lipstick kisses
Angelina started wearing lipstick after the war. She said it reminded her of her mother, whose lipstick kisses and sunshine smiles were gone too soon.
She simply strolled into George's life and threw open the curtains, bringing in traces of sunshine with every painted smile. Her smiles were brighter after the war, as if she'd been reminded of everything worth smiling for.
Dark lips for dressing up her melancholy, red lips for standing up straight, purple lips for mischief. Lipstick for every occasion. In the mornings, she tests the shades on the inside of her wrist and gives ghosts kisses while putting it on.
He told her once that she looked beautiful naked, lips and all. Angelina laughed and traced his jawline with one long finger and didn't answer. Her lips may kiss him, but they'll always belong to her. Lipstick isn't anything that he can understand. It's art and love and family and something she can't quite put her finger on.
The first night they'd drunkenly made not-quite-love, George woke up with plum colored kisses on his lips and jaw and neck. He washed them off with soap and water because it would be quicker with magic and he wanted to savor every trace of her.
She left kisses everywhere, placeholders for her smiles. On babies' cheeks, on shirt collars when she hugged too hard, on pillowcases when she fell asleep exhausted in her work clothes. She told him she liked it- leaving pieces of herself wherever she went. A form of temporary immortality, a reminder that she was still alive, living and loving.
He collected her kisses, on napkins and cup rims and skin. His mind was filled with Angelina kisses, coral and fuchsia and magenta and cherry. George needed that. He needed a girl whose kisses stayed when she was gone. A girl whose kisses were always changing, but whose smile always stayed the same.