Zk | columbines

Potential memories letter in Marsh to go along with Nasturtiums

Original

I remember the first time we laughed about the joyless droop of young columbines, the way they hung limply from their stems like the trunk of an elephant.

I remember how you were tickled by the flamboyance of their frilled hindpetals; by the bombast of ten and then their stamina like so many proud little dicks standing erect for all to bear witness, as if for us to do so was to be some kind of transcendental experience.

I remember how wide your smile was that day when, still amidst a fit of giggling, I mused that I may make a garden of them if their shamelessness so attracted you.

That brightness melted me; it made me what I am today.

Though neither one of us would see it be sown, I cherish this gift-memory as were it my own, So I will love you as she loved her; I will remember for all of us.

Other memories from Wolfery

8/21/2023, 10:57:41 AM: Pointillist of the Ode clade chuckles. “Perhaps we can get Heat And Warmth to dream us up a sample for you before we go to all the trouble. But I am more interested in ornamental horticulture anyhow.” She vaguely twirls her hand, smirking. “Sim design is a little more fun with a bit of hand-trimmed splash of color, is it not? Makes up for all the time I was not spending doing my job.”

The cladist sighs, then pinches on one of Beholden’s ears. “A Finger Curled delved much deeper than I did. It was actually one of her sims that I always walked you through back sys-side. You remember that sprawling little labyrinth of gardenboxes and such, yes? Sometimes one of her instances would be working just a path over or so. She sent me a letter once musing that it had become a bit of a game for her to stalk us as closely as she could without being caught!”
8/21/2023, 10:59:37 AM: Talonstrike Broadwing shuffles in, and arrives in the middle of… such a discussion. “Wait, there’s a ‘A Finger Curled’? That was a joke I was going to make one time.
8/21/2023, 11:01:23 AM: Beholden of the Ode clade chirrups and tilts her head toward her cocladist at the pinch to her ear, eyes half-lidding at the little tingle of sensation that comes with it. “Did she now!” she says, laughing. “How delightful. I am pleased to see that she leaned as much into that playfulness as we have, over the years.”

She sighs pleasantly, sounding relaxed. “I heard little from Beholden To The Music Of The Spheres. She seemed pleased to continue as she was, and I was rather tickled by the sense of divergence that came with not interacting, not sharing. Perhaps it is some of Dear rubbing off on me.” She grins, gently poking Pointillist on the knee. “Or you. Still, when she did talk, she sounded quite happy.”
8/21/2023, 11:05:44 AM: Pointillist of the Ode clade laughs vibrantly at Talonstrike’s comment! “Yes! My own secret up-tree, only technically an Odist. Beholden and I each forked to indulge in a more domestic sort of romance with one another. We are the performers and party-goers. A Finger Curled and Beholden To The Music Of The Spheres are boring cottagecore housewives.”

She kisses the top of Beholden’s head, then. “A Finger Curled never stopped sending merges from time to time. I had one pending during New Year’s I had planned to address in the morning, in fact.” She sighs, resting her mug on her knee and holding it there in her hand. “I do not know what became of it. I could not have known I would be sent here, but a part of me resents that I did not merge those memories sooner. Now they are lost.”
8/21/2023, 11:10:08 AM: Beholden of the Ode clade furrows her brow. “Really? I did not know, my love. I am sorry,” she says, turning that little poke into a gentle caress of the knee. “You, then, had a better sense of their happiness. One of Beholden To The Music Of The Sphereses and I’s early conversations was to agree that we would not merge. It felt so subversive! Transgressive, to view that core mechanic of our lives and say, ‘nah’.”

She laughs, shaking her head. “But listen to me, I am sounding like Slow Hours. Perhaps it is this weather, putting me into a more thoughtful mood than usual.”
8/21/2023, 11:13:30 AM: Pointillist of the Ode clade nods, crossing her legs and bringing her arm down to cup Beholden’s caressing paw. “Wildfire smoke is so paradoxical. I am at once enraptured by the novel beauty of the hauntingly still air, unnerved by the bleary familiarity of the angry Sun, and nervous that our cocladists in the woods might have been displaced or, worse, caught up in the blaze. It is burning somewhere, and here I am feeling rather cold.”
8/21/2023, 11:15:15 AM: Beholden of the Ode clade slouches a bit further, snout dipping and gaze drifting. “I had not thought of them. I suppose we are rather collecting them out there, are we not? True Name and, of late, Laz, and now apparently E.W. is here. I do hope that they are safe. I never was close to E.W.; not as much as you. I know that Heat And Warmth is rather excited, though. Or perhaps nervous.”
8/21/2023, 11:20:06 AM: Pointillist of the Ode clade smirks, bumping her temple against the skunk’s. “Heat And Warmth is positively terrified of E.W.; I am curious to see what will become of those two in the end. He has such a stony personality. I am unsurprised ey has such a hard time connecting with him. It took me decades of nagging him via sensorium before he finally accepted my request to visit. I brought him a bottle of whiskey and I think he was more enamored by the vessel’s utility as a water flask than the drink itself! It is such a fascinating life he lives.”
8/21/2023, 11:23:07 AM: (arrive) What-Lives Of the Ode clade arrives from the train station.
8/21/2023, 11:30:27 AM: Beholden of the Ode clade snorts! “But ey is such a dear! And so delightfully an armful of skunk. I do not feel quite the sisterly cameraderie with her as I do with Motes, but she is a little bundle of joy that is perfectly bully-able.” She giggles, adding, “I am also a little afraid of E.W., but mostly because he is so frighteningly competent.”

She perks, waves to What Lives. “Speaking of skunks, though!”
8/21/2023, 11:33:27 AM: Pointillist of the Ode clade perks up, waving a hand at What Lives. “Ah! You must be…one of Praiseworthy’s, surely…” She lifts her tinted glasses up, smiling. “Welcome to the Rift! It is not so miserable, but also, yes, we all appear to be stuck in Limbo.”
8/21/2023, 11:35:03 AM: Talonstrike Broadwing chuckles. ((Belatedly. Attending to tasks while Mirrdae takes a turn doing the driving.)) “Cottagecore skunks. Awww. That’s cuuute. Way cuter than my unsaid jokes.” ((Also Cadmium would draw them well.))

9/12/2023, 9:07:15 PM: Pointillist of the Ode clade softly smiles, resting her hand on Beholden’s shoulder. “The firepit,” she blurts, grinning. “I remember A Finger Curled’s pyromaniac phase. I also remember how it really worked for Muse. They danced, you know? In the way lovers do under the moonlight deep in the mountains. We had such a lovely fright once when your dress caught fire. That frumpy old thing was so ragged the coarse fibers made for wonderful kindling.”
9/12/2023, 9:10:30 PM: Beholden of the Ode clade giggles and claps her paws delightedly. “Yes! I got several messages in a row about roasting marshmallows, roasting sausages, smoking food. And then suddenly they all stopped, and I always wondered why.” She giggles helplessly. “I suppose now I know, yes? Poor Beholden! I cannot imagine how much of a fright that must have given.” She adds, poking her partner (quite gently) with the tip of a claw, “Please endeavor not to catch me on fire, boss.”
9/12/2023, 9:15:38 PM: Pointillist of the Ode clade squirms a little, grinning. “Oh, if ever I do it will be a fork, I promise. I have no intention of burning what is left of my muse. We did learn from that experience how tender you are to pain, however. That really shook her up. That is a soreness I did not— she did not ever address. They just stopped sharing their nights over the fire for a long while.”

A Finger Pointing knits her brow. “Perhaps you and I will try again with more care, as you are not burdened with the trauma of that panic coupled with unwithering memory.”
9/12/2023, 9:25:52 PM: Beholden of the Ode clade splays her ears, somewhat abashed. “I do not particularly like it, no. Or, rather, I do not mind the ache of dancing for far too long, or the little sting of an affectionate pinch or tug, but I think that flames licking against my calf or the like would leave me quite shaken.” She shrugs a little, settling for just petting rather than brushing her tail. “But for me, a joyous dance around a campfire still sounds quite fun. Twirling and chanting and lifting tankards high to the moon. How delightful would that be?”

The skunk laughs, tilting her cheek to brush it fondly against A Finger Pointing. “I do hope that they are still doing well on Lagrange.”
9/12/2023, 9:35:53 PM: Pointillist of the Ode clade nods, fishing the comb from her wristbag and brushing along Beholden’s tail. “I had that pending merge request leftover from the holidays. I have been thinking about Heat And Warmth’s advice. Ey gave us back our forking, our weaving, our dreaming. We can send our sensorium pings, sort of, and I have experienced my fair share of memory merges since arriving. It is so much less concrete — the merge process, I mean — and so feels less real. But here I am with memories I created with the intent to prove they were not my own.”

She leans back. “To that end, I have been writing quite a lot of late. I am searching for the vague gesturing at memories half-remembered sitting in the recesses of my mind, nearly lost in my being shunted to here. I have found something, and I think it might be her. I think I might still have those memories of their Winter together of two-seventy-five.”
9/12/2023, 9:49:57 PM: Beholden of the Ode clade shifts herself a little so that she can swish her tail around from the side further away from Pointillist to the side closer, draping it over her lap instead. Meanwhile, she slips an arm around her partner, just enjoying a little bit of gentle contact as they talk. “I did not know that you still had that pending. I mean…I am not surprised; we had to get to the party and all. Easy enough to just leave it lingering until later.” She stays quiet for a moment while she thinks before adding, “Though it does feel a bit strange that I sent a fork and you did not.”

She leans back a little, herself, to peek over at her cocladist. “What have you found so far? Or is it more vague than that just yet?”
9/12/2023, 9:59:09 PM: Pointillist of the Ode clade shrugs. “I planned to address the merge in the morning. She sent it to me just that evening; we always saved the anticipation of New Year’s for Spring on account of its significance as a beginning and not an end. I have in my journal an account of those memories of us in our cottage leading up to the turn of the century. I have been trying to parse out what is new and what is not. I have found a few that I cannot quite place in time; I am uncertain when they happened, and the warmth of Summer has faded in them all.”

She slips her journal out from under her jacket, thumbing it open with one hand — handy bookmark, that pen — and reading: “We stand at the window of our kitchen looking out over the shed whose roof is damp with fresh rain and hold one another side-by-side. I feel the coarse lace of her blouse’s frilled shoulders, the dampness of her freshly-showered fur. I smell behind her the grilled cheese just about to burn and kiss her temple, feeling in the moment as if I was saying goodbye to her.”
9/12/2023, 10:11:51 PM: Beholden of the Ode clade‘s eyes drift vaguely down towards that journal and the page its open to, glancing over the handwriting that is so close to her own. She stays quiet through the reading, stays still even after. Eventually, she sighs and rests her head on A Finger Pointing’s shoulder. “You, my dear, are quite morbid,” she says fondly. “I am as well, of course. That is one of the things that I love about you. We can collect our little stories and show them to each other like little baubles, talking about how pretty they are.”

She shrugs a little, saying, “My up-tree talked about this a lot, too. We had far different anxieties, towards the end there. She did not have quite the same fits of perfectionism that strike me. She did not have quite the same feelings around the clade and our past. She worried most about her friends. She would grill Motes when she stopped by about how everyone was doing back at the troupe. She would always hug her extra tight before she left.”
9/12/2023, 10:24:08 PM: Pointillist of the Ode clade furrows her brow. “I had not considered that the fire might have inspired that thought. That is too good. This is why I love opportunistic poetry; you cannot write this shit.” She chuckles, tilting the book so the light reflects better off the opposite page. “I remember how distant we felt. A Finger Curled shared my desire to have the Ode clade in harmony, but her very existence was transgressive. Her relationship with Muse could not be curtailed. You and I danced in private profanity, my dear, but those two were inseparable.”

“We are coupled on the Adirondack lounging chair on the porch while the Sun is low, its plastic bowing, threatening to snap in half under our weight. I am giving her that meteor shower of kisses down her neck, paw steadying her hips, when she bucks and the thing gives out right then. We both shout in surprise, then laugh at the absurdity of what had just transpired, and groan as we lick our shard-bitten wounds.”
9/12/2023, 10:42:06 PM: Beholden of the Ode clade grins and nods to Pointillist. “At least for most of it, yes. Those last few years, we danced pretty openly, did we not? We were the talk of the town — several towns, even — for just how visibly sweet we were on each other.” She grins, sititng up primly. “Or so I hope to think. “Look at those two!” they would say. “They must be new lovers!” Or perhaps they would say, “They bicker like an old married couple.”“

Those happy words turn into a giggle at the story, the skunk clapping her paws happily. “Oh! That would have been an absolute mess. I can only imagine how often they told that story to each other and friend,” she says once she can talk. “See? Not all of our story-baubles are sad or bitter. My up-tree sent a letter at one point talking about the joys of wood-carving. Did A Finger Curled have anything to say about that?”

10/14/2023, 5:54:19 PM: Pointillist of the Ode clade‘s shoulders sag a little at the touch. Another sigh comes from the Odist, her expression serene. “I see motes of memory all scattered about, significance imbued in pregnant silence and insignificant moments. I see fragments of a bigger picture all blown apart for me to collect and catalogue later, presuming I remember their details at all. That is why I have written in my journal most of all about what I sense, what I feel, what I know, and less the precession of events.”

“I see the courtyard of an abandoned schoolyard overgrown with frosted branches and cast in a blanket of blinding white. I hear the stillness of the air, the chill of that heavy silence that comes when a pressure front has rolled in and your voice carries twice as far. I feel the warmth of a paw on my back through fur, under a coat far too thick for my liking. I smell the breath of Beholden sharing the air under my jaw. I know she has just nudged me in that deadly way of yours by the buzzing up and down my neck, by the way my arms subtly curl in against my chest as if to embrace her despite the weight of her head on my shoulder.”
10/14/2023, 6:05:43 PM: Beholden of the Ode clade listens, rapt. There are a few more gentle touches along Pointillist’s cheek before the skunk once more gets both arms around her, the better to focus on these fragments of dreams. It is all very Odist, this piecing together a whole rather than a linear plot, There is a metaphor to be made about putting together the seeds of a dandelion to see the puffball again, but it slips from her mind before she can make it.

“I remain very pleased to hear that A Finger Curled still enjoys that little touch, and that my up-tree still does it. For the little cutesy maneuver that it began as, it has turned rather meaningful to us, has it not?” she says, sighing happily. “Winter, though, and abandoned school yards. That is curious. It still feels so prosaic, to me. Far less rushing about, far fewer wild nights. They had a very different kind of peace.”
10/14/2023, 6:18:18 PM: Pointillist of the Ode clade smiles softly. “That was always the point, was it not? To lean into domesticity with one another? It was on just such a night that they forked, after all. So they went on to build their cabin in the woods, to sit under the awning of that porch bench of theirs to indulge the light of dawn and dusk alike. I remember how you began to count the colors, to make silly names from their kenning like lividpurple and ultrablue and sweetlight.” She kisses the skunk’s near ear.
10/14/2023, 6:28:59 PM: Beholden of the Ode clade flits that ear at the kiss and buries her face against A Finger Pointing — yes, with her snout tucked up under her chin. “Lividpurple! That sounds very like me. I suppose she is nothing if not myself.” The skunk giggles quietly, sounding more content than anything. “She did offer merging down a few times, you know, Beholden To The Music Of The Spheres. We talked it through over sensorium messages over the years. She had about convinced me a few times, but I always held back. I liked what we have, even when what we have started to be colored by A Finger Curled’s memories in you. It was touching to me that we live separate lives, that I lean more into electronic instruments and her the analog ones, that I lean more into partying and her the caipirinhas on the porch. It was even important to me that you and I approach that differently. A part of me doubts that decision, but here I am in the Rift and still yours, so I am content in that, at least.”
10/14/2023, 6:32:48 PM: Pointillist of the Ode clade nods along, petting gently over Beholden’s mane. “Yours as a neighborhood, my muse. And I, your very own.” She smiles, kisses the top of the skunk’s head, and coaxes her up so she can stand. “I am feeling rather tired, of a sudden. Walk me home, please?”
10/14/2023, 6:35:59 PM: Beholden of the Ode clade gives a little nuzzle up against A Finger Pointing before nodding. “Alright, love.” She pushes herself to her feet and waits for her partner to stand before offering her elbow to loop an arm through. “Come, we can flop on the couch and pick out patterns in the textures of the ceiling.”