A Story

I wrote this in my Psychoanalysis class. I was inspired by Angela Carter's work of adapting fairytales in her own language. I encourage any of you to read her fiction. It was a wonderfully fun story to write and I enjoyed analyzing it as much as I enjoyed writing it. The analysis is not included on this blog however. If you are interested in my analysis I would be happy to email them to you or even post them...

A Story
By: Melissa Darsey
The waves lick and kiss the large rocks, smoothing the rocks with their sensual touch, while whispering a melodious tune for the dead lovers the sea devoured with its veracious appetite. Sitting, snuggly embraced by the large rocks on top of the cliff is a house. The house is precariously built almost as if the rocks are giving birth to it. The façade of the old structure is streaked with rain and mold. It is almost if this tiny home has cried its tears for the jewels it holds within itself. The windows are small squares. Red currents fall behind these iridescent eyes emblazing them with the glow of amber. A weary traveler might look upon the house and feel it possessed. The dark black door with the heavy metal lock is not to keep people out, but to keep people in.
The inside air permeates with the smell of gingerbread baking in the small woodstove. A woman with dirty blonde hair wisped up in a somewhat precarious bun sits silently in a rocking chair aimlessly trying to knit while her thoughts reside elsewhere. Long strands of muddy locks string down her face, concealing the lines that have crept far too soon across the face of a woman of her age. The only sound you hear is the creak, creak, creak of the old rocking chair as the woman’s weight shifts from front to back and front to back again. A little girl with golden curl and emerald eyes sits beneath the woman’s feet holding a doll in one hand, while the other possesses a tiny bottle in which to feed the waxen lips. The doll wears the same handmade pattern as the little girl. They are both as pale as the driven snow, and the tiny doll shares the same emeralds and curls as the small child. They are perfect replicas of one another. Looking closely one might not be able to distinguish the living from the dead among this inseparable pair.
The emerald eyes of the small child penetrate the woman’s soul as she breathes out, “Mama is the gingerbread ready yet. I am terribly hungry, and Anna feels that a storm is soon to blow.” She holds her doll kissing its eyes, and stroking its face with her cheek. “Why you little sprite,” Mama peers over her spectacles looking at her beloved daughter, “you know gingerbread is no good until fully done, and as for the storm, you tell Anna not to worry your little head with such nonsense.” She removes the spectacles from her eyes, looking at the reflection of herself within them. “Who are you?” she whispers at the face staring back at her. She is snapped back to reality by a small tugging at the base of her skirt. Cool eyes peer up at her, as red rich lips reveal tiny white teeth. The glow of her small child’s smile is something the woman finds hard to resist. “All right little one lets go check on the gingerbread, and while we wait I’ll prepare a nice warm bottle for you.” Gleeful little hands come together in applause, as tiny feet follow the woman’s faded blue dress’s swish, swish, swish into the kitchen.
On the top shelf of the cupboard there were three bottles. Even though the woman asked, she knew which one her child would choose. The red one, it was always the red one. “The milk tastes the best in the red one,” the small child would always reply when her mother asked why it always was that one. They checked the gingerbread together, while the small child sucked the sustenance out of the blood red container. The woman set the gingerbread on the counter to cool. A flash of lightning streaked across the sky. The woman sighed, “Well, little one Anna might have been right after all.” The little one peered up at the window beneath the woman’s skirt. All the while sucking the bottle, and clinching the doll in the other hand. The light of the torches danced in her emerald pools.
The woman lifted the child up on the counter. “CRASH!” The gingerbread came crumbling to the floor. Both women, one large one small, looked into each other’s eyes. The small one gently laid her doll on the counter as if it were dead, and traced the embroidered letter on the large one’s chest. All the while she sucked the contents of her bloody bottle. When she was finished drinking she let out a big satisfied sigh and said, “Mama the storm is here.” Her hands still traced the intricate fabric of the letter. A crack of thunder was heard in the distance. Anna was forgotten, left on the counter, while Mama and daughter went to be let out of their cage.