Write Me a Story

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“Catch me! Catch me!” The girl shrieked with laughter and she jumped from the chair she stood on and landed safely in the arms of her nanny. The girl, blue eyed and blonde haired, smiled brightly with sunshine as she giggled and gazed upon her nanny’s placid face.
“Oh, Mary Ann,” the nanny sighed, “you grow bigger every day.” Traffic zoomed in the distance, disrupting the silence and quite of their play. The nanny glanced nervously at the whizzing vehicles and the bright, flashing signs advertising the latest toys for both children and adults.
“Nanny?” Mary Ann whispered, tugging lightly on the collar of her caretaker’s robin’s egg blue sweater. When her Nanny returned her gaze, Mary Ann smiled. “I love you,” she proclaimed with all the love a little child could muster.
“I love you too,” the nanny replied somberly, looking little Mary Ann in the eye. For a moment, her face appeared clouded, as if she were going to cry.
But then a moment later, it was gone.

“God Mary Ann, your basement is totally junk.”
“Yeah. When did you last clean this place anyway?”
Mary Ann rolled her eyes, flopping onto a couch that actually had springs in it. So outdated. “We never come down here. I mean, hello! Only our shitty crap ends up here.” With a flick of her wrist, Mary Ann cast her long blonde pony tail over her shoulder. “So we should, like, do some shopping instead.”
Sighing simultaneously, her two friends crossed their arms over their chests. “All right, fine,” one grumbled, checking the time absent-handedly.
Mary Ann leaned back against the plaid surface of the couch for a slight moment before she stood. “Okay. Let’s go.” She hurriedly headed for the stairs.
“Wait!” The other friend called, giggling softly, causing Mary Ann to turn and go back towards her friends. “What… Is this?” She pointed to a figure cast mostly in shadow. The girl stepped forward and pulled it out into the light.
It was a woman sitting on a chair, her ankles crossed and her hands folded gently in her lap, her head hanging down as if she were in a deep sleep. Graying hair was pulled into a loose bun at the nape of her neck, and her black skirt had gathered specks of desk all along its folds and surface.
“Yeah… What is it?” The other girl asked, poking the woman’s shoulder lightly.
Mary Ann crossed her arms over her chest, and stomped towards the stairs.
“Nothing.” She cast a glance backwards for a moment, her friends muttering as they mounted the stairs. Mary Ann soon realized they were waiting for her at the top.
Hesitantly, Mary Ann stepped forward, and lifted the woman’s chin, so that her head was upright. She thought of reaching out, to touch the robin’s egg blue sweater and feel its soft fabric again, but Mary Ann felt her friend’s eyes creating holes in her figure, so she scoffed, and turned away. “Nothing,” she lied, “It’s just a stupid antique.”

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