-Knox-

Curiosity may kill some cats, but I don’t worry. Charlie only thinks he’s dying. Now, you couldn’t tell it by the way he shines in the day, of course. In the day, Charlie can know himself and not notice all of these itching changes that confuse him. In the day, Charlie is the angry teenager. He is the model student who prefers the truant’s corner. In the day, Charlie is the rugby player, the playboy, the vibrant-eyed counterpart to Neil’s hesitant but intense sidelong glances. In the dusk, Charlie is the guardian angel, psh angel, of haphazard mischief. He is Loki. He is Hermes. He is the fertile god of escape; forest fire incarnate with rolled up shirtsleeves and a pretentious schoolboy stride. At midnight, Charlie is the dead poet(as he so gracefully put it to Meeks the other night, I might add). At midnight, he keeps the melody to our running footsteps. But, in the twilight he is Charlie Dalton.

He is Charlie Dalton in red boxers. He is Charlie Dalton in striking brown hair and his glintless lying goodnight smile. He is Charlie Dalton in insomnia. He is Charlie Dalton pretending that he is asleep and pretending not to notice that I’m not either. He is Charlie Dalton trying to be in denial and, in that, Charlie Dalton is one of us. For every moment that he doesn’t notice what the rest of us spend our days pretending not to notice Charlie must pay in nights facing dead on, eyes open, chest heaving and head spinning.

Tonight Charlie thinks he’s dying. Charlie Dalton- infamous womanizer, dead poet, beatnik, resident fertility god of Wensicker dorm, Nuwanda- is dying because he is stifled. Charlie’s choking on the fact that it is not the written rules of Welton that leave him inquisitively trapped. It’s the unwritten ones. As much as Nuwanda scoffs at his father’s intentions for him to be a banker he’s smart enough to know Chekhov’s sneering banker was bitter and right. Voluntary confinement is a lot harder than compulsory.

If someone drew the lines Charlie would have no trouble coloring outside of them. But, as it is, Charlie’s really bad at figuring stuff out. He doesn’t want to realize that just because it isn’t written in the rules doesn’t mean it’s not unwritten in the rules. It is harder to bear for Charlie that he is strangling himself with his own school tie when it would be much more poetic for Charlie to sling the snake of tradition from his neck and tame it into pulling Neil from his studies and knotting him to the bed or something. He doesn’t know how poetic it would be after that because he doesn’t really think about it. Which is probably good because for now Charlie could bask in the fact that Neil tamed and tied away from all the stuff that a guy like Neil should do would just do what Neil would do and would cease to be model student Neil Perry and instead be Neil Perry, poet tied to a bed. Charlie plays with this idea cautiously but regularly as moonlight floods his room.

Charlie already knows that it’s unwritten that we eat at 7 o’clock with our right hands, that we listen to our fathers until we hit a mild 37 and become fathers ourselves. It’s unwritten in the rules that we’re bound for school and good profession that we may not be able to swallow, but will because it is the ‘good’ thing to do. It’s probably good that Charlie doesn’t wander on his thoughts too much. He’d know it’s probably unwritten somewhere that you’re not supposed to imagine tying your best friend to the bed. When Charlie knows this, when it clicks and he realizes that they’re already trying to fuck up what he hasn’t even thought about doing tomorrow while he’s still busy seizing today- he will break. Charlie will break. Charlie will break down and bring us together down with him. He will thrust the doors open so wide that even before we go outside we cannot hide from each other. He will get sick of being the good son, the good banker-to-be, the good student, the good American, the good man and the good poet. The last two are all that matter as far as he’s concerned. And, as far as he’s concerned, accepting those two means happily relinquishing the others.

Until the day Charlie breaks we will all continue not to notice. We will keep to our unwritten rites. No where does it explicitly say that we all have to follow our father’s footsteps until they are too old or too dead to follow. No one ever said we had to meekly mumble under our breaths against them until we resentfully become fathers ourselves. No one ever wrote that good young men should become good young lawyers and doctors and bankers period. We accept that we’re supposed to go to school and ignore who we are. Then we stay quiet as we sit through lectures about all of this classic stuff and realize we will never experience it. We accept that we’re supposed to get married to a good, Christian, white woman and be like our fathers. We accept that we’re supposed to continue the same traditions that leave our kids as fucked up and confused and just searching as we are, if they’re lucky. If they’re not they never question at all. For the most part, we oblige. We keep our heads in the forest and our eyes down on our poetry.

The small dorm is littered with stirrsome bed springs and the slight monotone slipping of contemplation slipping of Charlie tossing the tie between his fingers like a metronome.Outside, the tree sways under the pressure of the fall wind but continues. It remains and it beats back making a steady and ominous music against the window. It could be a warning, but I’m not heeding.

It’s only a matter of time though. Just like Hermes didn’t like to keep his feet on the ground, Charlie won’t be able to stay still all this time. When he breaks, we all will. It’s only a while until we realizing yelling carpe diem and spinning like fools only makes us fools until we stop putting stupid rules on each other. Keating said that the classics knew a steady wind was fates changing. For something like this, something we've read about, something we need, if we can't avoid it anyways why should we try?

Charlie’s choking, stirring, crumbling, mumbling in his sleep. I try to not stare at the way his shirt wraps around him, the way his face leaks in and out of a smirk and a grimace fluidly. His dreams are waking and even though he’s not I know it will only be a few days now. I guess I’ll be thrown into seizing the day and it will seize back, but I don’t mind. At least I’d know, for once, I’ve lived.

It's late and I have a day, a night, an english class and a lady to follow tomorrow. For now, I will not be Charlie. I will fall asleep to his raging hesitance and nod away to the sound of change creeping into the dorms.

A/N: 'Chekhov's banker' is an illusion to the short story 'The Bet' by Anton Chekhov which is about a shallow banker makes a extravagant bet with a young student that capital punishment is better than life imprisonment.

Thanks for reading the first ch. of my first DPS fic and please please please review! I appreciate negative and positive comments, but flames will be ignored.