A Picture Worth A Thousand Words

Creative writing project- Take a picture and draw a story from it

Annabelle

It’s like looking in a mirror,

    Seeing my daughter

    In that little pink dress

    With her hair in a bun.

Her

toes painted red

stuffed in those little pink

shoes. I remember how my

Feet

    Would cramp and blister

    as I flowed across the floor.

    Just as hers do now. We

                                                                                                   Were

    always so fluid, so in sync

    whenever we would move

    together. Like two swans on

the water.

Once

    beautiful and happy,

    now forced and painful.

    Her legs carry her swiftly,

    so elegant, quite unlike

Mine.

Charlotte

It’s like looking in a mirror,

Seeing my mother in the

photos on our walls. We have

two, side by side, almost identical.                      

                                                                      My

Dress is a few shades darker,

my hair pulled back a little tighter,

but our form, it’s the same. Our

                                                                       Feet

feeling the same pain I’m sure of it.

We used to soak them in ice water

together. Memories of us dancing

together,

                                                                         Are

some of my fondest. It was a bond

no one could break, no one could take

from us. It was ours.

                                                                            Not

even my father (her husband)

walking out on us would keep us

from what we love. Our legs and our

feet held us together, until Mama lost

                                                                             Hers.

Annabelle

I’m not sure who the accident hurt more,

I mean sure I got hit by that

truck. I lost my legs. I stayed

in the hospital for three weeks.

That was painful.

But Charlotte…

She saw it happen. She sat there

with my for three weeks in and out

of consciousness, all doped up.

While I lay there in pain,

feeling morphine course through

my veins. Sleeping well at night,

heavily medicated, drowned out reality,

she sat there and watched. Seeing

her mother like that. Knowing that

her role model, her dance partner,

would never put her two feet on the

the floor in sync with her own again.

I know that this constant throbbing,

the ghostly limbs that I can feel but can’t see,

this hurts me. But when I look at Charlotte,

I believe it hurts her more.

Charlotte

It’s tough..

How can I go on with this alone?

When we did it together we did it

for us. We did it to keep us busy,

sane, happy.

Maybe that’s not what we need

anymore. Or maybe it’s just not

what I need anymore. What’s

the point.

Makes me wonder if I can ever

dance again at all. How do you go on

doing something without the other

half of the pieces?

It’s like drinking           water out

of a cup cut               in two. Evenly,

down                            the middle.

It just                         doesn’t work.

Annabelle      

Is it wrong..

for me to say I love it when she dances?   

She’s just so good at it, with or without

me. She is so fluid and beautiful all on her

own.           

                                                                                           I

    keep telling her if she dances for the talent

    scouts, the way she dances for me, there’s

no way they’ll deny her. She could get a

full paid tuition to Julliard, to do what she loves.

I don’t know why she

                                                        would

    even think twice about considering it. She needs

to get out of this town. She needs to go out into

the world and make her own life, she can’t get

stuck here like I did, with a job as a volunteer

dance teacher making little to no money.

She has so much potential

                                                                                              if

    only she would just see that and use it. I have

    given her the tools to do it on her own. To work

    hard, train hard, and do what she needs to do

    to get where she needs to be.

                                                                                                I

    wish I had left when I had the chance. Of course

if I had she wouldn’t be here, but maybe it all would

have just been better off that way. I lost my chance

though, it’s up to her now, I know I would leave if I

                                                                                             could.

Charlotte

It’s not fair.

   

I

don’t know what it is that I want to

do anymore. If I continue, then I’m forcing

it and hating every second of it, but if I

quit it would kill my mother. I really don’t

think I could stomach that but I

just

want to do something else. How I can tell how

I feel? How can I take away from her the

only thing that still makes her happy, the only

thing that still makes her feel needed. I don’t

want

to hurt her, but I just can’t do it anymore. It’s

like her getting her dancing feet taken away from

her has made her push mine to their limits, even

harder. All that does is make me want to quit even

more. I just wish there was

something

we could still do together that didn’t consist of her

just sitting there watching me, trying to coach me to

perfection. I’m not sure exactly why she thinks I need

to try even harder now, or why she’s been acting the way

she has, but a lot more of her has changed than just her

ability and her legs. I can’t read her mind, but I sure can

tell our thoughts on this situation are totally

different.

Charlotte

   

I love her so much,

   I don’t want to hurt her,

    but I can’t live like this.

Annabelle

I just love her so much,

   I don’t want to see her get hurt,

She can’t live like I did.