Demeter
by Rosemary Hilliard
The skeletal silhouettes of naked birch trees scratched against the window, creaking audibly in a cool, autumnal breeze. Vast, yellow tendrils of sunlight spilled from the whispering branches, pooling like liquid gold on the windowsill and green grass below. Far beyond the trees and dripping sunlight, an ocean the color of shale pitched and frothed, filling the chilly New England air with a fine spray of salty mist.
Swaddled against the fall morning in a mass of blankets, Fannie Braidwood lay supine, blinking against the fresh morning sun. A heavy silence coiled around her, permeated only by the whispering, leaf-less trees as they caressed the cold glass of her window. Her soft features were draped in a tangled mosaic of shadow and light, rising and falling to the gentle rhythm of her breath.
Fannie drowsily wiggled her toes, freeing them from the warm shroud of her blankets and sheets. She studied the smooth skin of her feet and the knotty curve of her heels. Blue capillaries traced an intricate web beneath her pale flesh, pulsing gently with the rush of rich blood. Her nails were unpainted, and in the liquid light they shone like clean bones. As she watched, the tiny, feather-soft hairs that bristled along her feet rose from static electricity, charged with anticipation of the day to come.
Closing her eyes, Fannie imagined the feeling of grass between her toes: the cool, squishy bliss of running barefoot across an open field. She could feel the tickling pleasure of water as she imagined bounding across a stream. Flower petals caressed her flesh with silky sweetness, and marigolds left a faint stain of speckled yellow on her arches. The warmth of a sun-baked dirt road tingled against the bottom of her feet, and Fannie sighed, losing herself in the wonderful daydream.
Suddenly, the alarm clock perched to Fannie’s right began to squawk, shattering the morning calm with its chirpy proclamation of the arrival of seven a.m. The teenager grumbled before forcing herself to sit up, still fighting off the throes of sleep and idyllic musings. Swinging her legs over the edge of her bed, Fannie was careful not to touch her toes to the wooden floor. Instead, she pulled on a pair of heavy snow-boots and, leaving the laces trailing, Fannie clomped to the bathroom to brush her teeth and get ready for school.
It had been over a year since Fannie’s feet had last touched the world outside. Exactly seven hundred and five days, three hours, and thirteen minutes had passed since her toes curled in anything other than bed-sheets, boots, or bath water. Despite Fannie’s aching need to blend in with her peers, she had danced her seventh-grade prom in a glorious eggplant-hued gown…and Timberland work-boots. Her family’s yearly sojourn to Daytona, Florida was spent in a bikini and the same grubby shoes, resulting in the entire beach-going crowd staring at her for a week. When she took a bath, Fannie had to lie in the tub with her feet propped on its porcelain sides lest disaster strike while she was at her most vulnerable. Her entire existence revolved around the arduous chore of assuring that her feet never rested flat against the ground–a task that uprooted Fannie’s teenaged desire for the monotony of suburban normalcy.
An hour later, Fannie sat on the front steps of her family’s house, idly pulling up weeds as she waited for the school bus to arrive. The fresh air smelled of wood smoke and wet leaves. Winking sunlight glittered across nodding stalks of grass, staining the lawn a brilliant shade of emerald. Falling leaves danced in the crisp wind, swirling in a rustling cyclone of orange, crimson, and gold. Nature was slowly steadying herself for the onset of another bitter New England winter, however on this October morning the scene virtually sparkled with life and energy.
Presented with such beauty and quiet gaiety, Fannie could no longer bear her aura of caution and fear. Ignoring the distant, snorting rumble of the school bus, Fannie hurriedly pulled off her boots and tossed them aside, carefully holding her feet a few inches from the swaying grass. Time slowed as she drew in a deep breath of the fragrant sea air. Closing her eyes, Fannie slammed her feet into the grass and stretched her toes.
Hundreds of tiny plants exploded from the soil in a mad scramble for sunlight. Flowers stretched their fragrant faces to the sky, their arms rapidly growing into broad, green leaves. Vines tickled the underside of Fannie’s feet as they sought open air. Tiny ferns unfurled their fronds between her toes, their lush fiddleheads spiraling to reveal row upon row of fractal leaves. Fannie leaped up and began to dash across the lawn in a wild, haphazard dance of pure bliss, plant life bursting forth around her ankles with every step.
Fannie was brought back to reality by the sound of laughter. Her eyes snapped open and there, pulled up alongside her driveway, was the bus. Thirty middle-schoolers leaned out of the windows, their faces twisted into grotesque masks of cruel mirth. The students pointed and laughed, chanting, “Farmer Fannie! Farmer Fannie! Farmer Fannie!”
The plants continued their relentless upward push, filling the air with the sticky-sweet scent of green life. Her cheeks burning, Fannie bent down and pulled on her discarded boots and knapsack. She trudged to the bus amid the humorless shrieks and taunts of her classmates, ignoring their vicious jokes and attempts to humiliate her as she took her regular seat at the front of the bellowing crowd.
As the bus pulled away from the curb, Fannie glanced out of the window in an effort to ignore the jests of her peers. Though her enraptured, joyous dance across the lawn transpired only moments before, the seething mass of plants had already begun to wither. Once brilliant leaves and stems faded to a dusty brown and flowers closed their blooms forever, rotting even more quickly than they had sprouted. As much as Fannie wanted to hate her gift, as much as she resented her ability and its social implications, her heart broke to watch the plants dissolve into dilapidated brown piles of decay. As she watched, the plant corpses finally shattered into a cloud of dust, scattering like ashes in the cold wind.
Rosemary Hilliard graduated from Berklee College of Music in May 2009 with a degree in flute performance. She currently lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and is pursuing a career as a freelance flutist and author.
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