bryony fleming | district six | fin

Flemings - Bryony. Brianna. Beverly. Blossom. Blaire. Bentley.
Thatchers - George. Gerard. Garry.

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"Don't touch that!"

Little Bentley is just inches away from scraping toxic black mold from Old Man Rossington’s living room wall. “But it is mold, dad and Thatch said to collect the mold!” Bentley pleas, still edging closer and closer to the decaying wallpaper in the deceased’s home. ”That is the bad mold, that is not going to save anyone!” Bryony has had this conversation with them all now, the fascination that there are so many different types and still she is dubious that any of it even works.

“What do you know about mold Bryony? Mold is mold. We have been told to clean up this place and collect as much as we can for the shop, the Thatcher boys will be coming over soon if we don’t hurry up!” Beverly has always been the one to question her older sister, Bryony admires her resilience but she does not want any of her siblings facing the same fate as this house’s owner. ”Do you know why old man Ross died?”

“Yeah he had bad lungs, coughed his guts all the time!” Brianna answers from the other side of the room while she swabs the chair where the deceased once sat for weeks.

”And how did he get bad lungs?”

“He worked in the incinerator, probably from all the fumes.” Beverly rejoins the Q and A, tying up a bag of rotten food from the kitchen.

”Look at all of the walls in here, none of that grew over night. That is bad mold, it is not going to cure anybody’s pneumonia. It will just cause it!”

“New moan knee arrr??” Blaire calls out, the youngest sister not doing much of anything as she clings onto her bunny rabbit doll while sat on the unstained couch. “Just because you know big words Bryony, doesn’t make you a healer. You are stuck with us until you are married off to Gerrard!” Beverly is right.

”Okay just stay away from the walls, we need to be out of here in twenty minutes!”

There is only one prospect in life for the eldest Fleming daughter and that is a marriage that has already been written, with a boy she cannot stand to be in the company of. He is firmly rooted in the business while Bryony wants to stray away from it. Producing fake medicines from moldy food, to the random chemicals used to treat water. All because everyone in the District is so desperate for something. They all keep coming though, to the shop. Whenever Bryony is serving, she tries to push the herbal medicines that she has picked from the District’s fence line. Dusty books identify them as being medicinal, but they all seem so attracted to the bottled-up unknowns that are sold as miracle cures. But instead they are the rotting juices from deceased bodies mixed with last week’s grunge from the food waste plant.

Now and then she does like to plant the knowledge she has gained from these books and the healer she once shadowed for a day. Knowledge like that seems sparse in Six, all while everyone is dropping life flies because of the type of work and materials that are involved in it. Just one drop of dirty water in an open wound, she has seen a lot of infested limbs come through the shop begging for something to treat them. Then she sees them a week later, arms chopped off by their family members because nothing worked. Seems a lost cause in the District, nobody ever seems to learn.

“Bryony help, it is Blaire!” Blossom calls out through the screaming of little Blaire. Bryony is just finishing cleaning up the kitchen but she drops all of the bags, running out of the front door where the commotion is taking place.

“Get off Gerard, that is my bunny!”

Gerard Thatcher, the eighteen year old and second son of the man who started the business with Bryony’s dad. It has been written for a long time that those two should marry, despite being total opposites. “Little Blaire with her dirty bunny, shouldn’t you be working and not playing? We have been waiting for the goods back at the shop for ages now!” Gerard dangles the bunny up above his head, a good four foot from Blaire’s reach. ”Let go Gerard!”

“Have you lot been snooping around Rossington’s house, what has been taking you so long?” The youngest Thatcher, Garrison or Garry as everyone calls him shows his face from behind Gerard.

”Gerard, please give the toy back!” Gerard doesn’t listen but will he listen to a fist straight to his face? Bryony has been wanting to do this for a long time and now is the chance. Pow. It felt good.

Gerard grabs a hold of his cheek after Bryony gives him a good sucker punch, all while dropping the bunny on the floor that Blaire scrambles to grab. “Did you just punch your future husband?” Little Bentley, Bryony’s youngest brother says as now all of her siblings are standing outside. ”Yes, and I will kick him in the balls for good measure. Don’t mess with my siblings, Gerard. You need to learn from now if you are to put a ring on my finger.”