Somebody's Daisy (Title page by Evan!!!" )

Prologue: Harboured Feelings

GENERAL TRIGGER WARNING AND USE OF STRONG LANGUAGE 

I pity my mother; It doesn't take a genius to figure out I'm not exactly what she bargained for. Not that she would ever say anything like that. In fact she'd probably be angry with me for thinking anything close to it. I just mean I feel bad. We don't have that much, you know, in common and all. She wanted a girl's gal, you know, the type she could take shopping and pick out matching outfits with, like you know, the Ryan Twins down the lane from us. I mean, Karen and Graci Ryan aren't actually twins, but we all call them that; The mother- daughter duo show up everywhere dressed in the exact same outfits, with the exact same handbags and the exact same high-pitched chipper, fake as fuck voices. Hell, yesterday, I even saw them walking their snooty little schnauzer down the lane in high heels. I mean, how is that even practical? --- Anyways, my mother and I-- we aren't like Karen and Graci; She's tried a few times to take me out shopping, to spoil me with fancy-prom-like dresses and elaborate manicures, but I'm a camo girl. Shirt, pants, everything. Throw on a backwards baseball cap, and I'm good to go. No lipstick, no mascara, no muss, no fuss. And I guess I am a girl's gal, but not in the way that would give us any common ground. My first love was a gal named Sara Welsh. She lived down the lane from me. We were really too young to be anything, but sure, we kissed a few times. We'd go on long hikes together the summer before ninth grade, and talk about how fun high school would be. We would be going to school a whole town over, where nobody would know us. Nobody would tell us what to do, who to be. Sara and I, we both wanted that freedom so bad, we could almost taste it. I'd take pictures of her as we walked. I'd say it was to improve my talent as a photographer, but really I just liked how the sun bounced off the trees, shining through her black hair. It broke my heart when her parents sent her to boarding school across the sea. But it's what every Welsh had done for half a century and they thought it would help their daughter achieve the highest education. So, she went. And I stayed here, in the small, small town of Ashbury, pitying my mother, for five long, long years.

"Winnie! Would you come help me with these groceries?" Mom asks, busting the door open dramatically to announce her arrival. Before you ask, no, my full name isn't Winfred. I'd sooner die than have that old fashioned of a name. Not that I think there's anything wrong with having old-fashioned names, it's just that I'm not the type who particularly likes them. I guess my mother knew that, from the second I was born. Being born three months too soon in the middle of a blizzard, doesn't exactly scream conventional, but it's how I got my name. Winter Rosalie Hill is my full name. My mother says she named me Winter because the winter I was born was fierce and unpredictable, just as I'd proven to be. My second name is Rosalie for my mother's best friend, Rosalie Dillion. She'd passed on years before I was born, but my mother says that she wasn't afraid of anyone or anything, and she'd wanted the same for me.

"Yep, coming!" I holler from my bedroom as I throw on camo jeans and a black top.

I tie my blonde hair back in a messy bun as I walk to the kitchen.

"So I saw The Ryan Twins at the store," Mom says, unpacking some raspberry jam and putting it in the fridge. Countless times I've told her that nobody outright calls them The Ryan Twins, except for in casual passing, but Mom thinks it's some sort of hip thing to call them that all the time, and it makes her feel young. So, I bite my tongue and go with it.

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah. Graci's applying to a university just outside of town for fall semester. Karen says she'll still live at home and commute daily by bus. Of course, if you ask me, that girl spends too much time with her mother. She should get out of this nothing-town! See the world, just as you're going to do, after your gap year. Don't you agree? You gals are only young once. You deserve to enjoy it... to find yourselves."

"Yeah, well, it looks like Graci is more than happy to be a carbon copy of her mother. She might as well put the study hours in," I shrug, snickering.

"You shouldn't say things like that, Win," Mom says, adopting a serious tone.

"Why not? It's obvious," I defend.

"You never know what goes on behind closed doors," Mom says, sounding like a cautionary tale.

"Well, I guess," I consider, "But Graci's eighteen. She wouldn't be prancing around town with Karen all the time if she didn't want to be."

Mom sighs, grabbing a piece of bread.

"What?"

"Karen is a very demanding woman," Mom shrugs.

----

"What ya thinking about, Win?" my best friend, Polly, asks, as we lay side by side on my bedroom floor listening to Dolly Parton later that night.

"I dunno," I say, suddenly breathless. "I dunno."

"You can tell me," she says, turning to her side. "You know that."

"I- I guess... I guess I'm just thinking about everything," I say honestly. "Everything... and nothing at all. You know?"

"Yeah," she says quietly, "Yeah, I do."

"Do you think it's weird?" I ask, sitting up.

"What?"

"That I haven't-- you know, been with anyone since..."

"Since Sara?" Polly finishes for me.

"Well... yeah. And I mean, does that even count? We kissed a few times, you know, closed-mouthed, but that was it. She left before-- and we were too young at the time for anything... else."

"Did you genuinely love her?" Polly asks.

I don't even take a minute to consider it. "Of course."

"Then it counted."

I turn away, smiling to myself as warmth overtakes me.

_________________________________________________

The next day, the sun beams brightly over the horizon as I walk down the old porch steps. I stir my coffee and plunk down on an outdoor reclining chair, overlooking most of my front yard. I breathe in the cool air, stretching my whole body out as I exhale. I crane my neck to see chickadees flying overhead, and hum along with their morning's greeting. I see flowers sprouting from the flower bed; pretty white daisies. I remember the summer before ninth grade, Sara and I had been out here, in my front yard, taking pictures of the flowers. I had told her I wanted to practice taking pictures for the day I'd submit a portfolio in hopes of admission to college.

"Okay," she had said, leading me out the door, to the flower bed.

"What are we doin' here, Sara? It's just my flower bed. Nothing exciting."

"Look," she had said, pointing to the middle of the flower bed.

My eyes followed her instruction and in the middle of my painfully boring flower bed, I saw one perfectly not boring daisy.

"Oh my gosh, oh my gosh, oh my gosh, Sara, stand right here," I had said, gently guiding her by the shoulders.

I smiled sheepishly as I moved a stray piece of her hair behind her ear where I placed the daisy.

"Perfect, just like this!" I had said, snapping a beautiful black and white shot.

"Hey Winnie?" Sara had said.

"Yeah Sar?"

"You'll always be my Daisy, no matter where life takes us."

I had smiled wider than I ever had in my whole life, in that moment. We had just read F. Scott Fitzcharald's "The Great Gatsby", and the one thing I had managed to take away from it was that the love that Jay Gatsby had for Daisy Buchanian, it could endure even in the face of death. It was eternally unconditional.

"So will you," I had returned. "So will you.

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Back in present day, I smile at the memory just as I turn my head to see a vibrant yellow taxi pull up at a house down the lane... and a raven-haired beauty step out of it...

End of prologue