'Cherry...it's such a nice name, isn't it?'
She only smiles and says nothing, she's heard it all before.
'Now, how did a girl like you come by a name like this? You don't look like a cherry,' he says and he winks, as if she's supposed to know what he means by it.
Truth is she gave up trying to understand the men in her life long ago. In fact, she barely sees them as “the men in her life”...more like passing figures, shadows through a dream.
'I don't?' she toys with him, because she knows he'll like it. Men like to be played with. It is Cherry's theory that they're all just little kids deep down.
Cherry's not a kid, oh no, she lost all that long ago. But she humors them from time to time.
'No, you look like a...Patricia,' he bursts into laughter, as if it's some terribly good joke he's just said.
Patricia, huh? she thinks and tries to picture her life as a Patti, nice home, two kids, a surprise third, a husband who's always home on weekends and a lover on the other side of town. Yes, maybe she could be happy as a Patti, but that is not her name.
And the woman knows it's a very horrible sin to go against your name, it's like denying yourself. Silly, at best; dangerous, at worst.
'I'll be your Patti tonight, if you wish,' she says, wriggling her hips. The Old Ones know she means nothing by it, she would never deny her name. She is a Cherry, born and bred. No, not a Cherry, she is Cherry, for every one of them is different.
She remembers, as he unhooks her bra, that someone – long ago – told her she had a perfect name for what she was doing. That someone had been convinced it was a stage name. Or maybe, a bed name, since her profession rarely involved a stage.
But it wasn't, she'd been born like any other little girl, thinking she might become an astronaut, or a space engine technician or a movie star. She'd never known what life would hold for her, as a little girl, she'd just been certain, always, that she would follow the will of the Old Ones, wherever it took her.
Cherry looks down at the man, on his knees, with his glasses a bit askew and his tie hanging o'er his back, the only item of clothing still left on.
And she sees in his eyes adoration and gratitude. There is much she can give him, beasts and empires, and yet he only wants her to love him back, just for the night.
So, Cherry complies, making him so very happy. She loves him, planting soft kisses on his chest afterwards, like he'd be hers forever.
And as the man puts his clothes back on, she watches him. There is a destiny that she must fulfill, a purpose. Which is why she does what she does. But she doesn't know it yet.
There has always been something special about her, just like there's something special about all true-born cherries.
And she waits, as she sits outside the rented room, staring at the stars, for that something to unravel before her.
Wild Cherry (freewrite)
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