Stella Roth
My entry for maxis_taste dare #17, details are here.
Content warning: Substantial failure at picture continuity.
Stella missed Julio. She often thought about this as she peddled furiously on her exercise bike, looking out on the seemingly never ending fields and snow topped mountains. Julio had run her yoga class back in the Cove. But then again, she missed him just as she missed living somewhere where yoga classes were available. Or as she missed the girls she would share a skinny decaf latte with afterwards often enthusing about how cute their Latin instructor was. And of course living somewhere where skinny decaf lattes were actually available.
After finishing her workout, she wiped her brow before throwing the towel in the basket she had put there for that very purpose. She couldn’t help but roll her eyes as she looked around. Morty had gushed about the possibilities of this space as he convinced her to move to this drafty old house in this tiny town. But of course she was the only one who used it; it’s only other purpose was to store the piano no one else used anymore.
------------------------------------------------------------
After her shower and blow drying her hair, Stella entered her dressing room to find her daughter rummaging through her clothes.
Admittedly, she had insisted that the first room to be renovated was the main bedroom so that she could have a dressing room. But she still didn’t feel that meant she had to let the only room she felt was a sanctuary for her should be open to everyone. “And you are going through my clothes why?” she asked exasperatedly.
Her daughter started going on about a lost jacket or something and Stella couldn’t help but sigh as she took a seat. She and her daughter used to be so much closer she thought sadly, remembering the little girl who had loved being dressed up and taken to lunch with her mother’s friends.
Her attention was brought to the present by her daughter’s cry of surprise. Stella wasn’t actually given a chance to reply before her daughter declared she didn’t think she actually wanted to know and quickly exited the room.
Stella sighed again before curiosity got the best of her and she went to see what had caused her daughter to be, as what was seemingly the usual lately, utterly over the top. It wasn’t long before she found the outfit Morty had brought her after his first overseas trip when he had begun working as an intern for the ambassador. They had been dating for nearly a year when he’d been asked to go overseas and the costume had been Morty’s way of assuring his girlfriend he had been thinking of her the whole time he’d been away.
Wondering if it even still fit, she carelessly tied her hair up and tried on the exotic harem costume. But instead of feeling joyous at still fitting into the skimpy outfit, or even a fondness for Morty’s token of affection, she found she couldn’t help but feel silly. What need did she even have for clothing like this, let alone in Riverblossom Hills of all places?
She suddenly felt like a child caught playing dress up. But then again, hadn’t that been what she had been doing for the last few months, trying to make her city dresses wearable in the cold weather with a coat and boots?
Quietly she took off the ensemble and replaced it with more suitable attire. She couldn’t help but muse that before Morty had moved their family to country she hadn’t worn jeans for something like twenty years. For that matter, she didn’t even remember buying the cardigan she now wore.
But Stella figured it didn’t matter. After all, if she could make the best of her wardrobe, surely she could make the best of her family’s move to Riverblossom Hills.