Thursday, May 20, 2010

One girl in... a moving state.

Grace didn't have any siblings. Her mom said one red-headed child is enough-- one red-headed child without freckles is odd enough. Grace's mom has red hair and freckles. Her angry voice had never left anyone guessing what her heritage is. Grace could hear her mother in the kitchen. Baking chicken and baked potatoes and baked veggie salad. Her mother liked baking-- so Grace's mom was in the kitchen baking dinner.

Irish heritage without freckles. Grace thought about painting them onto her arms when she was 10. Her mom left a tattoo magazine on the table by accident, and Grace thought she could create the beautiness she desired by drawing her own prints. But she quickly realized magic markers couldn't create the spots she wanted.

Grace took out the last article from her suitcase-- ironically a tattoo magazine. She flipped through the pages of purple and pink flowers, blue and green waters, all inked into men and women's arms, legs, thighs, shoulder blades. Page 47 displayed a man with "mom" red-plastered on his ass.

"Nice," Grace said, as she now heard her mom singing to her baked chicken.

Grace crawled on all fours down the hall to where her face hit the stairs that lead to the kitchen below. She could see her mom, swaying her hips as she took the chicken out of the stove. Grace would lay on her belly for hours as a kid, obsessed with her mom's movements. The way her dressed swished when she wisked the eggs for her favorite macaron pie; how her arms kneaded the dough for homemade bisquits. Or Grace's favorite: squeezing lemons for fresh lemonade. The pressure she used in her arms and hands, a constant and intense turning.

Grace rolled over and looked at the white ceiling as she remembered the blend of bitter juice and sugar on her tongue. Five years ago she left home for something better-- but closing her eyes, she couldn't think of anything better than the taste of her mom's lemonade.

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Grace Pickering and Mark Stocktan are fictional characters crafted by Megan Blevins. Read previous posts to catch up on their story. Enjoy, Mb

Wednesday, May 19, 2010

One girl in... her room.

Grace Pickering bent over and pulled all the wadded tank tops out of her sprawled-open gray suitcase. Seperating them one-by-one, her favorite black and lace trimmed blouse blew a whiff of his house into her nose. She stopped. She scanned her eyes slowly to the left down the hallway, hunting for body movement. Grace's uneasy eyes floated back to the tank she caressed inbetween her fingers. She curled the shirt into face-- the smell deep into her heart.

Staring around her room, she breathed heavy, folding routinely, without thinking. Her arms moving back and forth. Up and down. Ten different colored tops held different memories. But they were each drowned with the same smell. The smell of a house. The scent of a man.

His scent annoyed her. The perfect mix of rain fresh laundry detergent and lavendar lotion-- the secret recipe that had kept Grace guessing for years. She had also convinced herself his freckles had an aroma. Cotton, maybe.

Grace starred at the pile of clothes. She placed the tanks into the top shelf of her cabinet, his aroma hitting her eyes. Her tongue. Coughing, disgusted of how his perfume possessed her, she threw her work into the white clothes hamper.

The bright red walls shined as the morning sun sneaked through the half closed blinds. She sat on the hamper, testing its plastic strength against her 5'7 frame. Her roomed used to be yellow. But then again, much of her life had changed. She used to swear she'd never move back into that old room. But there she sat, surveying her old room; a blanketed floor of shorts, skirts, dresses, sandals, tennis shoes, dirty socks, mascara and powder; power bars, empty water bottles, paper, pens-- her favorite teddy bear.

"I'd love to burn this place down," Grace huffed.

Her white cat Mikey observed her from his spot on the bed. He meowed back in response.

"Yea," she smirked. "You can strike the match."

She began laughing as the hamper gave way, bouncing her into the middle of the floor. Mikey jumped to Grace's feet, then into her suitcase. He meowed again.

"Okay," Grace chuckled. "Back to work."

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Grace Pickering and Mark Stocktan are fictional characters crafted by Megan Blevins. Read previous posts to catch up on their story. Enjoy, Mb