esky summit|district 7|fin

esky summit|district 7|fin Oct 3, 2015 9:34:10 GMT -5

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Post by b. on Oct 3, 2015 9:34:10 GMT -5

❊ obituaries ❊

The Summit bloodline ran deep within her -- porcelain skin, conglomerate hair, shapely eyebrows, those haunting ghost water eyes. ~~In other words, a ghost of Stella.~~ She too, had carried those pools of minty, forest green, a glassy mixture between grey and verdant like all the others; Blanche, Cynthia, and so many more. She was nothing but a ghost, too, a by-product of two mangled crowns, of love and hate and madness.

They were doppelgängers at birth, almost, but for ~~Stella's~~ fuller lips, her mouth left ajar. And then

one-two-three

years later, she was obsessed with her. Obsessed with her ominous depression, her distorted mind and deceptive perceptions. She wanted to help her, to save her, to catch her from the fall that she was falling forever. It's okay, ~~Stella,~~ I'll save you. She was always confused when doors were slammed in her face, as if it was the first time, reliving the moment again and again.

She hoped so strong she thought she heard ~~Stella's~~ breathing next to her, and weaved daisies in her hair, thinking of ~~StellaStellaStella.~~ She wanted to be her, be with her, breath with her. She created the bond that was not there, that was never to be there. She hated, was repulsed by her father, taking ~~Stella's~~ beating for herself, looking, desperate for a glimmer of gratefulness/thank you/contempt/sadness and any emotion at all, yet they only shone with hatred for her father, identical to the other - looking into a mirror. Help me, ~~Stella.~~ Help me. And once again, she was met with the slam of oak. The thick wood taunted her -

You can't catch me, no you can't.

Help me.

She was scared. She was tired of being scared. It was only natural that her heart should ache, for life had not given her the allowed time for sharpening her edges, so that she was frayed, unable to lick the flyaways, unable to fit in with her family. Pleasepleaseplease ~~Stella.~~

And the day of the Reaping downed on her like some gnarled eagle from the catacombs of brimstone, and she broke. Broke and fell and fell and fell, and this time, there was nobody to catch her.

Stella Summit.

How desperately she wanted it to say Esky Summit. To end this tragic life with the brief inhale of fear and agony. She would do anything for her dear ~~Stella~~, yet Stella would do nothing for her. But she knew, on the first hour of the Games, that the Summits would not be the victor, and that every second, she was waiting for the day where she would see ~~Stella's~~ tranquil face ( so still in death ) in a coffin, and memorize the touch and feel of the wood so that she would know which one seperated each of the unlucky tributes condemned to a life under graves.

She was ready for it. She was.

And when swift, mouse-like strides took her to the screen, she fell.

No. No. Stella Summit is not dead. She's just playing, that's all.

Wake up Stella. It's not funny. Please Stella.

( Stella Summit is still alive. She is still alive. She is still alive. )

An endless prayer repeated so much it became naught but a ceaseless drone. STELLA SUMMIT IS STILL ALIVE. no she isn't. And even after the cannon had rang like a fanfare of ~~celebration~~ in her ears, she denied that ~~Stella~~ Summit had no more breaths left. She denied that there was no colour in her cheeks. She denied-

Please, Stella.

She is still alive. She refused hugs, shielded her ears from i'm sorry for your loss & and she is in a better place because there was no loss, no better place. "Stella is still alive", she screamed, yet they only looked at her with pitying glances, with the look that a saint gives to an asylum. "She's just playing, I swear!", yet even her siblings embraced her in their cold arms, not understanding, not feeling. ~~Stella~~ is still alive.

hush, hush.

They tore off Dubois and stitched in Summit with crude needles, and even now she struggles to hold this surname in place, with no salvation to save her. Surnames are a strange thing. They are layers, so that one doesn't feel like a Summit right away. It might take weeks before you say Esky Summit when they ask you, yet ~~Stella's~~ death was a catalyst to her uncertainty, an epiphany to the closed-but-not-closed oak door. They took the door away after that, so that there was an empty space instead of the wood that molded to her curvature after years of leaning and pleading. Open the door, ~~Stella.~~

And when she turned sixteen, it was the same. Ages are like surnames. You're not just sixteen. You're one-two-three-four-five-six-seven-eight-nine-ten-eleven-twelve-thirteen-fourteen-fifteen and sixteen. When you still cry after stupid, worthless things you are three. When you dutifully clear the rooms of dust you are sixteen. Maybe when your mother cries you can tell her that she's feeling three. And right now you want to be a thousand years old because you could have said no when the teacher gave you a woolen sweater that was not yours. It was an ugly, red thing, the fraying edges and ancient thread.

For the whole class, you waited to throw the sweater away, maybe sling it over the fence or mold it into a ball and throw it in an alley. It was the end of class when the teacher said "Esky Summit! You put that on right now!" like she was really pissed off, and you were forced to tug your arms inside the too-small sweater, smelling the cottage-cheese when the collar stretched over your nose. You were a broken horse, a defeated stallion as the sweater-that-was-not-yours clung to your stick-thin-body.

Then that stupid Cleveland Hemingway said that she remembered that the sweater was hers, and you took it off as fast as you could, and the teacher forced a smile as if nothing was wrong and and and and-

Everything that you held in from when the teacher told you that the sweater was yours came loose and you buried your head in the crook of your arms and you cried until you could taste salt on your tongue. And then you were a runaway, sprinting to the safety of home as fast as you could, trying to hide your tears and grimacing at the hands that were trying to help smothered you in oh honey what happened and please tell me what's wrong.

You want to say everything, but the tears don't stop and they trace down your neck, below your clothes. You are feeling one, helpless and uncontrollable. And from this day on, you swear that you will become ~~Stella,~~ the mirror that she denied, the legacy that she would be afraid of.

Esky-

I am not Esky anymore! I'm Stella! Stella! Stella!

And then you realize that you don't have to cross out her name anymore. It is easy to say Stella instead of Esky now. Too easy, and you feel scared-and-happy at the same time. You cross out every single mention of ~~ESKY~~.

Esky is dead, but Stella is alive.

~~But it could be the throes of insanity.~~

My name is Stella.

And so Stella ~~Esky~~ she was.