Like A Rose

Wow. I didn't know the other YWC-er's are still hyping about YWC, writing reviews, thoughts, opinions, displaying photos, and posting their Writer's Slam pieces. So I thought I would too. 

Like A Rose

      The pungent smell pierced her nostrils, making her feel suffocated, constricted. But she ignored it. She had a lot on her mind, pondering them, turning them over, weighing them, tasting each option. When she was done, she started over. She had to be completely sure, without a single doubt. For she knew, once she had decided on a path, there was no turning back.

      She stared down at the man sound asleep lying beside her on the bed, willing herself into his mind. What does he think about in that mind of his? Why does he do these things? What fault of mine deserves such cruel punishment?

      She felt anger creep up her neck and the heat of it on her face. She had to take several deep breaths just to keep her hands clasped tightly in her lap.

      She raised her eyes and fixed them on the plaster of Paris on the ceiling of the room. Roses, she recalled, had always been her favourite. Tiny, delicate carvings of roses, reminding her that she too was beautiful, fragile and admired. She knew she was.

      But all her life, she has had no choices. Everything she did had already been decided for her. Never what she wanted. Never what she desired. Only rules and regulations. No fun, no parties, unless there were wealthy young men from distinguished and important families for her to be shown off to. Exactly like a rose in a vase, only for ornamental purposes.

Even now, her present life was forced upon her. But she accepted it, she knew she had to. As if she had a choice.

      But what angered her was that she had taken pains to work things out and he had not even seemed bothered. She had been patient, subservient, caring, she had actually cared! She had opened up her heart, but it had been thrown back at her, ripped and shredded.

      She pulls her sleeves up to her elbows and stares at the bruises on her arms. Stared at them until them became blurry and even seemed to look like black roses, drawn all along her arms.

      She wiped away her tears. A moment of weakness. She could not, will not, tolerate this anymore. She has been silent for far, too long. She stared at her husband’s face once again, feeling immediate hatred. She doesn’t care what happens anymore. She knew she had to do this.

      She stands, her mind made up. Silently, she walks to the door and closes it, locking it as she does, and simultaneously, cutting off the smell of kerosene leading to the door. With the light in her eyes dancing in harmony with the flame, she lights a match.

      For once, she was going to make her own choices.

© LISA KWAN 2011 ; All rights reserved.