Participants:
| Scene Title | Mama's Girl |
|---|---|
| Synopsis | Devi takes her first trip on Refrain. |
| Date | August 12, 2009 |
Anarchy Customs: Devi's Apartment
Black on blue on violet, the room seems done up in the dark motif of bruise-like colors. The loft apartment gives bares an open aura tainted only by the scent of stale smoke and beer. Navy carpeting spreads out like a dark sea everywhere but for the tiled portions designated as the kitchenette and bathroom that is shielded only by a Japanese folding screen.
The queen size bed is set beside the large windows that face out the front of the building, allowing a good view of the garage's store front and the rowdy streets of Staten Island beyond. There's a laptop upon the nightstand. A corner of the loft is designated as a little sitting area, a glass coffee table set between two white, leather sofas.
Finally, a hatch door is set with a simple, but sturdy, sliding bolt lock but reveals a spiraling, black-iron staircase that leads down into the lower floors of the building when opened.
The glow of the syringe beckons from the black comforter sprawled out on her bed.
Devi stands in the kitchenette, her rump leaning against the cabinets behind her as she stares down the drug from over the bottle of beer lifted to her lips. Refrain, Wendy had called it. She never mentioned it only affected Evolved.
Her feet are suddenly moving of their own accord, bare feet with azure-painted toes tickled by the dark carpeting. She’s dressed comfortably, aiming to make a cozy evening of lounging about in a pair of orange and red striped boxer shorts and a white beater. There is rest for the wicked, and it comes in the form of a little, glowing vial. She sinks down onto the bed, setting her beer on the nightstand, and plucks up the syringe.
The needle pierces the skin beside only a few older scars in the fleshy, vulnerable little crook of her inner elbow. The plunger forces the glowing substance into her flesh. There’s no turning back now. She waits…
She sits at the edge of the bed and reaches out from her beer. One sip. Two.
She’s about to finish off the bottle when the vision of present reality begins to fade under the stars winking in the corners of her vision, framing the view of her apartment before consuming it. Heavenly tingling begins to set in though her limbs, consuming her in a warmth that seems to radiate like the glow of the drug itself. *THUD* The beer bottle hits the floor, sopping a small puddle of booze into the carpet by the time only Devi’s body is a part of the apartment – her mind is elsewhere.
***
Summer in Sturgis, South Dakota. The biker’s are beginning to rumble in for the annual festival, crowding the streets with chrome, smoke, and booze.
But, Devi isn’t a part of that scene… yet.
”Devina!” Her mother’s sweet voice. She’s twelve – cute, skin unmarked by a single dot of ink or syringe scar. Wide set eyes only embellish her innocently impish sense of curiosity and naively outgoing nature. She’s playing with an anthill behind their big, light green house.
”Devina. Come inside. You’re going to get dirty!” Devina wrinkles her nose at the little mound of critters and earth before wheeling round and jogging up the stairs into the kitchen from where her mother calls.
”Girls’ Day, right Mama? You promised – Girls’ Day.”
The young mother turns around, beaming a smile that is almost reserved for the movie mom’s – sweet, understanding, and beaming of maternal comfort. She dangles a bottle of bright pink nail polish between two fingers on one hand, and presents a bowl of popcorn in the other. “Would I let you down?” Mama, replies. No. No she wouldn’t. She never did.
They’re sitting on the couch, some cheesy old romantic comedy playing in the background. The boys had gone fishing – how delightfully cliché – to give the girl’s the house. Devina watches, envious of her mother’s fine touch and accuracy, as she paints the hot pink hue over her little piggy toenails. “Ooo. Don’t you just look so cute,” the dark haired woman compliments her daughter.
”Not cute. Cute is for little girls. I look pretty,” she corrects her mother, watching the paint dry on her last, tiny pinky toe.
”Well excuse me,” Mama teaches. “That’s right, you’re getting to be a young lady. Soon you’ll be wearing make-up and Daddy will be chasing boys off down the street, hm?” She pinches up a piece of popcorn and flicks it at her daughter, bopping the little girl’s nose with the popped cornel.
Devina squeals and grabs a handful, retaliating with a tossed shower of puffy pop corner. A girlish war ensues before finally Devina is tickled into surrendering. “You’ll ruin my nails!!!”
Mama backs up, grinning, and plucks her key from the nearby hook. “Come on. Shopping time.”
Devina pops up and begins to wrestle on a pair of sandals, even as her eyes are glued to her mother’s visage. “Mom? … You said I could get my ears pierced today…” she notes hestitantly.
Mama wrinkles her nose and finally dunks her head in defeat. She’d hoped Devina wouldn’t remember. “Alright. Alright. Let’s go. God, you’re growing up too fast…”
The pair walk down the front steps and step into the family car… The car that only a few years later would become her parents’ death trap… Stars invade and then fade.
***
Devi gives a single, sharp convulsion as emptiness creeps in and her gaze focuses on the stale puddle in the dark carpet. A quick glance is spared to make sure she is alone in her moment of weakness. She’s reaches out and tugs the nearest pillow to her chest, trapping it in the envelope of her thin arms as she clenches shut her eyes and wills back the scene. “Mama,” she whispers, before slumping onto her side and falling into an uneasy sleep.
She'll call Wendy in the morning.