Listing
(part 15 of World on a String series, which takes place in gleerant’s Sugar!verse.)
Listing
What's that smell? Is it paraffin, woodsmoke, seared beef? Something's cooking closeby, something's hot. Her lips are working, she's salivating, there were kisses. Humming, fevered kisses, but whose?
She opens her eyes, flooding the room with blue, or is it the light through the curtains? Curtains blowing, rippling, shaking. Is it a storm? a breeze? simply a whipping dancing gust from the west?
And whose head is on the pillow beside her? And where are all the parents? Sure, they're 18 now, but what happened to House Rules? Not that she ever really observed them, arcane, byzantine, bifurcated. And for a bicorn like herself, why would a double standard apply?
She wonders if her nose is lying again. One time, her nose got so inflamed inside that peanut butter smelled like ammonia, like it couldn’t allow molecules as large as peanut butter in, only small molecules like oxygen, nitrogen, hydrogen, ammonia. Paraffin is a waxy straight-chain hydrocarbon, long and complicated, but not as long and complicated as love.
And what does love smell like? Cinnamon, maybe, fresh bread, chocolate chip cookies, yes that; peonies, jasmine, magnolia blossoms, yes, magnolia, sweet and lemony; armpits, ozone, girl.
But it's a girl. It's a girl beside her. And it's not Santana.
What room is this? What day is it? What time is it? It's still pretty dark, not entirely, but it must be pretty early. Twilight, predawn, rosy-fingered dawn. And the bed is so so soft, too soft, like it's half-swallowed her, how's she going to get up? And she's going to have to get up soon.
Soon. Soon she's going to have to pee, eat, brush her teeth. Does she have a toothbrush? And when she manages to get out of the too-soft bed, whose face will turn to face her?
Because she was sure those were Santana's kisses.
But that is definitely not Santana's hair.
She has to think, what is the last thing she actually remembers? Not like dream-memory, what's the last actual thing she did that she remembers?
Something about a catwalk. Then the kissing. But that had to be a dream, fantasy, mirage, because she's in the bed with a redhead. Reddish, anyway.
Time to use her head, focus, pay attention: this is a hotel room, functional, serviceable, cheapish. Only one bed. Everything seems tilted, slightly off-kilter, listing. But that's just Brittany. Isn't it? Where's the missing piece? How did she get here? And why?
What's missing?
Missing whom, more like. Missing, kissing, moving, loving. Touching. This list of wishes doesn't whimper. It demands. It wants. It seeks Santana. She wants to kiss Santana. Not this...
Girl.
That's it, she can't delay any longer. She has to get up. She has to get home, or go home to the girl who has been her home. So she rolls very carefully to the edge and without disturbing the girl, tips herself up and off the bed. She notices she's dressed mostly, relief, and attends to her hygiene.
She's just opening the door when a very sleepy Sugar looks up and says, "Mom? Come be cozy."
