Petrichor
(n): the smell, typical of concrete, after it rains
. . .
Rocio Sader liked getting into trouble.
To be fair, it wasn't that they technically went searching for trouble. Rocio had difficulty enough finding their socks in the morning. Looking for trouble meant it was bound to allude them forever. However it just so happened that most of the things they wanted to do were against the rules.
And there lies the issue folks. Rocio Sader couldn't sleep.
It was the third night in a row.
Now one night of bad sleep could be chalked up to too many eggs, or the cup of tea you definitely shouldn't have drank while staying up to read Machado. Two nights of bad sleep meant you were probably coming down with something, something you would defiantly ignore to sneak into your girlfriend's dormitory until you were too bedridden to protest. But three nights. Three nights was, very simply put, rude.
Now Rocio wasn't the most religious of sorts. Of course there was the occasional Allah thrown in, or B'ezrat Hashem, but that just about qualified. When you had a Jewish best friend, you were bound to pick up something. There really wasn't any way around that. And no proper Persian child could escape the house without a prayer to Allah, who was probably spending the morning clipping his toenails, not paying attention to the constant worries of Abru Sader.
A god, who's name would soon be taken in vain when Rocio stepped on a book. They were a colorful swearer, again thanks to Abru, but after hopping around like a decaptitated cactus, they placed the foot gingerly on the ground. Rocio bent to pick it up. Well fuck. That was Miriam's copy of So Say the Wildflowers. Rocio blew on the book frantically, dusting it off. This of course, did absolutely nothing to disguise the fact the book had been squashed like a winter melon underfoot, but it was comforting to them.
I'll buy her a new copy from Peregrine tomorrow. And a coffee. Hopefully she won't notice. She would in fact notice, but Rocio's brain was racing with more important thoughts. Three cups of tea will do that to someone, especially when said someone hasn't slept in three nights.
It wasn't the book they were looking for. After assuring their toe would fully recover from it's traumatic experience, Rocio thumped over to the desk. The blasted pen was lounging in their junk mug, the one with a hand done illustration of a ribcage in pastel watercolor. Rocio scowled at the pen. It was definitely mocking them. They snatched it from the mug, turning it over and over till their fingers found the comforting grooves along the sides.
As self righteous as the Blamrey Pen was, the emerald studded grooves along the sides never failed to calm Rocio's nerves. Some might say it was sacrilegious to treat a hundred year old architect like an ordinary fountain pen, but Rocio was of the opinion that if the pen was going to be that annoying, it might as well be useful.
It would be prudent to ask how a pen could be self-righteous. After all, a pen is simply an inanimate object, a being in itself as defined by Sartre. And yes, it was actually a pen. Rocio's working theory was that the pen had grown an ego after being treated like a priceless object to the Saders for seventy five years and was secretly reporting back to Abru on all of Rocio's illicit comings and goings. This was definitely true.
Rocio scrambled for the leather folio, the warm brown sliding open to reveal pages and pages of unfinished sheet music. The piece on top, a cacophony of spilled ink and jagged eight notes floated onto the desk. Cantanta in D minor. Rocio had been struggling with the piece for the past week. It needed a countermelody, something to add dimension to the layered basal harmonies. They scribbled out a few notes, the Blamrey Pen squeaking along pleasantly. There. That looked good. But notes could look as pretty as the wanted. It needed to pass the litmus test. Which meant that Rocio was sneaking out. Again.
