I just had to post this snippet my goobers. Teaser for Mashwoodweek day #1
Meryl has been chasing what she feels like is a ghost for a very long time, but not because of curiosity, but because she feels it, in her heart, in her soul. She cannot explain it, it's always there, silent, quietly simmering underneath her skin. It is something invisible. Something that pulls at her soul. It feels heavy, sometimes angry, but also feeling peaceful yet remorseful at the same time. She cannot explain it, but sometimes. Sometimes it feels like two individuals.
It's there when she lies in bed staring at the ceiling, hearing muffled sounds through the wall where the boys are sharing a room. It's not jealousy, she knows, feels it more than thinks it, it is more like a longing, a want manifesting itself inside her so intensely that she feels like she cannot breathe. She tells herself that she did not cry herself to sleep the morning after.
Meryl recalls her mother telling her about how she met her father. How she was running late one morning for uni. In her haste she bumped into a boy, losing grip of her books and binders, watching them fly out of her hands and scatter like confetti around them. In a hurry she knelt down to pick up her items, but a hand came into her field of view and on the back of his hand, was a little mark, no larger than a coin. A tattoo if you like, an intricate little blob shape.
Her mother would then pause in her storytelling. Look down at seven year old Meryl, as she sits in bed wide-eyed, listening to her bedtime story, with shining eyes. Then her mother would continue. Remembering how she felt her heart stop when she saw his mark for the first time. He was rambling profusely, apologizing left and right, babbling about how he should have looked where he was going, even though it was her mother who ran into him. She said she would grab his hand with her own, watch how he realizes that she has the same mark as him, he would then look her in the eyes for the first time and-
Meryl does not really remember any more of this story. It was cut off by her mothers squealing in glee. Meryl reaches for the ceiling, noticing a distinct lack of a mark. Or any mark on her body as a memory manifests itself. Of her standing in front of a mirror, naked with her eyes looking. Searching only to end up in disappointed nothingness. Sighing, Meryl rolls over onto her left side on the bed, tucks her hands underneath her head and curls up, making herself small. She closes her eyes and tries to fall asleep. Listening to the murmurs of Vash and Wolfwoods voices on the other side of the wall, lulling her to yet another dreamless sleep.