Daddy issues || h.s

3.9

He woke, his feet entangled in the sheets. The morning was bright, and the sun was high in the sky. The clouds were painted in yellow shades, and the skies were dipped in pink. It was all so sweet, the vibrant colours waking up his mind the moment he saw them. 

He could hear the sound of the radio from downstairs, but something was amiss. Because it was not the shaky tones of top-twenty music that reached him. No, these were tones his ears had yet to drink in, their honeyed sound melting into his heart like golden syrup. 

The melodious music got louder as he walked downstairs, and as he heard the words being more vividly painted in his mind, he felt as though he was dipped in gold. Sleep fell away from his waking eyes as he stepped into the kitchen and saw her sitting on the counter. Her naked legs swung in the air, her dark purple nail polish shining in the sun. A cereal bowl was perched on her lap, threatening to spill its contents every time she moved to bring the spoon to her mouth.

"Good morning," he said, and she smiled. Her mouth was full of cereal, and a few droplets of milk ran down her chin. She wiped it away with the back of her hand. 

"I don't know if we can say "good morning" any more, seeing as it is eleven o'clock" She said, putting down the cereal bowl. He furrowed his brow upon her words, but as his eyes fell on the watch above the oven, he saw that she was right.

"Then why aren't you at school?" he asked, and a devious smile played on her lips.

"My mom had to rush out to an oh so important business meeting, and left a note telling me to get you to drive me to school." She held up a yellow post-it note, Abigail's neat handwriting filling the page.

"Then why didn't you wake me up earlier?" He asked, walking over to her. He laid a hand on her cheek, and a finger played with her smiling lips.

"Because, my dear Harry, we are not going to school today," she said, the sweet tones of the music dripping into her voice as she spoke.

"Then where are we going, my dear Adelaide?" He smiled, leaning his forehead against hers, his eyes swimming in her mind.

"To the roots my friend, to the roots of the flowers," she said, her whisper breathing life into his limbs and sending shivers down his spine.

The road that had once been untraveled by him, now lay before him again, the houses passing by as the wheels of the car bore them on through the streets. The turns were not yet burned into his memory, but as Adelaide's ethereal voice steered the car, the road they travelled together started feeling like the way home. 

The houses gave away to trees, and the asphalt to gravel, and then the iron gates rose up in front of them, its rusty faces smiling down at them. "At the roots", he thought, "At the roots of the flowers, that's where we are."

She hopped out of the car, her scent lingering in the seats long after she was gone. He saw her run past the gates, turning around to look at him as she went. She waved at him, urging him forward, and he felt white silk ribbons wrap around his body, tugging him towards her. So he got out of the car, the silky ribbons pulling him so hard he had to run as to not fall down, they pulled him harder and harder, and when he reached her, they wrapped around their hands and tied them together.

His eyes fell to the greenhouse, its broken windows, its wild trees, its dust and dirt. It looked as though it was about to collapse any moment, and another person might have wondered why no one had knocked it down by now, but to him, it was the most beautiful place on earth. Yet, as they got closer, he saw it was not as dilapidated as he first had thought. Because the old paint was scraped away, the ageing wood naked and bare to the winds of the world.