14 Valentines: Transgender Issues
The second day of 14valentines is looking at transgender issues. While this post has nothing to do with transgender, you should take a look at the essay for the day posted over at the comm.
TITLE: Like Snowflakes Wiping Out The Noon
AUTHOR: memories_child
RATING: PG
WORD COUNT: 870
When winter falls she likes to watch the snow gathering on the roof, the guttering, the branches of the dead trees. She likes the silence of the frozen air and the hush of foxes and badgers in the woods. She likes the isolation, the feeling of being the last person alive in a world that's slowly dying.
When she gets so cold that she can't feel her fingers (standing on the front porch, idly drawing in the snow) she retreats inside, to the warmth and the light that permeates her small cabin. She warms her hands by the fire until the pins-and-needles heat gets too much to bear, and then she fumbles with the logs at the side of the hearth, piling them on until the fire is a funeral pyre.
She makes herself a cup of tea, black, with three sugars, folds the blanket around her on the couch and stares into the falling sky.
She doesn't think of him.
She hasn't thought of him for a while, if truth be told. She has pushed him to the back of her mind while she concentrates on living. On the day to day existence she shares with the creaky cabin, the hushed woods. Oh she'll admit she gives him a fleeting glance when the wood has been gathered and the fire banked; misses the gentle warmth of him next to her in bed when the wind howls around the door and ice creeps inside the window panes. But momentary glimpses are all they are.
Spring eases its way into the clearing one flower at a time. At first the snowdrops appear, their green shoots the only way to tell them apart from the frost that blankets the ground. After that the crocuses, the winter heather, pushing their way through the hard earth. She cuts the flowers and displays them in vases and pans on every available shelf in the house. The flowers, with their bright and vibrant colours, remind her of new life, of hope, of idle dreams bearing fruit. When they start to wither she presses them between the pages of books she hasn't read for years, their scent staining the pages.
Come March she begins to spring clean. The house brims with energy, the windows open to let the fresh air in. She hums to herself as she dusts and polishes, aligns the crockery into size and shape like divisions in an advancing army. She sleeps at night with the curtains open, the full moon, half moon, no moon ebbing and flowing like the tide.
She is too busy to think of him.
Summer brings its own problems, the contrast to winter clear in the burning brush of the grass on her feet, the condensation dripping down her icy glass. It is too hot to move and she sits in the shade, a makeshuft hammock hanging from the boughs of the nearest tree. The air is steady with the hum of bees, the chatter of the birds, and if she listens carefully she thinks she can hear the low droning of the planes that sometimes pass overhead.
She sleeps naked on top of the sheets, the humid air wrapping her in its embrace. She sighs and turns on the heavy sheets, the lazy whir of the desktop fan she found (clearing the attic) moving the air above the bed in nothing more than a whisper.
She tends the garden on the days that aren't too hot. Makes salads with lettuce fresh from her kitchen plot and tomatoes pulled from the vine. She sits out on the porch in the evening, the slow jazz of Ray Charles and Charlie Parker murmuring to her of other times and other places, and her bare feet slap the hard wood deck as she pushes herself to and fro on the heavy cotton swing.
On those nights when she can't sleep she wanders the grounds around her house in a white shift. Her feet grow calloused with the walks across dry stalks of corn, pitted stones. She thinks of him then, wonders what he's doing in that city far away, and wishes on the stars that fall in molten showers that he is happy.
She is happy.
Autumn is the time for dead and dying things. She closes the windows, one by one, against a wind that turns bitter and cold. She chops wood for the fire, pulls blankets down from the loft and slowly, slowly, her voice dries up.
She doesn't hum in the mornings, anymore, when she forages for mushrooms. She doesn't sing back to the birds, call out to the morning sun. She becomes a whisper, trailing her hands across the barks of the trees that are turning russet red and ochre brown. She turns inside herself.
The chocolate leaves fall one by one and blanket the ground that hides the shoots of trees and flowers. Blanket the ground like a shroud.
She grows used to the cold and the dark, grows used to the smell of lead mould and bonfires in the frigid air. She grows used to solitude.
But when winter comes, she likes the feeling of being the last person alive in a world that's slowly dying.
TITLE: Like Snowflakes Wiping Out The Noon
AUTHOR: memories_child
RATING: PG
WORD COUNT: 870
When winter falls she likes to watch the snow gathering on the roof, the guttering, the branches of the dead trees. She likes the silence of the frozen air and the hush of foxes and badgers in the woods. She likes the isolation, the feeling of being the last person alive in a world that's slowly dying.
When she gets so cold that she can't feel her fingers (standing on the front porch, idly drawing in the snow) she retreats inside, to the warmth and the light that permeates her small cabin. She warms her hands by the fire until the pins-and-needles heat gets too much to bear, and then she fumbles with the logs at the side of the hearth, piling them on until the fire is a funeral pyre.
She makes herself a cup of tea, black, with three sugars, folds the blanket around her on the couch and stares into the falling sky.
She doesn't think of him.
She hasn't thought of him for a while, if truth be told. She has pushed him to the back of her mind while she concentrates on living. On the day to day existence she shares with the creaky cabin, the hushed woods. Oh she'll admit she gives him a fleeting glance when the wood has been gathered and the fire banked; misses the gentle warmth of him next to her in bed when the wind howls around the door and ice creeps inside the window panes. But momentary glimpses are all they are.
Spring eases its way into the clearing one flower at a time. At first the snowdrops appear, their green shoots the only way to tell them apart from the frost that blankets the ground. After that the crocuses, the winter heather, pushing their way through the hard earth. She cuts the flowers and displays them in vases and pans on every available shelf in the house. The flowers, with their bright and vibrant colours, remind her of new life, of hope, of idle dreams bearing fruit. When they start to wither she presses them between the pages of books she hasn't read for years, their scent staining the pages.
Come March she begins to spring clean. The house brims with energy, the windows open to let the fresh air in. She hums to herself as she dusts and polishes, aligns the crockery into size and shape like divisions in an advancing army. She sleeps at night with the curtains open, the full moon, half moon, no moon ebbing and flowing like the tide.
She is too busy to think of him.
Summer brings its own problems, the contrast to winter clear in the burning brush of the grass on her feet, the condensation dripping down her icy glass. It is too hot to move and she sits in the shade, a makeshuft hammock hanging from the boughs of the nearest tree. The air is steady with the hum of bees, the chatter of the birds, and if she listens carefully she thinks she can hear the low droning of the planes that sometimes pass overhead.
She sleeps naked on top of the sheets, the humid air wrapping her in its embrace. She sighs and turns on the heavy sheets, the lazy whir of the desktop fan she found (clearing the attic) moving the air above the bed in nothing more than a whisper.
She tends the garden on the days that aren't too hot. Makes salads with lettuce fresh from her kitchen plot and tomatoes pulled from the vine. She sits out on the porch in the evening, the slow jazz of Ray Charles and Charlie Parker murmuring to her of other times and other places, and her bare feet slap the hard wood deck as she pushes herself to and fro on the heavy cotton swing.
On those nights when she can't sleep she wanders the grounds around her house in a white shift. Her feet grow calloused with the walks across dry stalks of corn, pitted stones. She thinks of him then, wonders what he's doing in that city far away, and wishes on the stars that fall in molten showers that he is happy.
She is happy.
Autumn is the time for dead and dying things. She closes the windows, one by one, against a wind that turns bitter and cold. She chops wood for the fire, pulls blankets down from the loft and slowly, slowly, her voice dries up.
She doesn't hum in the mornings, anymore, when she forages for mushrooms. She doesn't sing back to the birds, call out to the morning sun. She becomes a whisper, trailing her hands across the barks of the trees that are turning russet red and ochre brown. She turns inside herself.
The chocolate leaves fall one by one and blanket the ground that hides the shoots of trees and flowers. Blanket the ground like a shroud.
She grows used to the cold and the dark, grows used to the smell of lead mould and bonfires in the frigid air. She grows used to solitude.
But when winter comes, she likes the feeling of being the last person alive in a world that's slowly dying.