*Author's Note*
Hey there!
To any folks who may be rereading this: An explanation. So perhaps a month after I finished and published this story originally, I started fretting. I began to worry that things I had hinted at contextually had ultimately gotten left out of the story (remember, I wrote it in a weekend) to its detriment. And thus, I wasn't truly telling the story I had really wanted to. As this was a story written based on a film, I'd say some things got left on the cutting room floor. Add to that overall feeling, the fact that in the interim, I had also received some very valid and valuable critiques and I started to see this story as unfinished. I let it go originally, unsure what it would mean to readers and to myself to go back and edit it. (I write for an audience to read but for my own pleasure, after all). But after a while, I couldn't shake the feeling that there was more I needed to say but ironically, getting to the meat of what exactly I needed to add took weeks. In the end, what amounted to five additional chapters and a little tinkering in between, took nine or ten times (don't ask me for the real figure I'm flunking math currently) the time it took to write the majority of the original story. Still, I decided it was worth it. I really wanted to endeavor to write more in this universe and with this story. And now having done it, I feel much more comfortable in saying this is now a bit closer to the finished product I envisioned than the earlier version was.
Okay, now a little more housekeeping - Why am I rolling it out weekly instead of just releasing the whole thing at once as I did the last time? Well, that was my friend's idea actually. She seems to think that will help to digest the story better than a massive download. I'm not sure I see the difference but I'm gonna try it her way. I also decided to just repost the chapters rather than erasing the whole thing and republishing it because 1) I didn't want to lose my previous comments and 2) I didn't want anyone feeling confused or tricked into rereading an old story because FF sent them a new story notification. That wouldn't be cool.
Anyway, also a word of caution to the folks who have read this story already: It is NOT significantly changed. The additions and changes I made to this story do (to my way of thinking) address some of the comments that people made. But not all of them. And additionally, it may also not address them in exactly the way they were presented to me. So, if you didn't like the story before or how things played out, you still probably won't like it now (I suggest you save yourself the trouble) because I didn't change anything. I added things.
Now, to the folks reading this all for the first time, my apologies. I put my original author's note as the end note to this chapter. There you'll see the provenance of this story and what I was thinking of when I wrote it originally. If you are at all interested, I encourage you to check it out.
To everyone, I hope you enjoy my tale...and as always, feel free to comment if you feel so motivated.
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Michonne Marchand took a deep breath and held it.
One of the doors to the gallery stood open as an invitation but the frigid air that escaped from inside was actually more enticing. Michonne stood on the bottom step for a moment, hesitating. She looked up and down the street, watching the various city dwellers go about their Saturday afternoon adventures. This art gallery was more nondescript than the others that lined the street interspersed between ultra high-end fashion boutiques. A single large plate-glass window next to the door was adorned with a poster advertising the photographer. It was the same single picture she'd seen advertised over and over again as posted bills, and evidently, on subways all over the city. From the size of the gallery, however, Michonne guessed most of the exhibit's budget must have gone into those alone.
She pushed her sunglasses up off her face and peered through the dim doorway. The sun made it hard to make out what lay on the other side.
"It's okay," A voice said coming from behind her. "We're open. We're just putting the final finishing touches on everything but it's all in there."
Michonne turned and saw a young girl with a nearly white-blonde ponytail standing on the cobblestone sidewalk. The young woman smiled and squinted simultaneously without the benefit of her sunglasses which still hung on her dress neatly between her breasts. Her one open blue eye appraised Michonne.
She took one step up onto the old wooden steps and paused, clearly waiting to see if Michonne would choose to enter. Michonne stepped to the side to let her pass.
"Is the photographer in?" Michonne asked as the girl continued past her.
"Yep, should be. This is for him." She raised one of the two large iced coffees she held in both hands up to show.
"He tries to come in for at least a couple hours every day, but he should be in all afternoon in preparation for the opening tonight."
Michonne nodded as they changed places, with Michonne backing down the steps as the young woman ascended. They continued to regard each other: one with curiosity, the other with obvious wariness.
The young woman paused at the top of the stairs just at the threshold of the doorway. "Do you want me to get him?"
"Oh no, that's not necessary." Michonne was standing on the cobblestones again. The full glare of the sun forcing her to shield her eyes with a palm.
The young woman turned then to look at the photo in the window then back at Michonne. The beginnings of a smile curving the corners of her mouth.
"Do you want me to at least tell him you stopped by?"
Michonne looked again at the photo, seeing it for just a moment the way this young woman might have. As a simple, black and white photo of two girls on a dock. But just as quickly all the heartache and history that accompanied it returned.
"No, please." She pulled her sunglasses back down over her face as she turned away abruptly and headed down the street.
She was half a long block away the first time she heard her name. She hadn't heard his voice in twenty-something years but recognized it immediately, quickening her steps.
"Michonne!" He bellowed again over the ambient noises of the street. It was still distant but closer the second time.
Michonne hazarded a quick glance over her shoulder. One only fast enough to see a figure making his way toward her dodging pedestrians as he moved. She stepped into the street then, raising her arm and shaking her hand.
A yellow cab pulled up quickly and she pulled the door open with trembling hands.
"Drive please," She commanded. "I'll tell you where to go in a second. Just pull off, okay?"
The cabbie looked at her through the rearview mirror as well as further down the street and did as she requested as understanding came over his face.
"Where to, Miss?" He asked a full minute later as he turned off the small bumpy street and merged into the wide smooth avenue.
"Uptown please," Michonne sighed.
She pressed the button that lowered the window nearest her and leaned back settling deep into the seat behind her. She exhaled a breath she didn't realize she'd still been holding and closed her eyes as the thick, pungent city air blew into her face.
"C'mon, M&M Mars Bar, you have to! You promised!"
"I change my mind. I can," Michonne pouted, holding her shirt to her chest.
They stood huddled in the empty and vaguely damp football tunnel near the end of the field. The brass and percussion of the school's marching band along with enthusiastic clapping from the bleacher creatures filled the air increasing Michonne's anxiety. These were people she knew: parents, teachers, classmates, her bandmates even. In fact until last semester, she had been one of the school's best woodwinds.
Suddenly, she didn't even know why she had ever wanted to do this to begin with.
"No. No. We've been talking about this for three years!" Her friend Lori Robertson pressed her.
"Choney's a chicken. Always has been," Her little sister, Sasha chimed in then like the stray member of a Greek chorus.
Michonne and Lori both turned and looked at the girl leaned against the opposite wall. It was the first thing she'd said in minutes as she gnawed at a long piece of sour straw candy and glared right back. For some reason, at only fifteen, Sasha had already managed the disaffection of someone twice her age. At the time, Sasha had been uncharacteristically and easily agreeable to tagging along to hold their clothes and act as moral support for their little act of teenage rebellion. It made sense to Michonne since it was the sort of thing that was normally right up Sasha's alley. If there was one of them adding to the gray hairs on their father's head, it would never have been Michonne. But to look at her now, Sasha seemed as if she would be just as content if they did nothing at all and she could spend the rest of the afternoon merely heckling them for their cowardice.
It was just the small push Michonne required. She gritted her teeth and fired her shirt at Sasha's face. Her bra following closely behind it. Sasha pulled them off her head revealing a large smile and the sour straw still dangling from the corner of her mouth.
"Attagirl!" Lori said cheering and hopping on one foot to tug her jeans off each leg. "C'mon, halftime is nearly over."
Michonne shivered despite the blazing sun that waited to greet them at the end of the dark tunnel. Sasha bent down and pulled two glittery tinsel wigs out of their brown shopping bag.
"Here, don't forget your disguises, Batman," Sasha deadpanned, throwing each girl a tube of colored greasepaint.
Michonne held her nose against the turpentine odor of the bright purple paint as she rubbed it into her face, then she watched as Lori gleefully smeared the complimentary gold makeup across her own. After they'd applied the paint generously, Sasha affixed the wig of the opposite color onto their heads as they wiped their hands clean with a heavy-duty rag they'd swiped from Mr. Marchand's auto-body shop.
Sasha stepped back, then wolf-whistled. "Looks surprisingly good."
"GO SPARTANS!" Lori clapped then threw up her hands and jumped into a high split before stopping with a gasp.
Michonne averted her gaze to avoid an eyeful as she held one arm primly across her top and covered her crotch with her other hand.
"My boobs!"
"Feel a little different without the bra?" Michonne snickered teasing the cheerleader.
She couldn't believe how excited Lori still was to do this crazy thing. Michonne had a hard time remembering why she had been so obsessed with this for so many years. Although, she could admit, up until she'd had breakfast that morning she had still been too. What a difference a couple hours made.
"Ow!" Lori cried, crossing her arms and cupping a breast in each palm. "I'm fully offended by that!"
"You should be. That was a lousy toe-touch," Sasha added seemingly more offended by Lori's poor form than her stark nudity.
Michonne rolled her eyes but smiled at the glimpse of old Sasha that continued to peek through her more recent jaded alienation. For a while, it seemed as if the perennially jovial captain of the local junior high school's cheer squad had disappeared forever when their mother moved out for good.
Lori grabbed Michonne suddenly then pulling her toward the light, "You ready, Mars Bar?"
Michonne shook her head struggling to maintain her modesty as Lori gripped her arm.
Lori stopped and stood in front of her, nearly nose to nose, so close the shaggy foil tips of her wig tickled Michonne's face. Lori rubbed her arms up and down where they shook uncontrollably.
"Yes, yes you are. In three months, you are out of this town. NYU, here you come! This is it, M&M, the last chance to make your mark! The last chance to be known for more than just being the Valedictorian. Trust me: no one will ever forget this!"
"Yeah, 'cuz we'll be laughingstocks."
"We'll be legends!" Lori said pulling her along toward the light.
"Maybe a bit of both," Sasha appended, straggling behind with all their stuff.
"Enough from the peanut gallery," Lori warned turning her head slightly Sasha's way before returning to Michonne with a maniacal fervor in her eyes.
"What about you? You still have another year here. What–"
"Are you kidding me? I'm gonna live on the notoriety! I bet you, I don't pay for another burger for the rest of the year!"
"She already doesn't," Sasha added and then shrugged when they both shot her daggers.
It was true, Michonne knew it. Tall and lithe with gorgeous long wavy raven locks, Lori was the epitome of a small-town beauty. Then also funny and gregarious, popular and always down to have a good time, she and Michonne had always been polar opposites. Their relationship a local oddity that Lori liked to say was fated because opposites attracted. But Michonne knew the truth, their lifelong friendship was merely an accident of circumstance and geography. Two girls whose backyards dead-ended onto one another with parents too busy or distracted or disinterested to construct a proper fence between them. Their friendship had grown over the years through a neglected chain-link fence and bloomed in the sunshine of the hot and hazy Georgia summers, where the only escape was through it and to the nearby lake. By the time high school came along, the girls were inseparable, in each others' homes nearly as much as they were inside their own, with their families utterly intertwined as well.
"No one will ever look at us the same way ever again!" Lori took a deep breath and encouraged Michonne to do the same.
"That's my fear."
"Are we mice or are we men?" Lori urged, and improbably her enthusiasm was beginning to permeate the layers of Michonne's reserve, as always. They began a slow jog up toward the mouth of the tunnel. The squeaky sound of their tennis shoes, the only clothing on their bodies, echoed as they went, competing with the sounds of the school fight song that grew louder as they neared the end.
"We're women!" Michonne looked at her friend, terrified.
"Uh, okay, girl." Lori hesitated a second before regaining her metaphor. "THAT'S RIGHT! WE'RE WOMEN! LET'S DO IT!"
Lori reared back and screamed, something almost primal tearing from her throat. Michonne's eyes widened in shock. A second later, Sasha joined in from behind them dropping the shopping bag and rearing back like a beast up on its hind legs. Michonne had no choice but to join them as her heart thundered somewhere near her throat.
"LEEEET'S DOO IIITT!" Lori screamed as she and her best friend charged the field, arms raised and as naked as the day they were born.
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*End Note*
So, this was the original author's note. Stuck to the bottom for posterity. Read on, if you must...
Hey Everybody! Okay, bear with me. Currently, I'm living one of my personal authorial nightmares. I'm pulling my own personal George R.R. Martin. I'm leaving my magnum opus undone to tackle random side projects! In fairness to myself (and George RR, I guess) this isn't something I looked for. It certainly isn't something I planned for. Unlike other times when I've dabbled with other story ideas to jump start my process, this just came to me not as a writing exercise but as a story that wanted telling. It came to me fairly fully-formed (for a couple of reasons) and it only took me a long weekend to write. So, woo-hoo! It's actually a complete work. Unlike previously when I've rolled this out day by day (or week by week) I don't feel like doing that. I'm finished so you might as well get to read it all in one sitting if you want. It means fewer comments* from you guys but I think greater satisfaction otherwise.
Anyway, as always I gotta explain myself. So like OLLA, this isn't an original idea from me. This time, the inspiration bug bit me while watching this little indie film from 2013 called Very Good Girls (see what I did there?). It's a sweet(ish) coming of age story about two teenage girls with a cute (but ultimately kinda unfortunate) romance thrown in. And there is also an unexpected TWD connection. The movie was produced by Gale Ann Hurd! I'll admit initially I went into the film with no expectations other than that I had wanted to see for a while but somehow had never managed it. However, as I watched, this whole Richonne tale spun out before me and basically screamed: "C'mon, you lazy b #$% get writing!" That now said, I will freely admit that I borrowed heavily from my source material, including the dialogue. But I would argue that my story can still stand alone even if you went off and watched the movie and recognized some of the basic elements. (You can tell me if I'm wrong). Other than that source, and as always, The Walking Dead, I claim no others sources of inspiration. (Sorry to anyone who finds this reminiscent of some other thing they've read— it is entirely unintentional). That's it. That's all. Bear in mind, I basically wrote this over the weekend so pardon any typos and spelling errors (they will slowly be attended to as I encounter them) ...And Enjoy!
*As always feedback is appreciated though!