This story is something I came up with today as I was swinging. Hope you like it. Please comment!
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I'm hoping the breeze in my brown hair doesn't make it hard to comb tonight before bed. It's not worth worrying about though, so I keep swinging. On the upward stride I look up at the sky directly above again, but the gray-white color isn't as nice to watch anymore. I stare instead at the lavender hue that stretches and darkens a few miles off and fades behind a lonely tree on the horizon.
My eyes wander down on our valley. It's really very nice with its green hills, and pretty 4-blocks dotting it every few acres, home to the pastel domes and white prism shelters that sit in them. There's a few dirt paths and gravel roads, but they're so few they're almost unnoticeable, so the sea of grass captures my eyes for quite a while.
My coral capris billow on the upward swing as I pump. They're the ones that Daddy got me a few months ago from Japan. I smile a little when I see my name printed down the left leg. The name's not unusual (everybody's got one on their clothes in case of an... accident), but the light, silky material is. I'd like them more if I didn't often see a few children with their old, discolored shorts so often. I feel ashamed that I own better clothes than they do. However, I'm very thankful that Daddy can afford such nice things. (Even if it does mean he has to travel a lot for his well-paid job.)
My feet brush the ground as I dip, so I press the small button on the side of the seat, and I hear the soft click and feel the little jolt as it lifts the swing some more. Even if it does sag like that ever so often, I like my pendulum swing more than that other kind, that swings like a pocket watch does when you rotate the chain. What are those called? Oh, yeah-- Swivels.
I look up again- this time at the class dome above instead of through it at the sky- but notice a drop of water sliding down. It's just one, but I'm hoping it doesn't start raining on such a nice, warm day.
I close my eyes for a minute and pump, reopening them on the backwards swing, and seeing the prism shelter in the middle of our 4-block. It's mostly white, but I shiver a bit when I notice the the short ring of pink at the bottom, and wonder if its picking up the seismic blasts some forty miles away.
There I go, thinking in those unnatural words I've heard on Daddy's BluePrompt. I used to sneak and watch it more when I was smaller- listening to the news reports about the bombings happening in Ritchitan, or the strange disease crawling through the Tinbeck area- but now I just try to ignore the outside world. Besides, Daddy frowns when I use those words; they don't fit into the vocabulary they teach adolescants. It's comfortable to the ear. Comfortable, just like the rest of our ways.
I snap out of my daze and go on thinking of nicer things- like the star that's begun to shine early this evening. I watch it for a moment, before it moves, and I realize it's an airplane. I'll pretend it really is a star though, so as not to disturb my peace of mind. I can almost completely believe it already. How well I've trained myself. It feels wrong to be proud of it, but what harm can a little self-inflicted ignorance do? None, I convince myself, and stuff the plane in with the rest of the skeletons that inhabit that small closet I've shoved the world into, and prefer to stumble upon as infrequently as possible. It's a tibia, I decide with a smile, making light of the whole thing to myself. But tibia is another one of those unnatural words- this time one from school.
It's a word from Science- a subject I'm not very fond of. We're studying the table of elements now, one element at a time. I don't like it though. Studying the metals and radioactive elements makes me uncomfortable. After all the twisted wreckage and great weapons and bomb disasters I've seen on Daddy's BluePrompt, I don't find even the look of metal very pleasant. I don't think Daddy does either. Even metal things in our house are painted or covered so that they aren't shiny or cold-looking. Our dome's outermost walls are almost soundproof too- all except the walls of the indoor yard where I play.
I might not think on these things so much if I hadn't watched the BluePrompt so much when I was younger. I wasn't supposed to, but I would often sneak and watch through the opened door of Daddy's study. He'd catch me often, but smile and say, "I'll come tuck you in in a minute, Rumerose," and kiss me on the forehead. He rarely would come and tuck me in later, but I truly didn't mind. Our lovely maid, Katia, has a sweet way of putting me in bed- like a mother does, I suppose. She's gotten that way after years of taking care of me in Daddy's long absences. I think she worries about me when he leaves, but I'm fine with it. We just start back to life as usual when he gets back, with our light conversations on things like the flowers in Meva's garden next door, or the birds in the tree I pass on the way to school. Nothing about his travels comes up, unless he brings me a gift, along with the usually delightful story behind it. For some reason his job doesn't seem a comfortable subject, as it's always the source of his tiredness and headaches.
I'm starting to miss him now, but I don't want it to bother me, so I busy myself instead with the other three houses on our 4-block. They're all just as quaint as the one before it, and their inhabitants are just as pleasant. I secretly wonder if the community makes 4-block neighbors compatible on purpose. Everyone seems to love their neighbors, including me. It makes it easier to cooperate during Alarms.
I could pinch myself for thinking of such grim things again, but the last Alarm five nights ago is still fresh in my mind. It was terrifying, running through the front yard and through the gate, and heading toward the bright red shelter, its siren blaring. Once inside the prism, we all held eachother tight, eyes closed, and told one another it would be alright while all the time dreading that it wouldn't. Luckily, the only thing that came were the vibrations and muffled booms of the blasts five miles off. Afterwards it was as if nothing had happened. The war around us raged on while we slowly settled back into our routines, ignoring it as usual. It's getting harder to ignore it though. I'm wondering how much longer I can keep myself from watching the BluePrompt again, or asking my teacher about it in school. The thought of possible chastisement makes me fear it, but I need to know now.
I can't put the grin back on my face anymore, and I dig my feet into the ground to stop the swing.
My eyes are back on the shelter now; the pink is spreading, and so is my dread.
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Hope you like this! It was just going to be a one-shot, but I'm considering making it into a story. Give me some input!
Love, Haley
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