Yellow
The air was sweet-tasting, even inside the house. Lifting the lid off the paint can, she smeared her fingertips across her thighs, staining them pastel yellow. She watched with satisfaction as paint flowed from the bucket, collecting in a creamy pool at the base of the metallic pan.
The paint roller was dripping, and she knew that meant she had soaked it too much, but she only sighed and continued. Up and down, the roller kissed the walls, in shapes of "N" and "W." She breathed in rhythm with the familiar crackle against these foreign walls. Again and again, she smothered the room with paint.
As the day went on and the air-cooled, her thoughts wandered to lands of buttercup yellow, lands where she ate and slept and loved herself. She envisioned the dull apartment she was used to, and its monochrome of tan, and its lifelessness. And she thought, maybe all of those modern aphorisms are true—maybe you are a reflection of your surroundings, maybe it's impossible to heal in the place that made you sick—but she missed it anyways, in the way that she missed being lonely, in the way that she missed all of the people she left because of. Bittersweet was the harshest she could feel about those beige walls. They had suffocated her, yes, but trapped within them, she had known herself so deeply.
Turning around to cover the paint roller for a last time, she felt a presence in the doorway.
"Michael."
There he was, standing at her door, illuminating the already sun-filled room.
"Hey, Em," he beamed.
She dropped the paint roller and raced to him. He didn't mind that she was covered in yellow; he wrapped himself around her as if he needed to be colored in.
She let go, took hold of his hand, and introduced him to the rest of the house. They danced through each room, and he laughed between boisterous announcements of This Is The Kitchen! and Say Hello To The Office! She showed him a tiny hole, the width of a pencil eraser, in the seventh step on the staircase.
"It's charming," she sang, and he agreed.
She let him sit on the windowsill of the third bedroom down, her favorite spot in the house. Her mother said it would be a guest room, but all Em could feel was the shadows of bookshelves, the silence of literature. A library. After circling through the entire house, searching for undiscovered quirks, they arrived at the front door.
"Outside?" she asked, and he nodded.
Michael pulled her hand into his, intertwining their fingers. He pressed his thumb into the soft belly of her palm.
"I love you," his hand whispered. Hers couldn’t say it back.
They laid in the grass. It was prickly against her bare skin, but Em wasn't bothered. The sun yawned, its cool breath enveloping Em's body, sending her into a state of utter peace.
"Michael?" she said softly, unsure if he was still beside her.
"Yes?" he said. He wouldn't have left her for anything.
"I thought some things today."
"And what things did you think of?"
"Well," she breathed. "I thought that maybe I could be happy here."
He kissed her softly, briskly. "You could be happy anywhere, Em. You're glow-in-the-dark."
"No," she frowned.
"No? What do you mean?”
“I hate that you think I’m always happy. There’s a reason I had to leave.”
“I know. Stop acting like I’m stupid.”
“Stop,” Em spat, “acting like you understand.”
He turned away from her. She was so difficult. He had driven all this way to see her and for what? Gritting his teeth to hold back tears, he pushed clenched fists into his jean pockets. Something hard and cool chafed against his knuckles, and as he pulled it from his pocket, he remembered why he had come.
“I brought something for you.” He dipped the necklace into her open palm.
She looked down at the metal sunflower and attempted to smile. “Thank you.”
“Em,” he said, leaning on her, his syrupy breath condensing against the flesh of her ear. “I know you’re not happy. I know that this is so much harder for you than for any of us, but I am trying to understand.”
She hesitated before whispering, “I know. And… I love you.”
He kissed her again, this time warm and sweet and sorry. “I love you, Em. I will never stop trying for you.”
She laid in the grass with her eyes shut, letting the words seep into her, slipping in and out of her identity until it no longer existed. She was one with the yellow of the stars.
Finally, she sat up. "I can be happy here."
Macy Perrine is a senior from Marshfield, Wisconsin. Although her main concentration is poetry, she loves exploring fiction and creative nonfiction as well. She plans to pursue writing and editing in college.