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                                                o1.

                                                                                    xxx

 "goodness, Addie! What've you done to the place?"

   I was stirred by the fulminating tone of Sarah, Halle's mother, her obnoxious heels stabbing the poor wood beneath her as she censured her daughter. I shakily peeped out the window, not fully aware that I'd nearly slept half the day away. The sun was squatting over the skyline illuminating a path for the jubilantly crooning birds as they sailed aloft heading north of the parting winter. From their enraptured ditty and the sweet, gently waltzing draft that snuck through a few crevices in the window did I capture the realization that spring had finally sprung. A contented grin tugged at my lips and I stuffed my fingers into my left pocket, retrieving the berries I'd smuggled for the occasion.

   As soon as the first drupelet fell into my mouth, Sarah'd begun maundering on about how banal and dreary Halle's bedecking skills were, the grimace of distaste that I'd fancied to be blemishing her countenance made evident in her speech. Halle — or Addie, a title her mother had taken a liking to calling her — retorted saying she thought her home's décor was quite alright and enchanting however, and everyone else thought likewise. Addie then justified further that there hadn't been a sole problem with her deep beige woodwork and ivory upholstered furniture to deem. Sarah cackled, evidently amused by her daughter's delusions. She told her that she'd only been in denial, that she merely refused to accept the unfavorable truth that she was a horrible interior decorator. Sarah's raillery caused me to laugh a bit to myself, her goofy guffawing all too intolerable for my weak stomach. I'd have nearly vomited whatever little remnants dwelled in my gut had I laughed any harder than my emasculated being allowed. I swiveled my head at her puerility, now bested by my frailty, and listened on as Halle expertly evaded any other slanderous remarks that might've been swarming her mother's lips.

    Just as I burrowed into their quarrel regarding Halle's displeasing employment selection, the aural of Sarah's tall pumps and Halle's naked feet thudding against the timber toward the farther side of the house found way to my ears.

   I shut my eyes and availed myself of the moment of coveted silence to recollect the ephemeral times back on Xenon:

   A younger, doe-eyed aspect and I would scuttle about Abuela's home having the ever profuse balm of metal whiffing up our little noses. Defying Mother's wishes to symbolize a respectable King, Father would trot or lag, considering his age behind the obscured vessel [ whom I own only a vague distinction of ] and I, his arms outstretched and prepared to grapple either of us by our person, tickling us until our stomachs felt queasy [ I remember always being the first to be tackled, for the bleary soul had been much swifter on her feet than I ]. Abuela and Mother would watch with dissimilar countenances; Mother's, berating but her lips — as best they could — resisted her scowl and curled into a minuscule smile. Reluctant, but present still. On the contrary, Abuela's visage held an effulgent, intended grin, her chest heaving with gleeful laughs chucking through her lips.

   The days generally contained Mother and Father parading my younger likeness and me before a throng of raucous people, their screams and hollers vehement and rather odious, much to my younger disliking. We'd always have these itchy circlets mounted upon our heads, their monetary worth made apparent through their immense weight. Etched into each of our crowns was a symbol; a cursive "x" with a single line swimming along its upper left stem. As I'd overlooked the all too familiar faces below me I'd acquired a tad of mediocre knowledge of my inhabitance; every Xenon native was cloaked in ice blue rags, each of their eyes imparting divergent tinctures of a soft azure, dainty emerald — much like my own —  or piercing grey-white —  in much semblance to my Abuela's. My creators' irises oddly harbored a fusion of the three pigments, offering a deep teal. 

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