bugspray / d'arcy
Oct 6, 2024 1:05:43 GMT -5
Post by florentine, d4b ❁ on Oct 6, 2024 1:05:43 GMT -5
florentine.
i mix together a white cream with a pink one, some sort of balm. together they give off a pungent smell - antiseptic and tea tree, perhaps eucalypt, too. like something my mother used to comb through my hair when i caught lice from the kids at my fancy kindergarden. god forbid anybody find out that a girl of my standing would have become overrun with pests. i'd cry as she tore them out, taking no care with the fine-toothed metal comb, not caring that i shivered and squirmed in the bath. i begged her not to kill the bugs. after all, they were just trying to live their lives in my hair. she had no time for my sappy, sentimental anthropomorphising - she was punishing me for my misfortune, i knew, even then. not a motherly bone in her body, that woman. good job she's nobody's mother anymore.
the training centre is quiet - the heavy heartbeat of the day has stilled, leaving behind just the dregs; me, crouched by the first aid station, playing with the salves. mending things has never been a strong point of mine. i am mostly about fucking things up, creating a wreckage and then walking away. not so much about putting things back together, or making them whole again. i know, though, thanks to georgie's reminder, that accidentally giving myself a blood infection with a dirty needle, or not being able to treat a simple malady could cost me in the arena, so here i sit, hoping to imbue something useful into my brain through my fingers.
i find myself distracted; holding a long piece of thread in one hand and an aggressive-looking needle in the other, my eyes wander away to the other side of the room, where the kid is. i've been keeping an eye on her recently, because when i look at her the feeling of pity roars at me and makes me faintly sick. she is sweet-faced, all of twelve years old, her skull chock-full of milk teeth. it makes me even angrier than usual, to look at her, and see what they are doing. she seems too small, even for twelve. just a little bug, scraped away from her home, about to be poisoned with tea tree oil and eucalyptus. she catches me watching her, and i blush, fixing my eyes back on my needle, although her face is still stuck in my head. it's not kind, to worry about someone's impending death right in front of them.