Original Short Story- Skim
Title: Skim
Author irelandsavage
Words 534
A/N: An odd little story from my CW class last semester. The assignment was to look at a piece of artwork hanging in the Gallery on campus and write a short story or poem about it. I chose the paintin Burst by Lauren Collings (the painting on the far left of the photo), which my friend and I had jokingly said looked like a beach on an acid trip. Which explains this surprisingly-mopey story.
Owen watched the strong ocean breeze whip Lily’s hair into her face. She didn’t react at all to the tickling strands, just stared apathetically at the sky as she rocked back and forth.
(Just like she’d been doing for the past 6 minutes,
which was after a fit of uncontrollable scratching,
which followed a 3-minute unintelligible rant.)
It was December in Maryland, and Owen had brought (practically dragged) Lily to the beach hoping the cold air would assist in sobering her up. From the still-glazed look in her eyes, it wasn’t doing much.
“So…what exactly did you take this time?”
Lily’s eyes made a half-hearted attempt to find him in the bright sunlight (which somehow did nothing for the temperature), but quickly gave up in favor of squinting at a boat in the distance. Who knows what her brain was actually interpreting it as, she was higher than he'd ever seen her. Whatever she saw was apparently hilarious, though. Her whole body began to shake as she giggled, and he sighed.
Lily had been born three years before him, but he’d always felt like the older brother. He constantly had to clean up her messes and bail her out of tight situations-in some cases, literally bailing her out. Right now she was in her druggie phase, and owed a substantial amount of money to one of those drug lord-types. The type of person he hadn’t really known existed outside of bad action movies and television dramas.
She finally spoke, attempting to answer his question. “Um…I don’t really know. It was pink. And it was a lot.” She giggled again.
Of course, the reply that came out sounded more like a deaf person trying to communicate for the first time than actual English, but he’d learned to fill in the gaps.
He didn’t respond, just nodded, even though she still wasn’t looking at him. She was now sprawled on the ground on her back, whistling a jaunty tune, not caring one iota that she’d been almost entirely coated in sand by this point.
Her cheerful little song abruptly stopped, and Owen watched as she held her left hand up to inspect its fingers.
All he had to do was find a way to pay off her debt before it got both of them killed, and maybe get her into some sort of rehab (with any luck, stopping her from doing any more damage to herself). Easy as pie.
Owen allowed himself a moment to be thoroughly depressed at the turn his life had taken. He sank down to sit behind his older-younger sister on the frigid beach; head in his hands, eyes squeezed shut.
She’ll be fine. We’ll be fine. It’ll just… take some time. Everything will work out, just like it always has.
Never mind that she’s managed to alienate all of our friends and few remaining relatives.
Or that she’s done nothing but tear my life to bits since Mom died.
His gaze lifted wearily to his sister again, trying desperately to find some reason why he shouldn't hate her. But all he could see was that her left leg was twitching, just as it had been for the past 45 minutes.
Author irelandsavage
Words 534
A/N: An odd little story from my CW class last semester. The assignment was to look at a piece of artwork hanging in the Gallery on campus and write a short story or poem about it. I chose the paintin Burst by Lauren Collings (the painting on the far left of the photo), which my friend and I had jokingly said looked like a beach on an acid trip. Which explains this surprisingly-mopey story.
Owen watched the strong ocean breeze whip Lily’s hair into her face. She didn’t react at all to the tickling strands, just stared apathetically at the sky as she rocked back and forth.
(Just like she’d been doing for the past 6 minutes,
which was after a fit of uncontrollable scratching,
which followed a 3-minute unintelligible rant.)
It was December in Maryland, and Owen had brought (practically dragged) Lily to the beach hoping the cold air would assist in sobering her up. From the still-glazed look in her eyes, it wasn’t doing much.
“So…what exactly did you take this time?”
Lily’s eyes made a half-hearted attempt to find him in the bright sunlight (which somehow did nothing for the temperature), but quickly gave up in favor of squinting at a boat in the distance. Who knows what her brain was actually interpreting it as, she was higher than he'd ever seen her. Whatever she saw was apparently hilarious, though. Her whole body began to shake as she giggled, and he sighed.
Lily had been born three years before him, but he’d always felt like the older brother. He constantly had to clean up her messes and bail her out of tight situations-in some cases, literally bailing her out. Right now she was in her druggie phase, and owed a substantial amount of money to one of those drug lord-types. The type of person he hadn’t really known existed outside of bad action movies and television dramas.
She finally spoke, attempting to answer his question. “Um…I don’t really know. It was pink. And it was a lot.” She giggled again.
Of course, the reply that came out sounded more like a deaf person trying to communicate for the first time than actual English, but he’d learned to fill in the gaps.
He didn’t respond, just nodded, even though she still wasn’t looking at him. She was now sprawled on the ground on her back, whistling a jaunty tune, not caring one iota that she’d been almost entirely coated in sand by this point.
Her cheerful little song abruptly stopped, and Owen watched as she held her left hand up to inspect its fingers.
All he had to do was find a way to pay off her debt before it got both of them killed, and maybe get her into some sort of rehab (with any luck, stopping her from doing any more damage to herself). Easy as pie.
Owen allowed himself a moment to be thoroughly depressed at the turn his life had taken. He sank down to sit behind his older-younger sister on the frigid beach; head in his hands, eyes squeezed shut.
She’ll be fine. We’ll be fine. It’ll just… take some time. Everything will work out, just like it always has.
Never mind that she’s managed to alienate all of our friends and few remaining relatives.
Or that she’s done nothing but tear my life to bits since Mom died.
His gaze lifted wearily to his sister again, trying desperately to find some reason why he shouldn't hate her. But all he could see was that her left leg was twitching, just as it had been for the past 45 minutes.