i'm not gonna bother with excuses for why this came out roughly a month later than it was supposed to -_-' i'll just say that once again, i hated ending the chapter this way and was hoping to present you guys with more, but my muse has failed to get me to sit down and actually write. so here is part 4. i think. yeah, this is part 4.
i have never, nor WILL i ever, own the ppg. but then again. . . nah.
btw, i haven't said this before, but thank you to everyone who reads & reviews this little piece of junk. it really means a lot to me to get such positive reviews, even if i'm not so positive about the piece and don't necessarily AGREE w/the reviews myself ^^; so thanks to all youse guys. currently in san antonio, and i know some of you guys have me on your aim, so don't expect me on till. . . um, july 27 *coughcough* thank you again to everyone who reviews, i love you people :)
*currently counting down the days till the ppg movie comes out. . . fearing she shall spontaneously combust before it actually does @_@*
-jen
*A Skirt for Sunday Evening* pt. IV
~-songbirdjen-~
"I hate how my lips always chap during this time of year," I grumble, trying to steer the direction of the conversation away from my hair. Kris with a 'K' hadn't skipped out on his creative juices when he had set his hands on my tousled mane. I mean, the hairstyle was simple enough: my hair had been pulled back into two buns on the top of either side of my head, with stray strands strategically strewn (that's alliteration, folks) about carelessly. And my hair had been parted in such a way that my bangs appeared to hang down past my chin, when in reality they barely brushed my eyes. Kris had wrapped and tucked most of it into the two buns, with two sole strands hanging on either side of my face.
I don't care much for it; to be quite frank, it was difficult to keep myself from screwing up my face and pointedly saying I looked like a skewered anime chick out of Sailor Moon (I shudder to think). I don't like having to keep brushing the strands out of my eyes, my neck feels bare and naked, and I'm pretty sure that at least one of the million pins that has been shoved into my head is securely lodged in my brain.
Butch, of course, adores it.
"Thus your look of femininity is made ultimately complete," he had said with a grin as we walked out into the mall. Frustrated, I'd asked how much the idiot had had to fork over for my new 'do,' to which he had replied, "You're not supposed to ask how much a gift costs; it's rude."
"Well, I never wanted this 'GIFT' in the first place, so I think I have an obligation to know," I snapped.
"Did you happen to catch what shampoo he used?"
". . . What?! What kind of crazy question--"
And he leaned in to the nape of my neck, inhaled, and whispered, "It smells nice."
A period of awkward silence followed, at least for me. Butch only continued his careless gait, completely oblivious to the fact my heart was jammed in my throat.
***
That brings us to now. It was at this point I chose to comment on the physical state of my lips. It's a stupid thing to say, yes, but anything was better than not saying a word at all.
"Well, don't you use chapstick?" Butch asks.
I snort. "I don't like applying foreign objects to my skin, or don't you remember?"
"But you don't want your skin splitting and bleeding because you're too stubborn to treat it. Hey, let's stop in here for a minute." He veers off into a Bath and Body Works store before I can protest, and I reluctantly follow, trying not to inhale as I walk in. With as many fragrances as this piled into one store, I imagine half of the chemicals/ingredients are hazardous to my health and toxic.
I already know what Butch plans on doing and can't help but smile (despite the lack of adequate oxygen I'm getting at the moment) as he walks up to the front desk, leans on the counter, and asks the store clerk, "Say, do you have any bottles of Honeydew Pearberry Star Fruit--"
"--Kiwi Passion Delight Splash?" I finish for him.
He turns and flashes a gratifying smile at me while the clerk blinks and stammers, "I-I'm sorry, could you repeat that?"
"Honeydew Pearberry Star Fruit Kiwi Passion Delight Splash," Butch responds, slowly and deliberately. He's always had a great mind for remembering things.
I chime in, playing the ridiculously stereotypical lost little damsel in distress. "I received it from a friend of mine for my birthday a few months ago and fell in love with it, but I finished it off last week. Is it possible you have any in stock at the moment? I didn't see it on your display cases." I pout and dumbly twirl a strand of hair, Butch doing his best not to snicker at my horrendously accurate depiction of your typical idiotic female (no offense, ladies).
I'm finding it hard not to laugh myself as her eyes shoot back between me and Butch, and finally states, with much hesitation, "I guess I could go and check, but I seriously doubt--"
"Thank you," Butch interrupts. "Buttercup, why don't you look over the display cases again while our friend--" he takes this time to peer at the clerk's name tag "--Michelle here checks their stock in back."
"Can do." I step away from the counter and proceed to walk around feigning concentration on each and every label on the shelves as Michelle reluctantly goes through a back door and Butch starts fiddling around with random items on the counter. I idly hum to myself, hearing off in the not too far distance a couple of girls arguing over which out of twenty different scents is paramount to the rest.
"Country Apple's better than Peach, but not as good as Honeysuckle."
"Nuh-uh! Honeysuckle's worse than Cucumber Melon, which is better than Freesia but not as pretty as Lilac, which is WAY nicer smelling than Country Apple."
"Oh, PLEASE!"
"Fine then, I'll prove it! Say, lady--"
And horror of horrors, I feel a tap on my arm and look down to see two preteen girls with armfuls of body splash and lotions, gazing up at me expectantly.
"Could you tell us which one smells better to you?"
Before I can reply one of them shoves a wrist in my face, standing on their tiptoes. "This is tangerine spice."
I open my mouth to ask as civilly as I possibly can for her to please remove her hand from my face or else I shall remove it from her body when just as suddenly her friend shoves HER own wrist into my face too. "And this is Watermelon."
"And here on the back of my hand is Juniper Breeze."
"And this one's Rainwater."
"Oooh, smell this one, it's Vanilla Bean."
Now the only thing keeping me from physically harming them is the fact that the poisonous fumes have invaded my senses and my head is swimming because I'm finding it difficult to breathe. And all the while they continue to take turns (or not) worsening my condition, oblivious to the fact that I can't tell a single difference between Daffodil Summer and Ginger Olive and Cinnamon Tea.
"Oh, for crying out loud!" I finally snap in frustration, my face contorting into one of pain and disbelief. "They all smell THE SAME!!"
The two girls stop giving me fragrances to sample, look at me, then at each other. "Um, yeah, okay--" says one girl "--but which one smells BETTER?"
I grit my teeth and move, quite deliberately, to strangle them with my bare hands, when Butch takes me by the elbow and says, "Well, I've had my fun. Let's go grab some lunch. Good day, ladies." He nods at my attackers, winks, then escorts me out the store and in the direction of the food court.
Having yet to recover from 'Attack Mode,' I blink in mild confusion for a moment. Behind me I hear what sounds like a large number of bottles and tubes of body splash and lotion dropping to the floor, followed by a few gasps, then an excited voice squealing, "Omigosh! Did you SEE that? That guy was SOOOOO hot!!!"
***
"Oh, before I forget," Butch starts after a momentary stint of amusement (it was difficult for anyone within a five-mile radius of the store we were just in NOT to hear those two girls going on about how incredibly 'hot' Butch was), "I picked up something for you."
My head snaps to attention in shock. "Whaddya MEAN, picked UP something? From THAT wretched place?"
"I didn't klepto it, if THAT'S what you MEAN," Butch says, mocking my emphasis on words. "Paid for all $2.39 of it. Highway robbery, I swear." He reaches into his shirt pocket and tosses something into the air toward me, which I catch in my right hand. A tube of coconut lip balm. "That way your lips won't be so chapped. Try it out."
I stare at him in exasperation. "How do you expect me to put this on?"
He stops and turns around, a look of disbelief on his face. "You mean to tell me you don't know how to apply chapstick?!"
"Okay, first of all, this isn't chapstick: it's LIP BALM." I point at the label. "And no, I've NEVER worn this kind of stuff before in my life; what makes you think I'll start now?" I wave the little tube around in the air, adding to the complete and total idiocy of this entire conversation.
"Well, reason ONE," he answers, turning his back to me and starting to walk again, "your lips won't get so dry if you apply it daily, and besides, I thought you liked coconut."
I stay put, staring at the back of his head. "I hate coconut, I hate makeup--"
"It's NOT makeup, Buttercup--"
"--AND I can't even put this stuff on in the first place--"
"Oh, for Christ's sake!" Butch whirls around, walks toward me, plucks the tube out of my hands, uncaps it, and takes my chin in his hand, the lip balm in his other.
"What--"
"Hold it, don't move," Butch commands, and with a quick twist of the bottom dial, turns the applicant toward me and begins to smooth the balm over my lips.
I freeze.
My widened eyes dart around in panic, my heartbeat quickens furiously, and the spot on my chin where Butch is gently grasping and lifting towards him is starting to tingle and burn. Stunned, my eyes finally rest and focus on his face. The tip of his tongue is sticking out of the side of his mouth in concentration, and his eyes, half-closed, follow the path of chapstick he applies to first my lower lip, then my upper.
My face is starting to redden as I watch him. I can barely detect the faint flavor of coconut on my tongue and try to focus on that instead.
"Now," he says, removing the applicator from my mouth and recapping it, "smack your lips together like this." And he runs his tongue briefly over his own lips and demonstrates for me. I obediently comply. I can't say anything else at the moment anyway. "Perfect," he says softly, rubbing at the corner of my mouth. He drops the tube back into his shirt pocket. "I'll hold on to this for you for right now." With a quick flash of his genuine smile (my heart jams itself in my throat again) he turns and says over his shoulder as he walks, "And I'm sorry you hate coconut."
I subconsciously run my tongue lightly over my lips. "I USED to hate coconut," I whisper to myself before I take his lead and follow him to the food court.
*end pt. IV*
um. . . yeah. there was supposed to be more. but there kinda isn't at the moment. i've been attacked with two other writing bugs, possibly three, and they all scream "WRITE ME OR I KILL YOU"
. . . ok, maybe not that, but inspiration for this story is at a standstill at the moment *don't kill me* but since i already have it semi-mapped out in my ridiculously small mass of grey matter we'll see. hold tight. it'll come! i swear!
ff.net was down when i originally wanted to post this, and i was going into fic withdrawal O_o let's give a big hand to the ff.net staff for doing all the funky upgrading stuff they did; without them the site would not. . . um, be. . . here. *looks around stupidly* EVERYONE APPLAUD!!!
love ff.net, love it's staffers, and love mah readers, who have a tendency to love my stories no matter how much i might NOT love them myself ^^; it's just one big worldah love with me XD
now i'm going to go sit alone in a corner of a dark room and count the days until the ppg movie comes out, meanwhile grasping my sanity like i grasp the rag i killed the elephant with. . . @_*
i have never, nor WILL i ever, own the ppg. but then again. . . nah.
btw, i haven't said this before, but thank you to everyone who reads & reviews this little piece of junk. it really means a lot to me to get such positive reviews, even if i'm not so positive about the piece and don't necessarily AGREE w/the reviews myself ^^; so thanks to all youse guys. currently in san antonio, and i know some of you guys have me on your aim, so don't expect me on till. . . um, july 27 *coughcough* thank you again to everyone who reviews, i love you people :)
*currently counting down the days till the ppg movie comes out. . . fearing she shall spontaneously combust before it actually does @_@*
-jen
*A Skirt for Sunday Evening* pt. IV
~-songbirdjen-~
"I hate how my lips always chap during this time of year," I grumble, trying to steer the direction of the conversation away from my hair. Kris with a 'K' hadn't skipped out on his creative juices when he had set his hands on my tousled mane. I mean, the hairstyle was simple enough: my hair had been pulled back into two buns on the top of either side of my head, with stray strands strategically strewn (that's alliteration, folks) about carelessly. And my hair had been parted in such a way that my bangs appeared to hang down past my chin, when in reality they barely brushed my eyes. Kris had wrapped and tucked most of it into the two buns, with two sole strands hanging on either side of my face.
I don't care much for it; to be quite frank, it was difficult to keep myself from screwing up my face and pointedly saying I looked like a skewered anime chick out of Sailor Moon (I shudder to think). I don't like having to keep brushing the strands out of my eyes, my neck feels bare and naked, and I'm pretty sure that at least one of the million pins that has been shoved into my head is securely lodged in my brain.
Butch, of course, adores it.
"Thus your look of femininity is made ultimately complete," he had said with a grin as we walked out into the mall. Frustrated, I'd asked how much the idiot had had to fork over for my new 'do,' to which he had replied, "You're not supposed to ask how much a gift costs; it's rude."
"Well, I never wanted this 'GIFT' in the first place, so I think I have an obligation to know," I snapped.
"Did you happen to catch what shampoo he used?"
". . . What?! What kind of crazy question--"
And he leaned in to the nape of my neck, inhaled, and whispered, "It smells nice."
A period of awkward silence followed, at least for me. Butch only continued his careless gait, completely oblivious to the fact my heart was jammed in my throat.
***
That brings us to now. It was at this point I chose to comment on the physical state of my lips. It's a stupid thing to say, yes, but anything was better than not saying a word at all.
"Well, don't you use chapstick?" Butch asks.
I snort. "I don't like applying foreign objects to my skin, or don't you remember?"
"But you don't want your skin splitting and bleeding because you're too stubborn to treat it. Hey, let's stop in here for a minute." He veers off into a Bath and Body Works store before I can protest, and I reluctantly follow, trying not to inhale as I walk in. With as many fragrances as this piled into one store, I imagine half of the chemicals/ingredients are hazardous to my health and toxic.
I already know what Butch plans on doing and can't help but smile (despite the lack of adequate oxygen I'm getting at the moment) as he walks up to the front desk, leans on the counter, and asks the store clerk, "Say, do you have any bottles of Honeydew Pearberry Star Fruit--"
"--Kiwi Passion Delight Splash?" I finish for him.
He turns and flashes a gratifying smile at me while the clerk blinks and stammers, "I-I'm sorry, could you repeat that?"
"Honeydew Pearberry Star Fruit Kiwi Passion Delight Splash," Butch responds, slowly and deliberately. He's always had a great mind for remembering things.
I chime in, playing the ridiculously stereotypical lost little damsel in distress. "I received it from a friend of mine for my birthday a few months ago and fell in love with it, but I finished it off last week. Is it possible you have any in stock at the moment? I didn't see it on your display cases." I pout and dumbly twirl a strand of hair, Butch doing his best not to snicker at my horrendously accurate depiction of your typical idiotic female (no offense, ladies).
I'm finding it hard not to laugh myself as her eyes shoot back between me and Butch, and finally states, with much hesitation, "I guess I could go and check, but I seriously doubt--"
"Thank you," Butch interrupts. "Buttercup, why don't you look over the display cases again while our friend--" he takes this time to peer at the clerk's name tag "--Michelle here checks their stock in back."
"Can do." I step away from the counter and proceed to walk around feigning concentration on each and every label on the shelves as Michelle reluctantly goes through a back door and Butch starts fiddling around with random items on the counter. I idly hum to myself, hearing off in the not too far distance a couple of girls arguing over which out of twenty different scents is paramount to the rest.
"Country Apple's better than Peach, but not as good as Honeysuckle."
"Nuh-uh! Honeysuckle's worse than Cucumber Melon, which is better than Freesia but not as pretty as Lilac, which is WAY nicer smelling than Country Apple."
"Oh, PLEASE!"
"Fine then, I'll prove it! Say, lady--"
And horror of horrors, I feel a tap on my arm and look down to see two preteen girls with armfuls of body splash and lotions, gazing up at me expectantly.
"Could you tell us which one smells better to you?"
Before I can reply one of them shoves a wrist in my face, standing on their tiptoes. "This is tangerine spice."
I open my mouth to ask as civilly as I possibly can for her to please remove her hand from my face or else I shall remove it from her body when just as suddenly her friend shoves HER own wrist into my face too. "And this is Watermelon."
"And here on the back of my hand is Juniper Breeze."
"And this one's Rainwater."
"Oooh, smell this one, it's Vanilla Bean."
Now the only thing keeping me from physically harming them is the fact that the poisonous fumes have invaded my senses and my head is swimming because I'm finding it difficult to breathe. And all the while they continue to take turns (or not) worsening my condition, oblivious to the fact that I can't tell a single difference between Daffodil Summer and Ginger Olive and Cinnamon Tea.
"Oh, for crying out loud!" I finally snap in frustration, my face contorting into one of pain and disbelief. "They all smell THE SAME!!"
The two girls stop giving me fragrances to sample, look at me, then at each other. "Um, yeah, okay--" says one girl "--but which one smells BETTER?"
I grit my teeth and move, quite deliberately, to strangle them with my bare hands, when Butch takes me by the elbow and says, "Well, I've had my fun. Let's go grab some lunch. Good day, ladies." He nods at my attackers, winks, then escorts me out the store and in the direction of the food court.
Having yet to recover from 'Attack Mode,' I blink in mild confusion for a moment. Behind me I hear what sounds like a large number of bottles and tubes of body splash and lotion dropping to the floor, followed by a few gasps, then an excited voice squealing, "Omigosh! Did you SEE that? That guy was SOOOOO hot!!!"
***
"Oh, before I forget," Butch starts after a momentary stint of amusement (it was difficult for anyone within a five-mile radius of the store we were just in NOT to hear those two girls going on about how incredibly 'hot' Butch was), "I picked up something for you."
My head snaps to attention in shock. "Whaddya MEAN, picked UP something? From THAT wretched place?"
"I didn't klepto it, if THAT'S what you MEAN," Butch says, mocking my emphasis on words. "Paid for all $2.39 of it. Highway robbery, I swear." He reaches into his shirt pocket and tosses something into the air toward me, which I catch in my right hand. A tube of coconut lip balm. "That way your lips won't be so chapped. Try it out."
I stare at him in exasperation. "How do you expect me to put this on?"
He stops and turns around, a look of disbelief on his face. "You mean to tell me you don't know how to apply chapstick?!"
"Okay, first of all, this isn't chapstick: it's LIP BALM." I point at the label. "And no, I've NEVER worn this kind of stuff before in my life; what makes you think I'll start now?" I wave the little tube around in the air, adding to the complete and total idiocy of this entire conversation.
"Well, reason ONE," he answers, turning his back to me and starting to walk again, "your lips won't get so dry if you apply it daily, and besides, I thought you liked coconut."
I stay put, staring at the back of his head. "I hate coconut, I hate makeup--"
"It's NOT makeup, Buttercup--"
"--AND I can't even put this stuff on in the first place--"
"Oh, for Christ's sake!" Butch whirls around, walks toward me, plucks the tube out of my hands, uncaps it, and takes my chin in his hand, the lip balm in his other.
"What--"
"Hold it, don't move," Butch commands, and with a quick twist of the bottom dial, turns the applicant toward me and begins to smooth the balm over my lips.
I freeze.
My widened eyes dart around in panic, my heartbeat quickens furiously, and the spot on my chin where Butch is gently grasping and lifting towards him is starting to tingle and burn. Stunned, my eyes finally rest and focus on his face. The tip of his tongue is sticking out of the side of his mouth in concentration, and his eyes, half-closed, follow the path of chapstick he applies to first my lower lip, then my upper.
My face is starting to redden as I watch him. I can barely detect the faint flavor of coconut on my tongue and try to focus on that instead.
"Now," he says, removing the applicator from my mouth and recapping it, "smack your lips together like this." And he runs his tongue briefly over his own lips and demonstrates for me. I obediently comply. I can't say anything else at the moment anyway. "Perfect," he says softly, rubbing at the corner of my mouth. He drops the tube back into his shirt pocket. "I'll hold on to this for you for right now." With a quick flash of his genuine smile (my heart jams itself in my throat again) he turns and says over his shoulder as he walks, "And I'm sorry you hate coconut."
I subconsciously run my tongue lightly over my lips. "I USED to hate coconut," I whisper to myself before I take his lead and follow him to the food court.
*end pt. IV*
um. . . yeah. there was supposed to be more. but there kinda isn't at the moment. i've been attacked with two other writing bugs, possibly three, and they all scream "WRITE ME OR I KILL YOU"
. . . ok, maybe not that, but inspiration for this story is at a standstill at the moment *don't kill me* but since i already have it semi-mapped out in my ridiculously small mass of grey matter we'll see. hold tight. it'll come! i swear!
ff.net was down when i originally wanted to post this, and i was going into fic withdrawal O_o let's give a big hand to the ff.net staff for doing all the funky upgrading stuff they did; without them the site would not. . . um, be. . . here. *looks around stupidly* EVERYONE APPLAUD!!!
love ff.net, love it's staffers, and love mah readers, who have a tendency to love my stories no matter how much i might NOT love them myself ^^; it's just one big worldah love with me XD
now i'm going to go sit alone in a corner of a dark room and count the days until the ppg movie comes out, meanwhile grasping my sanity like i grasp the rag i killed the elephant with. . . @_*