Le tonnere is "the thunder" in French. :) A thousand thank yous and I hope you enjoy.
-bows-
-S
I love him not.
The petal drifts to kiss the ground around her perfectly bent knees amongst the perfectly strewn petals that made the same descent at the same leisurely pace moments and minutes and hours before. She bites a perfectly red lip and sends two perfectly tapered fingers to seek another bloom in all the thorns (it is no rose bush, to be sure.) She recognizes- I love him not- that she is an adult- I love him- and that she should be more than capable of answering silly questions like this without the assistance of flowers- I love him not- and yet- I… love him- she finds herself here-… I love him not.
She parts her lips in a perfect sigh, a perfect gust of a perfect frustration.
She is beautiful, even in her anger, and this is what she finds so frustrating. That and he liked sweets, he loved sweets, and it has never made sense to her where the attraction came from, how could ugly wed sweet, it was not normal, it was not in the order of things, it was not proper and proper was everything or nothing- the sky was grey.
Perfectly grey.
I love him- And it wasn't even outside-ugly (which has always mattered the most anyways), but it was outside-ugly and inside-ugly, more like inside-twisted, atrocious, nasty, repulsive, disgusting, revolting- but, then, weren't they all? Prime examples, if ever there were.
Perfect examples.
I love him not- But sweets, of all the things, sweets… she liked sweets, didn't she, hadn't she?, she loved them, or loves them or whatever it is these days, if these flower petals raining down really could be called days, if the flecks of scarlet around her perfect knees could really be called petals because he, after all, loved sweets and so does she, very much, very, very much, very, very, very- the clouds look heavy. They look heavy like a mother ready to give birth.
A perfect mother.
I love him- Yet there is something not quite right about it all, and that is what's really unfair, that it cannot be proper like she wants everything to be, that it cannot be perfect because he was not perfect and they are closer than she'd like them to be in their farness because of things she cannot control and it is all a long stream of can and not, can and not- Can. But not.
A perfect knot.
I love him not- Sometimes she sees it in the mirror, her insides, her heaviness- the things that lie beneath her perfect breast and perfect skin and perfect bone- her imperfection. And she thinks that all that, the fatherless child of lust, is more beautiful than any god-damned perfection and when she lies in twisted sheets, with perfect white outside-beauty and every ounce of her inside-ugly, twisted, atrocious, nasty, repulsive, disgusting, revolting, she finds herself thinking of an angry brother and wondering if those ugly eyes ever saw what rage really looked like, ever saw beneath her perfect breast and perfect skin and perfect bone.
If the man who loved sweets ever knew there was someone just as inside-ugly as he who liked them too, very much.
Very.
Very.
Much.
I… love him..- God-damned perfect flowers.- I love him not…
The petal drifts to kiss the ground around her perfectly bent knees amongst the perfectly strewn petals that made the descent at the same leisurely pace moments and minutes and hours before.
But this time it is knocked off its path, knocked to the ground by a drop.
And soon her lap is wet with the element of outside-beauty, inside-ugly: her element, so she isn't really wet at all. A thousand mothers are crying because their precious burdens died inside them, just like hers, and she smiles a bit because things are finally getting fair, finally getting proper.
Perfectly proper (just like she likes them).
She is the rain. And she is alone in a puddle of petals with a thorn bush and a sore ass from sitting too long.
But she is alone. No one will help her to her feet, no perfect gentleman for a perfect lady, and she can and not get up without a hand because she wants to drown with the other petals- plucked off perfection- and never eat sweets again even though she likes them very much, very, very much, very, very, very-
There is the thunder.
It jars her to her feet and the answer. She touches a perfectly red lip and sends two perfectly tapered fingers to seek a bloom in all the blooms.
I love him-
She smiles a bit because her perfect gentleman came after all.
I love him not-
He is the thunder-
I loved him.