It’s been a really long time since I’ve posted anything on here, and to my few wonderful and loyal supporters I apologize, life has been super hectic and busy in art school. But here’s a short story I wrote for a short story class I was able to take, tried to shake some of the rust off while doing it, and it mostly pulled itself together. Enjoy and have a great day!
Orange
The streetlight shone warm orange through the window and played over the contours of the darkened bedroom.
We collapsed onto our backs, breathing heavily, our limbs intertwined. My heart thudded.
“Well,” he gasped hoarsely.
I gave a throaty laugh and looked at him. “Well,” I agreed.
The light was playing over his features. His crooked nose, his sandy hair and his soft lips. I felt safe looking at him. I put my hand on his cheek and we just smiled at each other for awhile. I let out a small sigh and closed my eyes. “I love you,” he said. I opened my eyes again and he kissed my nose.
“I love you too.” We shifted and he drew me against him with his arm around me so I was looking out the window.
“Sleep well,” he said, and kissed my neck.
“You too,” I said.
We did.
The streetlight shone warm orange through the window and played over the contours of the darkened bedroom.
I layed down slowly and grimaced as I shifted the pillow under my neck. I must have pulled it while working. I sighed and flopped around a bit until I found a position that was bearable. A half-hearted moan of complaint came from the dark beside me and Des shifted in his sleep, tugging the sheet closer around him. I’d been staying at work late for the last while and we kept missing each other. I looked over at his silhouetted form for a little, then softly kissed his head and turned back to the window. I pinched the bridge of my nose and tried to quiet the headache I’d been feeling the past few days. There were just so many things to get done. I studied the leaves outside, with their warm halo of yellow-orange, and eventually their soft swaying lulled me into a fitful sleep.
The streetlight shone warm orange through the window and played over the contours of the darkened bedroom.
I sat cross legged on the bed and he sat beside me. Neither one of us were looking at each other. Tears filled my eyes, a by-product of most things these days. The dark room still echoed with his last accusation and my outraged counter. The silence stretched out and I brushed away the occasional tear, glittering a blurry orange in my watery vision. I was angry. I could understand him, of course, but if he just pulled himself to-fucking-gether maybe he’d actually realize how unreasonable he was being. I could feel him struggling with something else to say but I refused to help him this time. I’d said my piece.
“Look,” he finally said. “I just need some recognition, okay?”
I pursed my lips. I’d thrown out all my accusations before, it wouldn’t help bringing them up again. “Same,” I said tersely. I couldn’t look at him yet.
He sighed, sensing I wasn’t ready to give. “Tay, you know I appreciate you. You’ve been working so fucking hard – too hard -” I gave him a warning look,“ – how could I not appreciate that. It’s just you’re never here anymore. It’s just hard okay, just recognize it’s hard for me too.”
I didn’t say anything yet.
“Okay?”
Obviously I did, but the hurt from before was keeping me looking out the window at the streetlight and saying nothing. He threw his hands in the air. “Like it’s not like I asked to be let go!” He sunk back against the wall, frustration and a vague helplessness clearly evident in him.
I gave in. I finally looked at him, and shifted over until i was resting on his shoulder, the touching of our bodies an apology and acquiescence of its own. “I know,” I said softly. I found his hand in the soft light and interlocked our fingers, stroking his with my thumb. “I know.” I looked up at him and he seemed thankful as our lips brushed softly.
“You should get to bed,” He said after a few minutes of quiet. “You have another long day tomorrow.”
I sighed and found my way back to my pillow and under the covers. I did love him. I turned back to him and told him so. “My big project’s done at the end of this month and as soon as you get a job I’ll be able to take fewer clients.”
He laughed bitterly, “Yeah,” he said.
We both fell asleep.
The streetlight shone warm orange through the window and played over the contours of the darkened bedroom.
I couldn’t stop giggling.
“What?” he said. “Do you not find me attractive anymore?” He flung his flipper up against his forehead in mock horror, or least he tried to, but it being a flipper, only managed to knock his shark head askew. I giggled even harder. He feigned indignation. “Is it my back? Is there something on my back?” he tried to spin around on his knees on the bed to see the back of his shark costume but got tangled up in his tail fin and tumbled into a chortling heap.
I leaped on top of him with a wicked grin. “No, it is most definitely not your back,” I purred, and I kissed him. I pulled away. “Are you looking forward to dominating the children’s television screens with some incredibly manly shark wisdom tomorrow?”
He growled. “There is only one thing that I’m going to be dominating and it is most definitely not children.” And he flipped me over and finished the kiss, and we both felt hopeful and alive.
The streetlight shone warm orange through the window and played over the contours of the darkened bedroom.
I lay fitful in bed. Des hadn’t come home. I tried to tell myself that this was what it was like for him before, but I couldn’t help but feel a little indignant. I’d taken fewer clients so I could be home more, and now he was gone. At some cast gathering with Mina the stage hand.
I punched my pillow then picked it up and buried my head under it. I tried to find comfort in the black heavy suffocating air underneath it.
I sighed and pulled myself back out and looked at the light until sleep found me.
The streetlight shone warm orange through the window and played over the contours of the darkened bedroom.
I woke to him thudding the door, tripping over the edge of the bed and swearing. He threw himself down and slid up close to me, groping his hands over me and nuzzling into my neck. He murmured a breathy, “Hey,” that reeked of liquor and I felt a moment of repulsion. He stuck his hand down my pants and started feeling me with his fingers. I grabbed his hand. “Where have you been?” I didn’t ask it like a question.
“Just out.” He drawled in a way that made him sound like a teenager and I hated him for it. He started moving his hand again and I wrenched myself away.
“No.”
He seemed perplexed. Like the concept of me being upset made utterly no sense to him.
“Baby -” He reached for me again and I slapped his hand away. I saw his slow thinking change from confusion to anger. He grabbed my wrist, pulled me down and threw himself on top of me so I would stop pulling away. “What the fuck is wrong with you?” Again, like coming home in the middle of the night without any word and waking me up to have sex was perfectly reasonable to him.
I glared at him. “So this is how it’s going to be? You walk in at God knows when from doing whatever the fuck you do nowadays, reeking of alcohol and what I hope to fucking God isn’t your own cigarettes and expect to just have your way with me, hmm? Maybe slap me around a little bit?” His hair hung down into my face and his hot breath panted in and out.
I squirmed my hips mockingly under him and stuck out my chin. “Just fucking do it then.” I stared into his glazed eyes and watched as they eventually cleared. He softly let go of my wrists and flipped off of me, staring up at the ceiling.
A tear leaked out of my eye. He stayed quietly the way he was. I turned away from him and curled into a ball on my side shaking silently. Soon enough I heard him snoring. I gritted my teeth and pulled the covers off of him and wrapped them closely around my trembling form.
The streetlight shone warm orange through the window and played over the contours of the darkened bedroom.
Kisses rained down all over my face, showering my eyelids, cheeks and nose with his soft lips. I beamed and laughed. I put my hand on his chest and pushed him away gently. “We don’t know for sure yet, okay?” He grinned back, and hell if his grin didn’t make me smile even harder. I punched him softly. “I’m serious! Don’t go getting your hopes up yet!” He nodded but kept smiling then pulled me into a tight hug that I had to cry out from and remind him I was one of the people who liked to keep their bones intact. loosening his hold a bit, he cradled my head against his chest and sighed.
He took his thumb under my chin and tilted my face up to him. “I love you, Taylor-Ann.”
I sighed and curled more comfortably against him. “I love you too.”
We lay there contentedly feeling each other’s breathing, and even though I’d warned him not to get too excited, a thrill went through me.
The streetlight shone warm orange through the window and played over the contours of the darkened bedroom.
His hand was on my stomach. My naked body lay bare in the light and his hand made my stomach look small. It felt like I hadn’t stopped smiling in hours. I was literally carrying life. It was a feeling more electric than I have ever experienced.
I curled my hand over his on top of me and our orange hands made curving shadows over my skin. Looking down at us, at our overlapping limbs, at his thin, toned legs blending with the curve of my own, sinking into our white sheets and splayed in hopeful giddiness, it seemed to me that the orange light seemed brighter than it had. That we were glowing and radiating the light back, that the room was more light than it was shadow. With our hands together on top of my stomach on top of the light, it seemed to me like I could feel the light thrumming around us. I knew it was silly, but in my state of euphoria I could almost believe that the life inside me was that orange light, and I desperately didn’t want to fuck it up.
I squeezed Des’s hand harder and looked at him. He was already looking at me. I think he knew what I was about to say, because he just nodded, and from that, I drew comfort.
I turned onto my side again and pressed against him. I looked out at the streetlight, I looked out at the leaves, I looked out at the wind, and the light playing off of these, and as I fell asleep, my dreams were orange.
theskywillfall 