Yet another one-shot character piece.
Disclaimer: This fanfiction story is written solely for the entertainment of the readers and is not for profit. This one time, at band camp. No infringement on its copyright are intended by the author in any way, shape or form.
Silk and Skin
Swifty's earliest memories are of skin and silk. When he thinks back hard enough, he can see them, smell them, almost touch them. He can hear the sound of silk rustling like tissue paper, rumpled delicately, draped and embroidered just so. And he can feel the cool of his mother's hand against his cheek, her long fingers wrapped around a cup of tea still to hot to drink. He always drank the tea before it cooled anyway.
He knows where he came from. The memories tell him all he needs to know. He can remember so many scandalously slit dresses and bare backs, so many pale faces colored with dark makeup and shadows.
He has other memories of skin too. Silk and skin. The two are inextricable in his mind. Sometimes he remembers watching his mother prepare herself for the night. By day she worked as a seamstress, the elaborate designs of her own robes making their way onto the fanciest dresses for those who could pay. And by night she worked on the streets, giving herself away, silk skin and all, to those who could afford her.
Swifty likes to think that his mother had been expensive, when he thinks about her at all.
He's never met his father. He doubts that his mother even knew who he was. At times, in fact, Swifty isn't sure if she really was his mother. There were other women, there must have been eight or nine, who lived and worked nearby – maybe even in the same apartment; that's where the memories fragment and blow away. They all cared for him, all the women who could've been his mother. They fed him when there was food, and they kept him close to home, and they let him run his hands over their silks.
Sometimes Swifty wakes with a start in his bunk in the Lodging House, haunted by memories of skin that make him itch. Heavy skin, surrounding him, pressing in on him. Skin that smells of whiskey and sweat and powder. When he wakes in the night he can feel that too. His eyes jerk open, his mouth wide in a silent scream, and all he wants to do is scrub at himself, scrub away the dirt until he's clean again.
Swifty remembers running. He remembers breaking loose onto a deserted street in the middle of a night with no moon, and running as hard as he can for the first time. He remembers his heart pounding in his chest, blood pumping in his ears, and his bare feet hitting the icy ground faster than they'd ever hit before.
He remembers running until he cannot run anymore, and then sinking down on a pile of soggy newspapers. He might remember weeping.
Swifty thinks that he must have spent a long time running because between the dreams that make him feel dirty and the memories that come after them, he cannot remember very much.
He does remember the day he stopped running. He remembers a boy, a little boy with blonde hair and blue eyes who stuck out his hand and said, with a thick accent, "Speak English?"
Swifty had nodded, though he wasn't sure if he did speak English. He joined hands with the blonde boy, and was rewarded with a grin wide enough to rival the sun. He remembers playing marbles with the boy, and it seems once again that they must have played marbles for days, maybe even months. He also remembers racing the boy up and down the alley, and winning every time.
When the days of the marbles fade away, they are replaced by two new faces, faces that proclaim themselves to be Specs and Skittery.
"What's your name?" the face called Specs had asked. "Mine's Specs. This is Skittery."
Swifty had looked at his marble friend, who knew more English than he did. There was a brief silence, until Specs spoke again.
It was unintelligible to Swifty, the same language he'd heard the marble boy speak at him, but it was definitely a question.
As soon as the words were spoken, the marble boy's eyes had lit up, and he had nodded vigorously. Swifty could make out only one word.
"Dutchy?" Swifty had repeated.
The new faces had laughed, and Swifty couldn't tell if they were mocking him or not. But Dutchy had only smiled at him. "Nein! Deutsch," he repeated. "Bin ich Deutsch!"
Swifty shook his head, uncomprehending. He started to apologize, but Dutchy had waved it aside.
"This," he said, turning back to Specs and Skittery, "is… is… Rasch. Wie macht Sie sagen 'Rasch'?"
"Swifty," Specs said. "That's how you say it in English. Swifty. And you're Dutchy."
Swifty remembers looking at Dutchy, knowing just enough to know that he'd been named, and to know that this was a good thing.
He remembers that as the end of his childhood. Sure, he kept playing games with his friends, kept racing them up and down alleys, but from the day of his naming and on, Swifty considered himself a man. He had gotten a job, after all. Specs and Skittery had showed him how, and though he never sold papers quite as well as they did, it was something important to do with his time.
Swifty still wakes in the night feeling sick. When he first came to the Lodging House, he remembers dreaming almost every night, but it happens less frequently now. He never quite grabs a hold of what makes him feel so sick. He can't recall it, can't make himself remember. When he tries, all he gets is his mother, and tea too hot to drink, and pale moonlit faces.
So he gives up trying. He wraps his blankets closer around his shoulders, missing the sensation of silk on his skin, but as he rolls onto his side, he catches sight of a familiar shock of blonde hair on the bunk across from his. And though the wool makes him scratch until he burns, Swifty can close his eyes, and he can remember without fear.
fin.