(no subject)
oh! i figured I should post this too. I forget how to do LJ cuts so if anyone knows you can tell me and it will be less annoying for you...
My final revision (i think it could be the second to last revision, but oh well close enough) for my final short story in my Fiction Writing workshop:
"still untitled, looking for suggestions" by audrey mardavich
It was unbearably hot that summer. So hot that you wanted to strip down to your underwear, and then strip out of your own skin, and lie there, skinless, like raw meat being cooked by the sun on dark pavement. New England winters were simmering slowly out of me, thawing my bones and my brain, my blood steaming my insides like broccoli.
It was hot, but Patty and I had the right approach to survival. We sat out by her pool all day in our bathing suits. My grey and red one piece that I had for years that now barely fit over my growing body. The material was starting to stretch thread-bare and see-through leaving the faint sight of my belly button and new breasts. Every day, the same bathing suits, the same routine. Patty's mom, Barbara, told us it was bad to be lounging around all day in wet bathing suits, but we didn't care much about anything. We were young, we were fifteen, there was nothing for us to care about.
Barbara was awfully pretty. She had chestnut colored hair that fell below her shoulders. She was the only mom I knew with long hair still, and it made her look so young and beautiful. Much younger than my mother with her graying coarse curls pulled close against her scalp and her skin starting to wrinkle around her eyelids; her once young hands becoming veiny and worn. Barbara worked during the day and sometimes would be out for most of the night. It left us with plenty of time to do what we wanted to do without incessant parents offering us sandwiches, sun block, iced tea.
There was a rumor once that Barbara had been cheating on Patty's father. I overheard my mother talking about it on the phone with someone in her whisper voice she saves for phone calls with her sister. So, I decided to ask Patty about it. Her face went blank, and she told me to shut up and never bring it up again- that it was a lie and I shouldn't go around telling lies to people. I hadn't told anyone anything, nor had I known that it was a lie. I apologized, though, and kept quiet after that. Her father, too, was so handsome; tall and wide. When Patty would give him a hug after returning home from his trips, she practically disappeared in his arms. He would call her sweet names and usually bring her presents like fancy perfumes, chocolates, or various silly t-shirts. I watched the way he and Barbara interacted, as though strangers passing each other on a busy sidewalk; Barbara indifferent to the stories he told us. I seemed to be more excited to see him than she was after those long weeks. When I thought about it, I thought about marrying him. About the wonderful presents he would bring me from London and Beijing or California and New Mexico. I imagined myself as Barbara, asleep together in bed with him. Or sitting at the dinner table listening anxiously, sipping the wine he brought back from Italy. My love for him, for his words, unbounded. We would spend those long summer nights restless together, our limbs interlocking despite the stickiness, despite the hot, wet air. He would wake me with the newspaper and we would drink coffee and get ready for the day. I would not take advantage of his love like she did and I couldn't understand why Barbara would want to be with another man anyway. No one else had arms you could get lost in.
Barbara left for work in the morning and around 11 am I rode my bike to Patty's house. We would make ourselves sandwiches and grab soda cans from the refrigerator in her garage, behind which Patty kept a carton of Marlboro Menthol Lights that her cousin bought for her. Every day at noon we would eat our ham sandwiches, and then head out back to her pool, the sodas in one hand, cigarettes in another, and piles of magazines under our arms that we stole from Barbara's bedroom.
All day, every day of summer, we would lay there in the seventies floral print plastic lawn chairs smoking cigarette after cigarette and flipping through the pages of the magazines. It was hot and the cigarettes would stick to my dry lips. I hated the way they smelled and they only made me feel more disgusting and light headed out in the sun. The magazines were filled with pages of advertisements about maxi pads and hair dye and pictures of women in tiny bathing suits; their hair unnaturally perfect for women who were seemingly out all day playing beach volleyball and splashing around in the ocean.
I couldn't stand the heat, so I peeled myself off of the lawn chair and stepped onto the stairs at the shallow end of the pool. I asked Patty if she wanted to join, but she said she would rather stay in the sun and read. It was too hot to read.
Stepping into the pool, the water eased up my legs. Each step the water crawled up my body, passing my knees, my thighs and eventually I would be tip toeing around the shallow end trying to keep the water below my chest. Finally, I seized a moment of motivation and dove under water. My scalp tingled as I submerged myself below the surface. Under the cool water I could hear the humming, fuzzy sounds; my heart pounding inside my head, and bubbles bursting as they exited my nostrils when I came up for air. The blue and white triangle tile patterns at the bottom of the pool looked like strange sea creatures in my blurred and stinging vision. The dirt and leaves gathered in a pile at the deepest end of the pool and when I dove under, I maintained my distance to keep from disturbing the mess and clouding my water. For just a few moments, I could escape the stifling heat. The thought of him, the guilty pleasure, would be washed away and sanitized by the chlorine and leafy pool water just like the smell of the cigarettes from my hands and hair. Underwater, where I felt safe from the world around me, where I felt light and cool. I did a few laps back and forth and then climbed out into the sun, skipping the cigarette Patty offered as I wrapped my towel around my waist.
Patty looked so much older than I did. With the cigarette in her hand, and her early blooming hips. Her light blue bikini fitting her body snuggly, hugging and supporting the small breasts she had since years before. I couldn't tell if I looked young for fifteen or if she looked old for fifteen, but we somehow existed on separate levels of maturity. She looked so normal just laying there reading those magazines, flipping through the same articles and the same advertisements over and over again, completely unaffected by the ninety degree heat. There was something else that made her seem older, not just the cigarette and the woman parts, but big eyes like treasure chests, locked and forbidding. What was she hiding in there all the time? What didn't I know? At fifteen she seemed to have secrets and at fifteen I didn't seem to have the map to figure out what they were. Lying silently together in the sun, she could have sat there for days, I think.
I thought about going back in the pool, but I had just finished drying off and would soon have to go back home for dinner. I told Patty I was leaving, as I picked up my things and slipped on my black rubber flip-flops that were still warm from sitting out in the sun all day. She put down her magazine, stretched her skinny arms toward the sun, circled her neck in slow figure eights, and then got up from her lawn chair that seemed as though her body had been carved into it. Like catching a glimpse of an exotic bird, I was startled by her presence, by her movement. I watched her, careful not to disturb. She didn't say anything, and instead just walked toward the deep end and dove in gracefully; arched back, spread wings, and a splash that could have been made by a small rock. When she came up for air, her hair was slicked back and her makeup was running a little bit down her cheeks. She looked up at me with those treasure chests, said "see you tomorrow I guess," and dove under water again, kicking her legs up in the air as if to wave goodbye.
When I think back to that summer I think of the heat. It was so damn hot, you would barely see anyone outside for days and days. You would say hello to your neighbors while you ventured outside to grab the mail, or water the lawn, but that was it. No one wanted to be out there except for me and Patty. I remember the magazine articles too- "How to Improve your Rear View," "Hotter Happier Sex," "Sunkissed Hair and Skin." I remember seeing Patty's father occasionally and I remember the dreams I had about him as I fell asleep in long t-shirts, the night's heat keeping our secret love affair at bay. I remember the face Patty made when I brought up her parents, and how I could see the disappointment collecting on the inside corner of those big eyes, and I remember her long legs splashing up water as I left for dinner that night. Most of all, I can still smell the stench of the cigarettes, and feel the paper sticking to my dry lips, over and over again until the pack was empty.
My final revision (i think it could be the second to last revision, but oh well close enough) for my final short story in my Fiction Writing workshop:
"still untitled, looking for suggestions" by audrey mardavich
It was unbearably hot that summer. So hot that you wanted to strip down to your underwear, and then strip out of your own skin, and lie there, skinless, like raw meat being cooked by the sun on dark pavement. New England winters were simmering slowly out of me, thawing my bones and my brain, my blood steaming my insides like broccoli.
It was hot, but Patty and I had the right approach to survival. We sat out by her pool all day in our bathing suits. My grey and red one piece that I had for years that now barely fit over my growing body. The material was starting to stretch thread-bare and see-through leaving the faint sight of my belly button and new breasts. Every day, the same bathing suits, the same routine. Patty's mom, Barbara, told us it was bad to be lounging around all day in wet bathing suits, but we didn't care much about anything. We were young, we were fifteen, there was nothing for us to care about.
Barbara was awfully pretty. She had chestnut colored hair that fell below her shoulders. She was the only mom I knew with long hair still, and it made her look so young and beautiful. Much younger than my mother with her graying coarse curls pulled close against her scalp and her skin starting to wrinkle around her eyelids; her once young hands becoming veiny and worn. Barbara worked during the day and sometimes would be out for most of the night. It left us with plenty of time to do what we wanted to do without incessant parents offering us sandwiches, sun block, iced tea.
There was a rumor once that Barbara had been cheating on Patty's father. I overheard my mother talking about it on the phone with someone in her whisper voice she saves for phone calls with her sister. So, I decided to ask Patty about it. Her face went blank, and she told me to shut up and never bring it up again- that it was a lie and I shouldn't go around telling lies to people. I hadn't told anyone anything, nor had I known that it was a lie. I apologized, though, and kept quiet after that. Her father, too, was so handsome; tall and wide. When Patty would give him a hug after returning home from his trips, she practically disappeared in his arms. He would call her sweet names and usually bring her presents like fancy perfumes, chocolates, or various silly t-shirts. I watched the way he and Barbara interacted, as though strangers passing each other on a busy sidewalk; Barbara indifferent to the stories he told us. I seemed to be more excited to see him than she was after those long weeks. When I thought about it, I thought about marrying him. About the wonderful presents he would bring me from London and Beijing or California and New Mexico. I imagined myself as Barbara, asleep together in bed with him. Or sitting at the dinner table listening anxiously, sipping the wine he brought back from Italy. My love for him, for his words, unbounded. We would spend those long summer nights restless together, our limbs interlocking despite the stickiness, despite the hot, wet air. He would wake me with the newspaper and we would drink coffee and get ready for the day. I would not take advantage of his love like she did and I couldn't understand why Barbara would want to be with another man anyway. No one else had arms you could get lost in.
Barbara left for work in the morning and around 11 am I rode my bike to Patty's house. We would make ourselves sandwiches and grab soda cans from the refrigerator in her garage, behind which Patty kept a carton of Marlboro Menthol Lights that her cousin bought for her. Every day at noon we would eat our ham sandwiches, and then head out back to her pool, the sodas in one hand, cigarettes in another, and piles of magazines under our arms that we stole from Barbara's bedroom.
All day, every day of summer, we would lay there in the seventies floral print plastic lawn chairs smoking cigarette after cigarette and flipping through the pages of the magazines. It was hot and the cigarettes would stick to my dry lips. I hated the way they smelled and they only made me feel more disgusting and light headed out in the sun. The magazines were filled with pages of advertisements about maxi pads and hair dye and pictures of women in tiny bathing suits; their hair unnaturally perfect for women who were seemingly out all day playing beach volleyball and splashing around in the ocean.
I couldn't stand the heat, so I peeled myself off of the lawn chair and stepped onto the stairs at the shallow end of the pool. I asked Patty if she wanted to join, but she said she would rather stay in the sun and read. It was too hot to read.
Stepping into the pool, the water eased up my legs. Each step the water crawled up my body, passing my knees, my thighs and eventually I would be tip toeing around the shallow end trying to keep the water below my chest. Finally, I seized a moment of motivation and dove under water. My scalp tingled as I submerged myself below the surface. Under the cool water I could hear the humming, fuzzy sounds; my heart pounding inside my head, and bubbles bursting as they exited my nostrils when I came up for air. The blue and white triangle tile patterns at the bottom of the pool looked like strange sea creatures in my blurred and stinging vision. The dirt and leaves gathered in a pile at the deepest end of the pool and when I dove under, I maintained my distance to keep from disturbing the mess and clouding my water. For just a few moments, I could escape the stifling heat. The thought of him, the guilty pleasure, would be washed away and sanitized by the chlorine and leafy pool water just like the smell of the cigarettes from my hands and hair. Underwater, where I felt safe from the world around me, where I felt light and cool. I did a few laps back and forth and then climbed out into the sun, skipping the cigarette Patty offered as I wrapped my towel around my waist.
Patty looked so much older than I did. With the cigarette in her hand, and her early blooming hips. Her light blue bikini fitting her body snuggly, hugging and supporting the small breasts she had since years before. I couldn't tell if I looked young for fifteen or if she looked old for fifteen, but we somehow existed on separate levels of maturity. She looked so normal just laying there reading those magazines, flipping through the same articles and the same advertisements over and over again, completely unaffected by the ninety degree heat. There was something else that made her seem older, not just the cigarette and the woman parts, but big eyes like treasure chests, locked and forbidding. What was she hiding in there all the time? What didn't I know? At fifteen she seemed to have secrets and at fifteen I didn't seem to have the map to figure out what they were. Lying silently together in the sun, she could have sat there for days, I think.
I thought about going back in the pool, but I had just finished drying off and would soon have to go back home for dinner. I told Patty I was leaving, as I picked up my things and slipped on my black rubber flip-flops that were still warm from sitting out in the sun all day. She put down her magazine, stretched her skinny arms toward the sun, circled her neck in slow figure eights, and then got up from her lawn chair that seemed as though her body had been carved into it. Like catching a glimpse of an exotic bird, I was startled by her presence, by her movement. I watched her, careful not to disturb. She didn't say anything, and instead just walked toward the deep end and dove in gracefully; arched back, spread wings, and a splash that could have been made by a small rock. When she came up for air, her hair was slicked back and her makeup was running a little bit down her cheeks. She looked up at me with those treasure chests, said "see you tomorrow I guess," and dove under water again, kicking her legs up in the air as if to wave goodbye.
When I think back to that summer I think of the heat. It was so damn hot, you would barely see anyone outside for days and days. You would say hello to your neighbors while you ventured outside to grab the mail, or water the lawn, but that was it. No one wanted to be out there except for me and Patty. I remember the magazine articles too- "How to Improve your Rear View," "Hotter Happier Sex," "Sunkissed Hair and Skin." I remember seeing Patty's father occasionally and I remember the dreams I had about him as I fell asleep in long t-shirts, the night's heat keeping our secret love affair at bay. I remember the face Patty made when I brought up her parents, and how I could see the disappointment collecting on the inside corner of those big eyes, and I remember her long legs splashing up water as I left for dinner that night. Most of all, I can still smell the stench of the cigarettes, and feel the paper sticking to my dry lips, over and over again until the pack was empty.