𝕂𝔸𝕃𝔼𝕀𝔻𝕆𝕊ℂ𝕆ℙ𝔼 𝔼𝕐𝔼

here is where i will put all my links

bio/about is below the read more. will be sparse for now but once i figure her out more ill revamp a time or two. 

note: alluding to abuse/power imbalance in a domestic relationship, bullying.

Where: Outside the general store When: June 2021 Who: Anyone! Murkesh was not really having a book signing so much as just wanting the local to know what he was up to by being in town. He felt he hadn’t really stepped into Holy Cross on the right foot and wanted to show he was serious so he decided to all but give away his book he’d written on Appalachian folklore. He was just sitting outside in a University of Kentucky t-shirt rather than anything formal with a small foldable table the general store had generously shared along with a few of his books on Appalachian folklore. He also had his tablet out and was playing the video of him interviewing Mrs. Brady. 

No one was really here, though, so he was just watching the video again. Thinking of her made him bittersweet—she had passed recently but her stories and folklore knowledge from all over Appalachia would live on, to the point he had made her a co-author of his book. 

However, someone passed by. Unsure if they were heading into the store or by him, he gave a friendly, “Good afternoon!” 

Routine is comfort. It's there in between waking moments. Her husband says good morning and kisses her on the cheek, two minutes later he's sat in his spot at the kitchen table. Hot coffee and hot breakfast steaming in dawn's sunlight. Her daughter is roughly forty minutes later. She sits in the very same spot. Lidded cup filled with fresh squeezed orange juice and her plate stacked pancakes once over with a fruit salad side. Then off to school she goes.

Afterwards Marnie cleans. The floors and counters are daily, and the dishes twice a day. Bathroom, bedding, and all things hard to reach are once a week. Windows and both the front and back patio are once a month. During the winter her husband clears the snow. During all other seasons, she tends to her garden of mixed vegetables and herbs. She does this after she cleans.

(Today she ate one of her very own tomatoes, sliced, over whole wheat toast with herbs and olive oil.)

These moments exist outside of consciousness. They are beyond awake but not quite asleep. She makes the same steps, breathes the same breaths, does the same thing day after day. And nothing else. There isn't anything going on beneath. Her brain is fluff (not static), its comfort. Padded insulation. Stuffing inside a teddy bear, the same foam as a stress ball.

Oh, how she just loves it!

It feels good.

The comfort of nothingness.

But sometimes there's interruptions. Blips in the scheduled programming. Sudden news dropping, widespread across her little mind. Today, its a man. Scruffy beard climbing his cheeks. Its unshaped, random patches of hair reaching past others. His hair is messy, and it looks best that way. A side swept rush of waves and curls. However, his shirt is loose around the neck and theres a little sleep left in the inner corner of his right eye.

'Good Afternoon!'

Ah, Dr. Singh.  

Across the foldable table are books, all the same title, with the same author's name stamped along its cover.

"Good Afternoon," if he might listen closely enough he could hear an angel sigh when she speaks. Her voice is heaven calling. "How how are you doing, Dr. Singh?" The tip of her manicured nail follows the title as her eyes read it.

location: church steps open to: everyone

the morning air felt still, unsettled, as if it was anticipating the arguments that surly the afternoon will bring. men always had a way of trying to make themselves the loudest in the room, even when no one else is talking. at least, that’s what she has noticed from her own father. unlike him, sevda liked the silence, the quiet. the moments when no one is talking. perhaps that’s why she dreads the mornings as they lead up to the violent behaviors ahead. at night, even if it’s only an hour, the sounds die out and she’s left with nothing more than her own thoughts. however, this can never last long. especially in the morning. 

wavy hair held back from her face in a tight bow, sevda stood on the church’s step, busy doing her daily church duties, ones that she had not picked out for herself as her father had the hand in whatever she does. but sev would never complain. not out loud, and especially not when the internal battles within the church is starting up as many argue over who will take place of someone who only so recently disappeared. 

with a broom in hand, she tried to push any dust, and any of her own thoughts, that dares grace His steps away. she barely looked up as she spoke softly, barely above a whisper, “ would you like some lemonade? i made a fresh batch this morning. ” 

The pastor has officially gone missing, but her mind is blank. Her husband, veins pulsing from neck to forehead, has been searching for weeks, but her mind is blank. He seems so stressed, and he is really. He tells her in between thrusts. But her mind is blank. Rose tugs at her side and asks her what's going on with Daddy. She asks where he's been. Marnie tells her, and sadness crinkles her soft face.

Still — her mind is blank.

"Would you like some lemonade?"

Oh, that sounds good.

"Hi, Sevda," her voices floats into air like smoke, "Why, yes. Doesn't that just sound delightful on a day like this?"

WHERE: MOVIE RENTAL INC 

WHEN: EVENING

WHO: @marin3tte​

alec leaned on the counter, picking idly at the bandages wrapped around his left hand. it was thursday night, which meant that they were reasonably busy, neon lights illuminating the small group of patrons that had formed in the aisles. his hand still stung, and alec knew under his bandage the scar that ran from his index to his life line would look gnarled and raw. it was the result of a gardening attempt gone wrong, an idiotic move on his part to try to clean up the rose bushes near the entranceway. the roses had been his mom’s favourite part of the garden. it was stupid of him to try to clean it up — especially when she would never see them. 

at the familiar ring of the entrance bell he looks up to see marnie walking through the doors. she looks distinctly out of place in the video store, well, she looks out of place everywhere in the drab, grey-browns that seem to color the entirety of holy cross. but something about the harsh, fluorescent lights in the video store exaggerated that effect — like a doll placed under glass. he remembers when he first laid eyes on her, he had felt a quiet stab of irritation, one that was anchored by how much of a prick her husband had been in high school, but sharp all the same. funny, how things could change so fast. 

“hey, marnie.” he lifts up his bandaged hand with a wry grin, waving it in the air. “this is what happens when you leave me alone with the gardening.” 

he freezes — suddenly realising where he is. none of the customers turn to look at them, busy scanning the selection, but all the same, he shoves his hands into the bottom of his pockets, features smoothing into an impassive mask. “how did rose like the movies you rented last week?” he moves to the easier shores of small talk — hoping desperately that he hadn’t crossed some unspoken line. “i’ve got some new dvds in this week, if you wanted to check them out.”

Her daughter is a bee that pollinates (buzzing with the crackle of small glass wings). 

She idles from time to time. Gathering all her little world has to offer. At a flowering bush she plucks petals, at a certain store front she wants only sweetness and sugar coating. Her voice buzzes there, a high little noise that can only mean desperate need. The kind that children get when looking at something so trivial, but still so important. In her eyes the world must be ending, right? All that pollen heavy on her yellow-black frock, all these things left to do — they don't matter anymore, do they?

"We are going to the video store, little bug. I'm sure Mr. Buckley will let you pick something good from that wall of candy he has." Bee returns to hive. Where the air is sweet and the honey is only sweeter. She follows the queen closely, her mary jane's don't have a scuff on them.

Oh, how good little bee has been.

Marnie smiles.

The door jingles when the woman walks through it. Eyes are passively drawn, but on her they stay just a little longer. Worker bees before a foreign queen, what do they do? Are they supposed to bow? Here she is spring's first blossom (lemon yellow silk and floral eau de parfum amongst dark earth colors and graphic tee's). Over her shoulders is a sheen of gossamer. Layers of cream tule make a beautiful cape, subduing her heels and the dress that's three inches too short.

With her at the center, their little worlds start again. And there he is too, orbiting, earth and moon. A magnetic pull keeping him close.

It's not supposed to be like that is it?

Vincent Scotts pities him, he says so somewhere between a huff and a laugh. He remembers more of Mr. Buckley with each DVD she brings to him. With American Sniper, Mr. Buckley was a pussy who didn't have a lot of friends. 'Looks like that never changed.' At the end of The Godfather (when Marnie puts the DVD back in its case and makes Vincent another bourbon), he has a story about a high school party at Mr. Buckley's mansion. Something about a fist fight and a hole in a wall. When its the Wolf of Wall Street, he just rolls into the old days. It begins like so, "Y'know, one time this fucking freak..."

She pats him on his handsome-man jaw in response, 'Wow,' Marnie marvels, 'you have such a good memory, darling. I don't remember a single thing from high school. Did you enjoy the movie?'

And then they fuck.

She never tells him the part where Mr. Buckley recommended them for him.

It’s not supposed to be like that is it?

When he speaks small glass wings crackle (like mother, like daughter). When she replies, it's mellifluous. Honey dripping from comb. "Hi, Mr. Buckley," she smiles, "she just loved them. She watched..." she stumbles trying to remember the name, "Trolls everyday. It was delightful."

Rose thanks Mr. Buckley before she hovers to the candy section. Marnie lets her.

"I would just love to."

Her gaze is the kind felt on the tongue.

It's wildflower and lemon blossom.

Just so sweet.