Together We Are Outliers: Silicon Valley

Tangarine Buggy

There has always been this longing to chase a dream, this life that seems to be ideal; even when all those times the darkness seemed to never leave her mind- the highest and infinite feeling of light will and always forever will be there. She just needed to find it. Caralee longed for that moment to find a life that she always wanted, the type of life where you never felt like you needed a vacation from. That was her dream, she wanted nothing more. She started packing her belongings in her and her friends apartment. She had to move away; this place was beginning to crumble right under her feet. She lifted each box one by one as if they were feathers even though they were squares of solid concrete. She felt a presence behind her.

"You know I can always help you with that." He walked closer to her and placed his hands on one of the boxes. She glanced at him and then her eyes fell away.

"No. Its fine, I got it handled." She lifted the box and walked to her car. The old tangerine colored buggy. She was surprised that this ultra metal never fell apart. She put the box in the passengers seat.

"Come on Caralee, we can at least still talk."

"You're kicking me out for your asshole friends, Wirt. To do what?"

"Look, they need a place to stay. We're planning to kickstart something- like a band or," after hearing that she tuned out. She went back into her car to start the engine."Just keep the rest of the stuff. I don't care."

"Come on Cara- even all those assassins creed games?"

She thought for a moment; her eyes never leaving the road. She loved those games; and she knew all of her movies and books were in there. She thought that she at least had most of them in the car already. But she knew if she were to go back into the house it'd pain her even worse. She remembered all of those times they were going to make something together; even if it were just as friends. The were going to invent a program that could crush the odds. But she knew he was lying; he bragged her into moving in with him to become just another person that would pay for everything, like cooking and cleaning. How did she put up with all of that?

"Just keep it." She started her engine and drove off. Goodbye Wirt, hello to not knowing where she was heading. But she had to leave; nothing was happening there. It was just a bean bag filled with styrofoam, muck, and sharp shards of glass she was trying to swim through to make something. She wanted to at least create some sort of program for her graphic design. But there was no way she was able going to make anything in that incubator.

She felt as if she was driving on this road of infinite nothingness; it seemed to go on endlessly, and she had no idea where she was heading. Everything seemed to cave in. Nothing seemed to matter anymore- only this path of not knowing, and all the world was white noise. 'I sound depressing as fuck', she thought just from her listening to herself. It made her sick. 'Not me. This isn't me.'

She put in her Mumford and sons CD Wilder Mind and her favorite song Tompkins Square Park came on. "Oh hell yeah." She grinned; her hands stuck on the steering wheel as she cried "I want to hold you one last time. Oh baby." She began banging her head back and forth; and as the song progressed she started to sing along, 'Nooo flame burns forever' She started strumming along with it; her screaming and singing all together; nothing is about to stop her now. No one. She will never stop for anyone, not again. At least not until she found her dream.

Soon the moment quietened as the song Hot Gates came on from the same album. She drove on endlessly; she had no idea where she was. She pulled over at the gas station to fill up her tank, she felt herself cave in. She rested her head on top of the door of her car and moaned.

"I'm so stupid. Stupid stupid stupid." She began to cry. "What am I going to do now?" she said to herself. "I should have begged Wirt for me to just stay for atleast a week longer until I knew where to go." From a distance a man noticed her, his eyebrows scrunched together; he seemed concerned for her. She just stood there with her head against the door of her car, it seemed as if she was never going to leave. 'Shes looks as if shes about to turn into a pile of goop,' he thought to himself. 'Like that scene in Howls Moving Castle where howl was sitting in a chair and he turned into a pile of goop just because Sophie mixed up the potions for his hair.'