Resisting Your Ripeness
This is a possibly-spoilery scene from the revised version of Gemma's story.
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The local Church-affiliated community center had a special Purity & Love Pageant, and many local children played a part, with the children of Purple Orbs often getting central parts. This meant I should have had a part, but I didn't. Even though I was fifteen and should have been onstage as one of the leads in the Resisting Your Ripeness dance, I was instead banned from the community center. It was a veritable miracle I wasn't banned from the Church itself.
My house was a rush of madness as my seventeen year old sister Ruby frantically dashed about getting ready for the final dress rehearsal. As a potential new member of the Young People's Service League, it was her job to help oversee the older community center kids as they pranced in skimpy outfits in the name of sexual purity. Somehow, midriff-baring tank tops and frilly short-shorts were the epitome of abstinence and the ideal thing to wear onstage to show how you were “Resisting Your Ripeness.” Ruby wore such an outfit, even though she wouldn't be onstage, as it was a Children's Dance. Nobody who had gotten their Orb danced, but Ruby wore an outfit “for morale.” I think she wanted to show off her “Ripeness,” what little she had of it.
She swung her long, bouncy brown hair around and asked me, “So, Gemma, how do I look?”
I deadpanned, “Like a paragon of Churchly virtue.”
As much as I was supposed to believe in the Church, some of the things they did struck me as decidedly odd. How did it make sense to promote abstinence with half-naked teenage girls? I wanted to get it, but I didn't.
Ruby explained, “Well, unlike some people I am, indeed, a paragon of virtue. I haven't so much as kissed anyone, ever.”
I retorted, “Neither have I!”
She insisted, “That's not because you're virtuous, little sister. It's because you're totally psycho. After all, you should be dancing in the pageant, but your ripeness went rotten, didn't it?”
That was thanks to my sister, who had been teasing me for my oddly wavy red hair that was unlike anybody else in my immediate family's. They were all brunettes with straight hair. Ruby had been going on and on and on about how I must be the product of an affair to have hair such as mine, and I had punched her in the nose. I had my mother's green eyes, just like she did. True, my father could have technically been anyone, but that was highly unlikely and not something Ruby should have said.
Perhaps I could have gotten away with this if I hadn't punched her onstage during the dress rehearsal two years ago. Unfortunately, everyone saw, and I was banned in order to prevent the Church from thinking their community center was “encouraging violence.” Ruby was the one encouraging that particular piece of violence. Oh, I knew punching her was wrong, but that was far from the first time she had teased me about my appearance. I hated it because part of me did worry she was right. Everyone else in my family was tall and thin, with slender, curveless, almost-bony bodies. Somehow I had gotten both muscles and curves. I was firmly in that curious “but you're not fat!” range, being 5'10” and maybe 175 pounds. I had the tallness, but I had the wrong body. Ruby was close enough to my height at 5'8”, but she weighed at least 60 pounds less than I did, if not more.
Still, being a genetic anomaly didn't mean I was the product of an affair or anything. It did mean that I was stuck at home while my dad was working on the weekend and my mother drove Ruby to the community center, calling public transportation “unseemly” for an aspiring politician's daughter who wanted to get into the exclusive Young People's Service League. She had been rejected last year when she turned sixteen for her parents “not being prominent enough.” This performance was her time to shine.
Ruby leaned forward when my mother came down the stairs. “How do I look, mother?”
My mother replied, “You look lovely, dear.” She turned to me. “Try not to burn down the house while we're gone, Gemma.”
How could I burn down the house? It's not like I were one of the people with fire magic, like my sister Ruby or my mother. She might burn down the house, but did my mother ever warn her about destruction of property? No, she didn't.
I grumbled, “I'm not the one with fire magic.”
My mother clucked, “You should still be careful. Do try to keep out of trouble, for once.”
I was not as much of a troublemaker as my mom suggested! Just because I had tried to sneak into the local Temple's secret rooms when I was ten, did not make me a troublemaker. Why would I do that? I thought they might have a secret answer for why my mom seemed to like Ruby so much better. It was a logical move, and not a sign I was a budding malcontent. I was perfectly content to follow the Church, even if they could be blastedly stupid sometimes. Maybe they would make more sense once I got my purple orb.
While I had a history of acting out and hitting people, mostly my sister, a troublemaker wasn't something I aspired to be. And, to quote that age-old phrase, “she started it.” Ruby just loved to provoke me, especially over my appearance. She also love to provoke me over how easily provoked I was, and, sadly, that usually worked, too.
Ruby admonished, “Yes, do try to keep out of trouble, sister. You don't want to hurt your family's reputation any more than you already have, do you?”
I wouldn't mind hurting her reputation if it didn't mean hurting mine. What was it about me that made me seem to screw up constantly, speaking out of turn and getting into fights and otherwise doing not-so-Churchly things? It seemed like from birth my mother expected me to be a failure, and somehow I had been living up to that, at least a little. Well, I wasn't going to stay a failure. I would get my purple orb, and I would show everyone how good I could be. They would have to eat their words about how messed up I was. I knew I could be who I was supposed to be. I just had to wait.
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The local Church-affiliated community center had a special Purity & Love Pageant, and many local children played a part, with the children of Purple Orbs often getting central parts. This meant I should have had a part, but I didn't. Even though I was fifteen and should have been onstage as one of the leads in the Resisting Your Ripeness dance, I was instead banned from the community center. It was a veritable miracle I wasn't banned from the Church itself.
My house was a rush of madness as my seventeen year old sister Ruby frantically dashed about getting ready for the final dress rehearsal. As a potential new member of the Young People's Service League, it was her job to help oversee the older community center kids as they pranced in skimpy outfits in the name of sexual purity. Somehow, midriff-baring tank tops and frilly short-shorts were the epitome of abstinence and the ideal thing to wear onstage to show how you were “Resisting Your Ripeness.” Ruby wore such an outfit, even though she wouldn't be onstage, as it was a Children's Dance. Nobody who had gotten their Orb danced, but Ruby wore an outfit “for morale.” I think she wanted to show off her “Ripeness,” what little she had of it.
She swung her long, bouncy brown hair around and asked me, “So, Gemma, how do I look?”
I deadpanned, “Like a paragon of Churchly virtue.”
As much as I was supposed to believe in the Church, some of the things they did struck me as decidedly odd. How did it make sense to promote abstinence with half-naked teenage girls? I wanted to get it, but I didn't.
Ruby explained, “Well, unlike some people I am, indeed, a paragon of virtue. I haven't so much as kissed anyone, ever.”
I retorted, “Neither have I!”
She insisted, “That's not because you're virtuous, little sister. It's because you're totally psycho. After all, you should be dancing in the pageant, but your ripeness went rotten, didn't it?”
That was thanks to my sister, who had been teasing me for my oddly wavy red hair that was unlike anybody else in my immediate family's. They were all brunettes with straight hair. Ruby had been going on and on and on about how I must be the product of an affair to have hair such as mine, and I had punched her in the nose. I had my mother's green eyes, just like she did. True, my father could have technically been anyone, but that was highly unlikely and not something Ruby should have said.
Perhaps I could have gotten away with this if I hadn't punched her onstage during the dress rehearsal two years ago. Unfortunately, everyone saw, and I was banned in order to prevent the Church from thinking their community center was “encouraging violence.” Ruby was the one encouraging that particular piece of violence. Oh, I knew punching her was wrong, but that was far from the first time she had teased me about my appearance. I hated it because part of me did worry she was right. Everyone else in my family was tall and thin, with slender, curveless, almost-bony bodies. Somehow I had gotten both muscles and curves. I was firmly in that curious “but you're not fat!” range, being 5'10” and maybe 175 pounds. I had the tallness, but I had the wrong body. Ruby was close enough to my height at 5'8”, but she weighed at least 60 pounds less than I did, if not more.
Still, being a genetic anomaly didn't mean I was the product of an affair or anything. It did mean that I was stuck at home while my dad was working on the weekend and my mother drove Ruby to the community center, calling public transportation “unseemly” for an aspiring politician's daughter who wanted to get into the exclusive Young People's Service League. She had been rejected last year when she turned sixteen for her parents “not being prominent enough.” This performance was her time to shine.
Ruby leaned forward when my mother came down the stairs. “How do I look, mother?”
My mother replied, “You look lovely, dear.” She turned to me. “Try not to burn down the house while we're gone, Gemma.”
How could I burn down the house? It's not like I were one of the people with fire magic, like my sister Ruby or my mother. She might burn down the house, but did my mother ever warn her about destruction of property? No, she didn't.
I grumbled, “I'm not the one with fire magic.”
My mother clucked, “You should still be careful. Do try to keep out of trouble, for once.”
I was not as much of a troublemaker as my mom suggested! Just because I had tried to sneak into the local Temple's secret rooms when I was ten, did not make me a troublemaker. Why would I do that? I thought they might have a secret answer for why my mom seemed to like Ruby so much better. It was a logical move, and not a sign I was a budding malcontent. I was perfectly content to follow the Church, even if they could be blastedly stupid sometimes. Maybe they would make more sense once I got my purple orb.
While I had a history of acting out and hitting people, mostly my sister, a troublemaker wasn't something I aspired to be. And, to quote that age-old phrase, “she started it.” Ruby just loved to provoke me, especially over my appearance. She also love to provoke me over how easily provoked I was, and, sadly, that usually worked, too.
Ruby admonished, “Yes, do try to keep out of trouble, sister. You don't want to hurt your family's reputation any more than you already have, do you?”
I wouldn't mind hurting her reputation if it didn't mean hurting mine. What was it about me that made me seem to screw up constantly, speaking out of turn and getting into fights and otherwise doing not-so-Churchly things? It seemed like from birth my mother expected me to be a failure, and somehow I had been living up to that, at least a little. Well, I wasn't going to stay a failure. I would get my purple orb, and I would show everyone how good I could be. They would have to eat their words about how messed up I was. I knew I could be who I was supposed to be. I just had to wait.