That was the last time I saw Mom’s smile. Now when she’s near, raspberry aura envelopes my retinas. It sways like a flag in the breeze, and perpetually manifests and evaporates.
Pitying glances, consoling words. They are more bitter or more sweet now, vibrating my earlobe, activating goosebumps. The doctor’s voice is the most harsh, coarse like a splinter-laden rug. His apologies to Mom or Dad are boulders jutted out a waterfall. Abrupt, brusque, insincere.
I feel their eyes land on me. It tickles, it hurts. When they speak I drown in the cinema they draw. An unending movie plays all the time in my mind. I am the camera and the protagonist. I lose myself in the plot. In the other characters.
But when I hear Mom say it’ll be okay, the burgundy wisp returns and dwindles. Kindness of alien light warms my insides.
The Fiction Writer 