I've been needing to get back into freewriting, which is a daily practice for most poets and fiction writers, designed to loosen up and get things flowing, like stretching before exercise. Visual artists, especially those who draw or paint from life (figures, landscapes, still lives, etc) do something similar in "gesture drawings". After reading several of @poetrybyjeremy's freewrite posts, I got excited to try these again. Many thanks to @mariannewest for hosting this daily freewrite! @mariannewest/day-126-5-minute-freewrite-thursday-prompt-switch

So here's my first entry:

(source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corsage - image By Tai Gray from Provo, USA - CorsageUploaded by France3470, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=17578554)

Pajamas

Pajamas. She was wearing pajamas. White cotton pajamas with purple teddy bears and little pink hearts all over them. I didn't know what to do, so I just stood there looking at her. She wasn't saying anything, and the look in her eyes was open to interpretation. After considering the situation carefully, and weighing the possible repercussions of any words I might speak or actions I might take, I brought out the little silver box that I had been holding behind my back, and handed it to her. She looked at it, her eyes half examining its contents through the little cellophane window on the front, half abstracted. "It's pretty", she said at last. Her voice sounded faint, as if it had had to cross a great distance to reach me.

I coughed, fidgeted, looked away for a moment to collect my thoughts. My eyes were caught and held by a picture on the wall, an antique black and white photograph of a young couple, the woman stunningly beautiful in a white wedding dress, the man dignified in black suit and tie. Their faces wore very serious expressions, frighteningly serious, and I wondered for a moment if they had even wanted to be married. Which was silly: of course they had. Why else go through all of that?

I looked back at her. "I'm glad you like it... I thought it would go with that gown you had picked out".

Now it was her turn to fidget, look away. Like steps to a dance we both knew without having to learn them.

"I couldn't do it", she said. "I... just didn't feel like it tonight. I'm sorry."

I thought about the money. The limousine parked outside. The corsage. The tux rental. The hotel room. I thought about how excited she'd been.

I thought about the couple in the photograph on the wall. Her grandparents.

"Can I have that back?" I asked, holding out my hand. She gave me a quick, searching look. Then she handed me the box, not even looking at it, her eyes fixed on mine.

"Thanks", I said.

I opened the box and took out the little clump of flowers and ribbon. She looked away. I reached over and, carefully, pinned the corsage to her cotton pajamas. When her eyes came back to mine, there were tears in them.

"Finally" I thought to myself.

"Should we watch a movie?" I said out loud.

©2018 Bennett Italia