The moon and back (Short Story)

"It's very simple," i projected in my most smug adult tone. "Admit you're in love, crazy, smitten, hopelessly, painfully, ruthlessly in love with me." I fashioned myself to my full height, fixing my toddler hands against my hips, pouting watermelon and posing opposite an organised reflection. My brown hair fell loose, in a tangle of waves down my back, and the kiss of blue i added to heavy eyelids made the gold of my eyes shine like medallions. Teenage Fever. Last Week i'd hated Jason Emille cross, this week i'd studied him walk up and down our crowded school corridor for fifteen minutes. Analysed his discussion with Mickey Bults in front of Mrs Kafan's lunchtime vegetable spaghetti. I can lip read so across a twenty second distance i saw their mouths, rotate and halt.It was an intensely political debate about Xmen versus Batman, the original animation. I grit my teeth as Jessica Jones trotted by 'slag' swinging her huge buttocks from left to right, fully aware that 99.9% of the male eyes swam towards her. Hungry shark eyes. I patted my bum self consciously, noticing with a tinge of irritation that my denim stretch Jeans had too much stretch, and my pink t shirt didn't display succulent breasts, but an arrested development in growth. "Jeeze i hate being fifteen."
My friend Mia lifted her orange curls from the tray of glamour magazines lined on the bed. "Fuck i hate being fifteen,"
"Who needs teenage years anyway," her sapphire eyes spun with amusement.
"Seriously, all you do is analyse life, or spend time disecting guys you never gave the time too before," i groaned dramatically.It was like the groan you make with runs on the toilet seat. "When did this happen to me. I never..ever..liked this guy before,"
"Shit your obsessed with him now,"
"You call it obsession. I call it intense distraction." Mia fixed her mouth to a thin wire line. " It's the whole face stretching, tyranosaurus rex, height thing," i nodded in detailed agreement.
"Age is such a cunt. Why did his face have to stretch, and his voice have to break so deeeeeep," i remember Syrine Wilcox describing a conversation with him being like swimming in a bath of hot chocolate. It depends how you look at it. Hot chocolate makes some think of sex, whilst others just relate it to falling asleep. The worst thing about being a teenager is having to admit you'r just as shallow as everyone else. Suddenly a flood of girls admitted to liking him, and i didn't have to feel weird, or pretend to be angry when his bedroom eyes dripped all over me. On one School trip to 'make believe mars' an adventure to the local safari park, TOTAL SHIT, i'd actually spent the whole bus ride ice block frozen in the same pose. A vogue pout, which included an exclamation mark scowl, in case he knew....i'd begun to enjoy his heated stares. So much so that despite my jelly belly, and owl like frames, i had moved three seats closer in spanish, watched a complete season of xmen, and accidentally on purpose put his name down for school prefect. He didn't win. Yet some idiot had told him i put his name down. "Gina yax would never put me down she loathes me," he announced in a thick tone, loud enough for me to hear,and possibly contest. The room was busy with silence, eyes oohed and mouths mutely uhmmed. "Gina," he teased "i'm your biggest fan." Which translated means F you, i don't give a shit about your opinions.

"It's very simple," Jason Cross had cornered me by the edge of the basketball court, his lean frame a sky scraper, his magnetic eyes absorbing every flinch of movement. "Gina Gi you nominated me to be some stupid class prefect, you know i stare at you,"
i smiled coyly, "sometimes i wonder what your looking for." I flicked my crisp white watch pretending to be distracted. I had my red chequered mini skirt on, and the black polo neck my mum had kept, a gift from her latest divorce. "I guess..." he glanced up at the grey white sky briefly,the scene looked like a painting i'd seen on one of those free art websites. His expression intense, seemed to match the afternoon sky, his navy blue denim jeans, with fitted matching sweater, were almost a click match. Blue was his nervous colour. Every presentation he'd stammered through on Shakespeare, or economics he'd advertised how amazing navy blue could look on an image of raw beauty. I crossed my fingers anxiously behind my back, he soldiered on,smacking his tongue against a plump mouth, worshiping shuffling suede shoes every 3 minutes. I was counting mentally.
" well," he began in a flat lecture monotone "Jennifer Layman asked me out this morning. She says i was too shy to talk so she did it, and erm," he cleared his throat, "some crap about me being intimidated and bull. Like erm.." he paused to pull threads of thought together. "Like one of those guys whose scared of women."
"So?"
"In Laymans terms, i told Jen Layman, if i liked her enough i'd ask her out." I thought id quit biting my lips, but i could feel myself chomping them. "I think your pretty in that interesting way that not everybody likes,"

"Your basically saying i'm ugly." He shook his head adamnantly.
"I like the look of you. I'm not on any athletics team, or a zillionaire's son, i stare a lot," his gaze levelled and narrowed " and i think you like it." I scanned the growing audience ignoring helicopter whispers, and green eyed stared. "Get to know me? I'm not bad,er..will you go out with me?" he released in one full expulsion. It was like a drowning person expelling that belch of air and water. Moses Bright and the other players had clambered unto the b-ball court, spinning two red and white autographed balls as the coach bounded on screeching authourity through the high pitched shriek of a whistle. My heart leapt like a junior jumping skipping rope. I waved at my cousin kev, Mia's boyfriend that would be driving me home shortly. "Yeah Okay," i tossed cooly. "Where?"
"3 trips to the moon and back." He flashed a brilliant smile that made my whole body melt. "Yeah whatever, that pancake house right?" He shoved his hands in his pocket self consciously, "yeah."
"I like chocolate. I had a coffee pancake once." He quirked his brows in confusion. "Who does that?"
"Me i guess."

Black and Yellow (short story)

Black and Yellow (Short story)

"There's nothing wrong with me," i wanted to tell him. Scream and rip it out from the pit of my lungs. Where it's moist, but the airs still chaotic with stale ciggarette smoke, and rough with the need to clear a throat. Cough up a furball. "Fuck your mum, your friends, the people who stare and analyse as we creep along the street, like were shadows in time and space." His brown eyes continued to glare through me as though i were a looking glass. "Seriously," he rubbed his eyes pink, "What are you harping on about now,let's just get in the fucking car." I zeroed in on the busy street, too many faces and too many places. People were seeing us together, i was his big black shame. "Well? Were in the middle of the main road, people need to get by, busses-"
"Tell me you get it." Tell me you get me, i thought. I'm not your prettiest, and i heard the sigh of disappointment as i approached your friends. I remember that day. His almond eyes had shone with the beauty of me.

Then i watched in horror as pieces of his face sank bit by bit, reflecting the disappointment of his friends. The air swamped in a conscious silence was tainted with giggles. High pitched and deep throat growls. "So this is the princess you've been telling us about.." a fairskinned guy to the left spoke up first. He had eyes like two green orbs and a face like a magazine cover. I looked from picture to picture, shuffling my feet nervously, each person looking more like a magazine shoot than the next. They were so camouflaged in beauty, i imagined nobody cared wether they knew Aristotle, or had an understanding of Marx.An Asian girl called Nina commented on how beautiful my dark skin was, My boyfriend responded by saying nothing.

We stood at the edge of the bustling sidewalk, the door of his shiny blue toyota left hanging open, the Fresco shopping bags, being pierced by the gravel. "Is it me or is it you?" I spoke softly, like words tiptoeing out of my mouth. "I just need to know that you haven't been brainwashed by the world to love what suits everybody else-"
"Stop being ridiculous!" he spat.
"When was the last time you held my hand in public? Took me out to dinner? Worshipped me in front of another human being,"
"Isn't that blasphemy, you self righteous religious nut," he teased. Yet there was no humour behind his eyes. "Tell me i'm more important than mums who think im too dark, friends who think you can do better, ex girlfriends parading themselves like marketing campaigns."
"This is your shit." Adrien breathed a heady sigh, like those men in those westerns, sitting at a bar, craving alcohol. "If you hate yourself that's not my problem." I shook my head slowly holding his gaze with a silver knowing one of my own. I needed the truth even if it hurt.
"Your not pretty in the way my exes are, and yeah i guess my friends and my mum do think i can do better," he picked up the shopping bags and tossed them into the cars back seat. "Is that what you wanna hear? You never really care what i think. Your too busy feeling sorry for yourself about ancient shit-"
"I had a tough childhood!" I spluttered defensively.
"Everybody had a tough childhood. Were Children and we hate it, then were adults and we hate it," Adrien pulled a cream toothpick out of a black compartment in his car. "Yeah my mum doesn't like that your hairs still natural, and other really stupid crap," he paused, "but my mums on the verge of a divorce,she doesn't like anyone right now." He began tapping his pockets anxiously looking for the ciggarette i knew he'd smoked nervously two hours ago. We'd been talking about kids. "My father cheated on her ten times with a dark skinned woman,who had a huge natural Afro, and some red beads she wore everyday." He finally gave up on the quest for the ciggarette, fixing two midas eyes on me once more. "As for my friends," he smiled lazily, a slow motion flash of polaroid teeth. " Can you say associates? Connections. Each one of us got snobbed before we entered that circle.Were frenemies." He shoved the tooth pick he'd found in the glove compartment into his mouth, crunching it's end tastelessly. A habbit i'd learned to loathe. "I once dated a dark skinned girl that told me everything i'd achieved was simply because of my fair skinned complexion. She made my life hell. Hating herself and me in the process" He nodded and smiled to an old lady shuffling along. She was white with hair like candyfloss and chequered skirt, with black cardigan. She looked happier than i was. "That chick still gives me nightmares. Are you her?"
"Your exaggerating,"
"Maybe you are her. You just haven't reached that level of insanity yet,"
"Oh forgive me for expressing my feelings!" I shrieked, the perfect dramatisation of a toddlers tantrum. He leaned over the open left window snatching up the two remaining bags at my feet.

"Your insecure arse can walk home. Oh yeah, and i don't go to restaurants with you because your Paranoid as fUUUUUUUUUUCK! It's like walking with an army sargeant in the middle of a crossfire," he tilted his head to the left, exposing two perfect dimples. "I bet you can't believe your luck pulling a guy like me," he wanted to laugh, but there was a sadness that sat like salt residue in his golden eyes. "Pathetic. In your case it is about skin tone. You think i'm too good for you, how fucked up is that?" I raised my hands in defense like someone being held at gunpoint.

" You can keep your baggage, i'm taking mine home to cook, and having a damn good meal.When your done hating yourself...give me a call." I watched as the engine roared to life and the sapphire toyota sped into the distance. Even with my favourite tan trousers, and pink top, face painted elegantly with ebony rouge,i still hadn't felt comfortable in my own skin. Worse it had translated. My phone beeped and vibrated in my pocket. I yanked it out of my pocket. It was Adrien. I scanned it and smiled. "Your beautiful, and sexy, and i'm waiting on Redar street five minutes away." I pressed the redial button, his voice smiled into the phone. "You see i'm even willing to fight you for you, now that's some creative shit."