I know I'm late and I'm really sorry, but I live in this lame excuse for a counrty which gives us 24/7 electricity and great internet connection. Mark my sarcasm. Anyway I understand if I am out of the competiton, but my internet went down and it would mean a lot to me if you just read it. I know you're busy but you promised your, and I quote, "Eternal love."
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As I tried to remove my finger from the red mess I call my hair which was twirled around it, I realized that eventhough my finger was stuck in there and it was hard for me to pull my finger out without pulling the hair strands, my situation was much worse.
I had spent the last six hours of my night trying to write a proper essay for my English assignment, but to no avail.
And to be honest, I had no idea which of the two represented my situation better; my now red finger suffocating from the all the tiny hair strands united together to form a noose around it, or the blank sheet of paper that had been mocking me for the past six hours.
"Write about something that happens everyday."
I thought that English teachers hated that word, "something" or "thing" or "stuff". And now I understand why. It's just so undefined, just like alphabet in mathematics and a shadow in a dark room. It also meant that a decision to choose between two undefined 'things' had to be made.
And let me tell you this, I stand for fifteen minutes in front of McDonald's just to choose the flavor of my McFlurry.
I sighed, rubbed my temples with my fingers and tried to filter my thoughts for the millionth time.
Think Madeleine think. Something that happens everyday. Photosynthesis? Something you can't live without, breathing?
I shook my head and let my hands fall down by my sides, then yelped quickly when my trapped finger, which I had obviously forgotten about, pulled my hair.
You aren't helping.
I got out of my chair and kept my finger close to my face, then I got down to the living room for inspiration.
I found my mother and father all cuddled up on the couch watching family videos. As soon as my mom saw me she hopped off the couch to save this damsel in distress while my father's eyes remained fixed on the screen.
"So ma cherie, how'z your assignment going eh?" Mom said as she was capable of un-knotting my hair strands and grooming my hair.
I shook my head and said, "Mom I don't know, I haven't come up with anything yet!"
Her eyebrows rose with her worry. "Um, did you call your friends?"
"No, they're busy thinking of something as well and I don't feel like listening to some nagging."
"Hey Maddie, look at how adorable you were when you were a baby!" My father pointed at screen displaying me 6 hours old and dad doing weird faces at me.
Remind me to burn that tape so they wouldn't display it on my wedding.
"Harry!" My mom shook her head smiling. She then looked at me, "Did you ask your brother?"
"I said I didn't want to hear some nagging." I replied frowning.
"How about your uncles?"
"Well the twins said that I could write about their daily awesome adventures with, and I quote, "making the world a better place". But I'd rather send a doodle of an elephant than writing that."
My mom's head slightly turned as if she was watching a documentary on bees.
So I continued, "And the others are busy. Elliot one's phone is off because she's studying for her collage finals and Elliot second isn't much of a help I guess."
"You know," Dad said, "Don't underestimate that American guy. He can have some wild ideas."
"Uncle Elliot? Isn't he as crazy as the twins but with a higher IQ level and a deeper side?" I shook my little head which was filled with wonder.
"You said it," My father winked at me, "a higher IQ level and a deeper side."
I wasn't sure of the idea really, I haven't spent much time with Uncle Elliot because he's often working, continuing his collage studies or doing whatever. But I guess it wouldn't harm checking on him or Aunt Ellie.
-
My father stopped the car in front of a tall building. I got out of the car and waved good bye to my father, then made my way up the sixth floor.
I knocked on the apartment's door three times, every five minutes but no body answered. This wasn't Aunt Ellie and Uncle Elliot's house, well it was their's but it was a second small apartment for collage studies or taking a stand after a small fight. But they spent most of their time in this cozy apartment than their actual home.
I was lost in my little world staring into the crimson color of the apartment door until a raspy voice guided me back to reality.
"Nice door isn't it?"
I looked at a tall man with messy hair and dark eyes, two times my age holding a bouquet of neat pink roses.
"Hey Uncle Elliot."
"Uncle Elliot?" He asked as he unlocked the door.
"Well you're like a brother for all the siblings of your wife and my dad. " I shrugged.
"Yeah but, Uncle Elliot? " He said in his same tone.
"Uncle E?"
"Nah that's like a rapper's name." He waved the bouquet.
"So what's the bouquet for?"
"Eliot" He said smiling warmly at the bouquet like it was Elliot herself.
"Why?" I said slowly when I could feel the grin on my face.
"Because it's our fifth marriage anniversary." He looked at me then at a picture of Elliot and him on their wedding day.
"But why pink? I thought Elliot hated pink." I questioned.
"She did but I was preparing for a surprise anniversary party." His height increases as he started standing on his tiptoes then his heels repeatedly.
"That's so sweet!" I smiled, "But knowing Elliot, she loathes pink!"
"I hope she wouldn't mind. I got them at the last minute from a flower shop." He started laughing.
"What's so funny?" I asked.
"Well the woman from the shop was Elliot's and my therapist from high school." He facepalmed.
"You guys needed a therapist? Not surprised." I smiled.
"Yes, and apparently she's still a therapist but runs a small flower shop two blocks from here. Now shoo, I need to bake a cake." He said quickly as he looked at his clock.
"A pink cake?" I said sarcastically as I was exiting the door.
"Ugh it would take a miracle to finish this!" He said without acknowledging my question.
"It would also take a miracle for Ellie to like pink!" I shouted as I closed the apartment door.
I got down the stairs, It was four in the afternoon on a cloudy Saturday but you could still see a bit of golden rays breaking the sky and emerging between the grey and blue clouds, giving the trees ahead different shades of green.
I slumped my shoulders and walked silently back home. Uncle Elliot wasn't much of a help since he was too busy preparing for his little surprise.
As I was walking down the street, a vintage green label rose ahead of me with "IT'S PelleGREENO." written in white, with addition to some flower textures.
It must be the place Uncle Elliot was talking about earlier. I thought to myself. It wouldn't hurt to learn about my weird paternal side of my family tree.
As soon as I entered the shop and the weird bell rang, the strong scent of incense and roses ignited my nostrils and I started coughing. I covered my nose and mouth with the sleeve of my blouse and I could feel the teardrops forming between my eyelids blurring my vision.
Out of no where, a tanned woman in her fifties appears, her curly brown hair with a strand of silver white was up in a large bun. She wore a long yellow-orange dress with a jean jacket. Large bracelets decorated her long thin hands which danced due to the warm pie she was carrying making the bracelets chime.
When she saw me, she put the pie down on the table beside her and smiled, then she tried to fist bump me as she greeted me. Her white teeth soon disappeared as her smile turned into a frown when she saw me suffocating, so she ran and got me some water.
I sat down on a chair when I felt something touch my foot. I looked down and saw a grey big fluff of a creature called a cat.
Great, cats. I'm allergic to those guardians of hell.
I drank the sweet tasting water quickly and looked at the weird woman who sat on the desk smiling.
"Pie?" She asked quickly.
I shook my head then looked around me. A neat flower shop which exploded with colors, from flowers with peach-like colors and sunflowers, to lavenders and midnight blue petals. All in all, it was breath taking.
"So how can I help ya?" The woman said with a smile that reminded me of that cat from Alice in Wonderland.
What should I tell her? I don't know? My uncle was here so I decided to come? Because I can move?
My answers crashed into my mouth all at once causing me to say the most brilliant answer ever.
"Is that a water fountain in the back?" I asked.
"Yes it is." She smiled at me.
"My uncle was here, he bought the pink roses." I tried to say something.
"Ah, so your uncle is Elliot Fintry?" She said calmly.
"No, he just has a tight relationship with my biological uncles, so he's like one to me." I nodded back as I repeated the same symphony for the billionth time.
"Aha," She nodded like a therapist. "How's his relationship with your aunt, the second Elliot?"
"They're married."
"Oh those two?! It's a miracle! They're bickering and fighting was so intense you'd think that Augustus Waters would come back to life rather than them getting married."
"But I'm not surprised." She then continued.
"That's contradicting, Miss..?" I asked the weird woman.
"Miss Pellegrino." She said. "And what is?"
"It's a miracle yet you're not surprised." I stated.
Her eyes brows rose then she smiled as she said slowly, "Miracles happen everyday."
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is obviously why this ex-therapist is now a gardener. She was probably accused of being crazy and she ran away and opened a flower shop.
She must've seen the look on my face, or even read my mind because she wanted to explain.
"Aren't you breathing right now?"
"I am."
"Did you know that The Queen of England is human?"
"I did."
"Then you do know that one of the trillion small capillaries supplying your muscles with blood and oxygen could just pop. Or you might've been born as The Queen of England because both of you come from human mother and father. Also, you could have got hit by a truck on your way here."
What?
"The sun could stop rising."
I raised my eyebrow at her.
"What holds the Earth and causes it to rotate and move in space when it's not suspended from a wire or on a gigantic table?"
"I don't know." I said.
"Well what would happen if that unknown source prevented the Earth from rotating?"
Where was she going with this?
"Or more importantly, why hasn't ot prevented it. How would life change if the brightest minds were stubborn enough to believe that the world was flat? Or if that little bird on a tree was shot?" She started moving her hands then stood up.
"How do birds always make it by spring? And how does the spider create it's home without getting stuck and more importantly, without being taught how to make it."
"I.. I don't know." I said breathlessly.
"Those are miracles, and they're happening everyday. With those cancer survivers or those plane travelers that had a safe flight. We are always, always, 99% at risk and the 1% also known as miracle is there. It always happens. It's just so common that we mistake it as normal!"
She was now walking back and fourth and talking about miracles so passionately that I found a 1% of sanity in what she said.
A 1% of sanity and a 1% miracle. Oh no..
"I mean you just don't see it do you. You're so blinded by the 'normal' stereotype that you don't see the magic around you. How you could have been a male or how the world could've ended now. It's like this; when a child of age 5 does something 'new' like drawing a good house, you woo and compliment him. You find it magnificent. But if a fifteen year old drew a good house, you wouldn't give him that much attention would you? Why? Because he's old now. Just like the Eclipse of the sun. Centuries ago it was new, so it was a miracle, but now it isn't because it happens periodically. But it's phenomenon still happens, that doesn't change the fact that it's a miracle does it? " She winked at me.
"I couldn't do this anymore, it was too much to grasp.
"I.. I need to go." I stood up and ran out of the flower shop and I could hear Miss Pellegrino shout, "What about your pie?"
I ran back home and thanked God that I wasn't hit by a truck, or a rock or that va tree didn't fall over me. Oh no Miss Pellegrino's words really did get to me didn't they?
Miracles huh? They happen everyday? That's something to write about for my English essay.
I was home now, and I as I entered our cozy home I thought about how it could be different if my dad got into jail or my mom left dad or if I didn't have a little brother to annoy the hell out of me everyday.
I smiled and ran up to my room quickly to jolt my ideas down for my assignment, but I could hear my father on the phone with someone.
I had no idea how to start my essay though, so I opened a story I found beside me. It was Paper Towns by John Green. I skimmed through it and landed on the first chapter.
“The way I figure it, everyone gets a miracle. Like, I will probably never be struck by lightening, or win a Nobel Prize, or become the dictator of a small nation in the Pacific Islands, or contract terminal ear cancer, or spontaneously combust. But if you consider all the unlikely things together, at least one of them will probably happen to each of us. I could have seen it rain frogs. I could have stepped foot on Mars. I could have been eaten by a whale. I could have married the Queen of England or survived months at sea. But my miracle was different. My miracle was this: out of all the houses in all the subdivisions in all of Florida, I ended up living next door to Margo Roth Spiegelman.”
I smiled, I guess I was going to write about miracles.
"Maddie! Elliot wants to talk to you." I heard father shout from down stairs.
I rushed down and grabbed the phone from dad.
"Hello?"
"Hey Maddie!"
"Uncle E, what's up?" I said nonchalantly.
"Elliot.''
"What about her?" I asked with concern.
"She loved the pink roses." And I swear that I could feel him smile from the other end of the phone.
I guess miracles do happen everyday.
-
I tried my best?