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pokeprompts2012-09-29 11:51 pm
Prompt 022: Weeds
Author:
phantasmagory Rating: PG-13.
Verse: Game, generation I.
Characters: Leaf, Green.
Summary: Green's not going to let her get away without a haircut.
Gurfa (Arabic) – the amount of water that can be scooped with one hand.
“Come on, Leaf,” he pleads, “we have to cut it. Or do you really want soot-stained hair? You smell like a Camerupt!”
“I've never cared what I have smelled like and you know it. It'll wash out.” She puffs out her cheeks and turns away, holds tight to the yellowing, raggedy hat on her head, smeared with black stains and tiny flakes of debris; she looks to him like someone fresh out of a dip in an oil spill.
“It didn't the first five times! Why would it work next time?”
She crosses her arms and refuses to meet Green's gaze, always the petulant, stubborn child of their trio.
“If you don't let me cut it, then I'll let Exeggutor do it!”
“Have you gone insa-” Before she catches her breath, he uses his right hand like a manacle to lock both her twig-thin wrists in place, flips her around still holding her like the dangerous prisoner she's become in the past few minutes, and shoves her against the bed. “Let me go, pervert!”
He struggles (when did she get this strong; or worse, when did he get this weak?) to keep her in place, momentarily distracted as Eevee walks in after a disrupted nap, then slowly walks out with a look that says, Sorry to interrupt, distaste in her almond eyes evident at the racket they were making.
She twists and turns in his grip like a magikarp out of water, but before she can roll away, he grabs the bottom cluster of her still-moist hair and tugs it like a rope until they're eye to eye. “No one told you,” he grits out, “to run into that burning building and save that Bulbasaur. So sit still, heroine, and let me help you.”
“No!” she shouts again, and water inches along the edges of her eyes.
He startles at her tears, off-kilter. “What is so wrong with me cutting your hair? It'll grow back! Idiot. Stubborn idiot.”
“Why do you want to cut my hair this bad?” she counters.
“Because when I smell that damn fire all I think about is how I could've lost you to some stupid, reckless mistake you made! Again!”
Leaf stops flailing, and he releases his iron hold. They part, out of breath from the unexpected wrestling match that just took place on the old, dusty floor.
“Oh” is all she manages to say in response to his brutally honest outburst. She combs a few fingers through her matted hair in the smothering silence that follows, the charred scent that the motion emits suddenly overpowering all of her senses. She tries to tell herself it's just the small size of the room and the fact that the windows have been closed since she arrived here a few hours ago, blackened with ashes and embers. She's just been here too long already.
He looks at the floor, his cheeks crimson (though from anger or embarrassment, she can't quite tell) and his teeth grinding consistently (must be anger, she decides). She's never seen his granny smith eyes such a deep color, so drenched with remorse and sadness. He looks like he already had lost her.
Leaf moves toward him and hugs him without warning. She can't think of any other way to apologize; words won't work right now.
He wants to move away, because again all he smells is the stench of fire, consuming the old scents of her he likes to remember – some sort of mesh of mango and apricots and wind from all the places she's been over the years (she never is one to stay still). He doesn't move to reciprocate her embrace. He's frozen and wracked with guilt for letting her slip through the cracks in his fingers like a handful of water time and time again.
“The reason I wanted this hair,” she confesses with a trembling voice, “is because you told me to always keep it long.”
“When?” Green still doesn't hold her back. His breath is scarce at the moment.
“We were four.”
“You've got selective memory,” he whispers as he finally wraps his arms around her, and slices her cascading hair.
Snip.
Her disentangled locks falls to the floor like overgrown weeds ripped from a garden before their time. The brown strands all mixed with the ebony shambles of a crumbling building swirl around the floor as he walks away to put his scissors down, then steps back to admire his work, and smiles.
She scrambles, in disbelief, to pick up the hair she's grown her entire life (for him, she pathetically tells herself) without once cutting, as if it could be sewn back into the shortened, uneven remainders. He stoops down to help her, but only to turn around and throw the loose ribbon-like pieces in his trash.
“What are you-”
He kneels in front of her. “I told you to keep it long because I was hoping you'd get it tangled in a thorn bush or something and I'd be able to get way ahead of you.” He laughs. “That's what I meant by selective memory – you took that as a compliment when you and I both know I was just being a jerk. You look a lot better this way.”
She proceeds to punch him in the face and joins Eevee in her nap, and resolves to leave in a few days with the intention to come back only when much of her hair has grown back, and Green's bruised ego heals.
Aww, such a cute Eevee...
It didn't feel like Green's words were much of an outburst when I first read them. This feels like it should be the climax after I got past this section. However, with the first read it seemed like they were still bantering, so when I read Leaf's responce, it sounded like it wasn't as big a deal. o.o; I think it would come out better if you could emphasize that the way he says it is different- before he actually says it.
Also, may I suggest putting a space between Leaf's responce and her action? The description of the room and her combing through her hair in the same paragraph as what she says makes the moment feel kind of rushed.
Don't mistake my suggestions as dislike, of course. Thay're just my opinions. Your phrasing is very attractive and I think that the concept for the plot is good!
I think if you work on your pacing, this story will be very enaging. You know, the kind that you can't put down until you're finished. ;)
Re: Aww, such a cute Eevee...