Of Dresses and Breakfast

I wrote this for the 10 words I give contest. The coloured words are the words that I had to include.

Mari was standing in front of her mirror, a frown on her face. The grey dress that she had picked out made her look frumpy and washed out. The woman at the shop had lied to her about the colours effect on her dark skin and pink box braids, she looked like a kid trying to wear their parents’ clothes. She let out a sigh of resignation as Faith made her way off of the bed and put her arms around Mari, leaning into her girlfriend’s neck tiredly. 

“You look great babe.”

“No, I don’t.” There was a bitterness there that was up to Mari wanting everything to be perfect for their last school dance together. Faith understood, even if she was really tired. 

“You’re perfect.”

“Number seven was a fail.” Mari said as if this was of extreme importance.

“That’s so many dresses. I’m going to mangle whoever invented fashion.” She said it kindheartedly, a laugh in her voice.

Mari pulled the grey jersey dress over her head and shook out her braids. Faith took the bundle of fabric from her girlfriend and passed her a velvet dress that they had come across recently. “Apricot?”

“I’d say salmon.”

“Wouldn’t you rather wear a fruit than a fish?” Mari said it as she turned her back to her so that the dress could be zipped up, over the past few hours they had developed a pattern of Faith helping wordlessly with any dress. 

“This dress looks perfect.”

“You really think so?” They definitely looked good together, beautiful and strong girls standing together with so much love for each other.
“Well I always think you look perfect but I think that you look like what you would think is perfect.”

“Don’t I look a bit too pink?” lines had appeared between her eyebrows as she peered at her own appearance sceptically.

“It makes you look happy.” She slipped apart from where she had been standing close to her. “If you want to split it up you could put on some necklaces and tie your hair up.”

The two girls proceeded to spend the rest of the night sitting on the floor as Faith tried to copy what a youtube video was showing on how to put braids into stylish buns while Mari researched The Phantom of the Opera for her Film class. This lead to a minor argument over whether or not Mari looked like a moose. She had tried to pull her hair out of the not bun but had stopped with a spasm of pain. Faith had tried to kiss her to make her feel better, which had led to more kissing and then the argument wasn’t’t something that they could remember as the kissing developed into something more languid and sensual. 

In the morning, all sun and easy movements, Mari made breakfast in Faith’s shirt and little else. The smell of toast had woken Faith up, she came into the kitchen with a yawn. “Are you sure you’re not psychic or something? I was craving toast.”

“I can confirm that I am not in fact clairvoyant.” Mari put a plate in front of Faith and kissed her on the top of the head. Breakfast was eaten with happiness overflowing from them. Mari’s brother Ray joined them later and attempted to make coffee with soy milk which ended up curdling, much to everyone’s displeasure. 

Ray and the girls had an enjoyable breakfast and headed off to sixth form as Mari’s  mother made her way down the stairs. They were all dressed by then and joking about some of the teachers that they would have. Mari’s mother asked about the dance and Mari told her all about the velvet dress, and how she would wear it to the dance.

Reviews

[Wicahpi]

Hello Mel Jayne. Thank you for entering the 10 Words I Give contest. I remember the feeling of finding the perfect dress for a dance. It's a daunting task, but fun, I thought. I think you did a good job in crafting a story line using all ten words, though some tweaking is advised. "...headed off to sixth form as Mari's mother..." as an example. It's easy to overlook grammatical issues when reading one's own writing. Another instance is "not bun" which should be 'knot'. I think you did a fine job using all the words and capturing the relationship of best friends who seem to like to experiment with their sexuality. I got a giggle out of "wouldn't you rather wear a fruit than a fish" comment. I must admit, I enjoy both Apricot & Salmon alike! Good job!

[Mel Jayne]

I'm glad you liked it. I'll try editing it soon. Thanks for the review.