SUNSHINE KISSES

03 | apricot sun

03

apricot sun
young and pure

In a meadow near the school's greenhouses, Angela laid out a picnic blanket scattered with porcelain plates of jersey caramels and macadamia florentines. It was close enough to Macarthur House to be able to see it silhouetted against the twilight sky but far enough for the constant static of people to fade to a faint buzz at the back of their minds, the perfect level of detachment.

Angela dangles from a monkey bar, her black hair a bright auburn where the yellow nectarine sun grazes it.

"Tell me one more time; why are you joining classics club?"

Juno picks at a half formed scab underneath a simpsons bandaid. Her legs are bruised with pretty mementos from her (unauthorised) trips to the forest on the very edge of the school grounds. Bart Simpson smiles at her from her kneecaps.

"I don't know."

They both know full well she's lying, but it rolls off her tongue so easily it may as well be the truth now. That triad of words had been her favourite thing to say, an easy way to shrug off unwanted questions, but now her choice in speech seems less arbitrary.

The bell for evening roll call rings and offers her an excuse to end the conversation before Angela tries to delve further, which she would be grateful for if it weren't for the nagging sensation at the back of her mind.

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That evening Juno sits on the edge of her balcony window and plucks wisterias from the underside of the ledge. Her feet swing rhythmically, soft heels brushing the mohair carpet.

She puts crocuses and fire-petalled hyacinths in an empty Pellegrino bottle with two broken-stemmed tulips. Her room smells like darjeeling tea and soft musk and ripe citrus. She swirls the surface of her empty fish tank.

It's a February night, meaning she reads with her eyelids half open and the fan on high. The crickets are chirping and the breeze carries drifting jasmine blossoms into her room and the air is warm and sweet and sticky and Earth is just a pebble in her fishbowl.

She dips her fingers into the Andromeda III.

— hearts break with the dawn