up to play Barbie. In retrospect, that’s what most likely made her appealing to a lot of men. Even women, since a lot of them put in the effort to look beautiful, and here is Nell—a living, breathing deity of godly good looks.

“
I now pronounce you Mr. And Mrs. Rodney Dale Gray.
”

Seldom do a lot of selfish wishes from a little girl’s “perfect-wedding dream scenario” come true. In the end, does it ever matter? Whether it’s getting married on a desert island surrounded by nothing but beautiful clear water or on top of a mountain in a resort with freshly fallen snow cascading down like clouds from Heaven. That’s best-case scenario. No different than getting married in a state park, 100-feet from the water, getting sunburned on a rather muggy May day, or a warm October when it decides last minute to rain during the vows. That’s worst-case. Mother Nature is a bitch and she never apologizes.

It never does make a difference. Not when true love and eternal appreciation are streaming out of the eyes of the bride and groom. Sometimes the most beautiful things in life
are
the hiccups. Nothing is perfect, but you can sure as hell act like it is. At least for one day.

Even though a lot of people know what they would like their wedding to be, sometimes the reality might not exceed the expectations. For Nell, it really did. It didn’t matter how grand her wedding was. She got what what she wanted: Rodney standing across from her at the altar, staring back into her eyes.

That day meant more than just nuptials. It meant a man swearing he’d love her forever, no matter what their future held. For the most part, he does love Nell. “Good man, terrible mistakes” bullshit. It meant taking his last name. A constant reminder that she had a man who loved her; it was now her job to represent the Gray name. Not out of respect of the generations that came before, but for the generations coming after Nell and Rodney. Their children; children’s children, and so on.

It meant a chance of starting fresh in life and writing her story any way she damn well pleased. What became of their life and their daughter, wasn’t her fault.

Amberly was supposed to be the first of five planned children. In a perfect world it would have been two girls with three big brothers to protect them. Rarely does life go as planned.

Noble thoughts are…
noble
. The real world changes often. Sometimes—
some
—things turn out pretty good. But for the rest of the Earth’s inhabitants, they know nothing but failure, depression, and regret. No matter the cards Rodney and Nell were dealt at a young age, they played them and did everything they could to rewrite their destiny. For a while, when they were younger, it worked. Like most things in life, it catches up to everyone and knocks them down a peg. In Rodney and Nell’s case, it can flat out throw you down a flight of stairs.

II

November 5th.

Noon.

“You’re never too young to die,” Rodney Gray has come to realize, only to deal with the strain he currently feels tugging at his heart-strings. He’s in pain, though he’s only acting brave for his equally distraught wife, Nell. It’s not natural to bury someone who hasn’t experienced the world or anything it can offer.

The child should bury the parent. It’s an unwritten rule, but it’s natural. You’re born, you get in trouble as a youngster, you live and learn. Keyword being “live.” You grow up, get a job, get married, have a family, and enjoy the rest of your life any way you can, then you
die
.

What happens when you can’t look in to the piercing blue eyes of a little girl you birthed? When you can’t hear the soft, almost angelic voice say, “
mommy
.” “
Daddy?
” The laughs, giggles. The crying.

Shock. Pain. Anger. Depression: the reflection of a short life with memories you can no longer recall. There are no upward turns or “working through it.” Not when you don’t want to be saved. Not when you refuse hope. Not when you abandon acceptance.

There will never be any blissful escape to the times when it all made sense. When everything was fine. Not in real life.

Their little girl is dead. And that’s that.

The honor of burying your body into that six-foot hole should belong to your children,
never
the other way around. Unfortunately, shit happens.

The Grays are a young, unassuming couple,
both
good-looking. Be that as it may, it has not stopped people from asking how Rodney, a shorter man with glasses and hair a tufted mess, could ever catch the eye of Nell; who stands tall like an Amazon.
She
is the high school jock to Rodney’s varsity cheerleader, though Nell never saw herself above Rodney. Even with her beauty.

They grew up together in the same shitty town of Carmichael, Michigan; about twenty minutes outside Highland Park. They went to the same shitty school and had the same shitty friends. They united in matrimony when they were both just twenty-four.

Nine years of marriage.

Life’s supposed to be different for them now. A new start outside of Carmichael. A fresh beginning in Olave, Michigan. It’s every inch different than Carmichael. Great food, friendly and caring neighbors, and almost zero crime. A generally ideal place to settle and start a family. The old story of “Give to your kids what you never had.” That is their goal. Or,
was
. To become better than their parents. Which, in certain respects, wouldn't be that hard.

They were both raised in direful homes. They never really had a chance, but they fought through their own personal wars. Rodney grew up with a single mother, who drank all her worries and sorrows away. After all, it’s not everyday that your husband gets a sex change and leaves you for another man. Rodney’s father figured that his mother was such a shit wife, or woman in general; he’d give being a female a shot and prove it wasn’t
that
hard. The lugubrious, yet, humorous truth.

As for Nell, both her parents were murdered when she was seven. If there was one thing that Carmichael had plenty of, it was heroin. Any drugs really. Also, a lot of thugs who are surprisingly punctual when they expect payment. There’s no way to explain to a young child, boy or girl alike, why mommy and daddy were gunned down in front of their eyes. She learned what her parents were, because her family never hid it. Tough love; learn from their mistakes. Crude, but, truthfully, it never seemed to bother Nell that much anyway. She got to live with her grandmother. Hardly an angel of a woman, but at least she was constant

Even with a childhood that should have shaped and molded them into nobodies; drunks, users, or abusers… they survived.

All Nell has ever wanted was to be able trust someone. Someone who would actually do as they promised. A companion to share her load of heartbreak and disappointment. She needed Rodney, she just hadn’t met him yet. A match for Rodney’s need to feel loved. To be told he was worthwhile. A true sentiment other than the lies found at the bottom of an empty bottle. He never asked that of Nell, but he never had to. Misery can sense misery. They were fools who rushed into love for the sake of not feeling abandoned by the world, yet somehow found their soul mates.