(This story is only vaguely based on ppl here. Fox is a guy I really do know, not you FoX! Sorry! But Bright is me....-^^-''' Egomania...)
At some point in everyone’s life, there comes a time when questions are asked. It comes at different times for everyone. In the case of Bright McMullen, it was now. On the morning of her 15 birthday.
She didn’t count on having a birthday party today. It was only her fifteenth, and besides, she didn’t know anyone who would come. She’d probably just end up going into the sea and joking with the local surfers. Then she might go back to her tiny trailer under the pier and work on her story. But before any plans began, she asked herself one of those life-altering questions. Hers was simple.
What exactly am I doing here? Well, it was simple as far as most of those life-altering questions went. She never knew her parents. She assumed she had always lived in this trailer under the pier. All she knew was that her parents had left her in the care of a baby-sitter who eventually got bored and left her there, in the trailer. That was when she was four. Now she was fifteen. Or so she assumed. She had made up her birthday. It was on the same day as a tourist friend of hers who had never come to see her again after that summer when she had turned eight.
It didn’t really matter. She asked herself her question, and decided to think about it on a walk down the shoreline. She shimmied into a wrap skirt, and left her bikini top on. Casual was a good thing. She also grabbed her art bag in case she grew bored and wanted to doodle some of the sunbathers. She slid the wraps over her windows tighter and tied them shut, then went to the rusty door of her trailer and opened it.
The sun kissed her once on each cheek in greeting. There were hardly any clouds past the wispy things drifting around, and the sea was being nice. As a result, not many surfers were riding the swells. She squeezed her body through the tiny opening left by the open door and shut it as tight as she could. She flowed out from under the pier, avoiding the fishermen’s’ hooks stranded in the woodwork from errant swells. She drifted close to the water, getting her ankles wet, and moved up the beach with her odd sway. Past the boat rentals and a little further down the strand, she got to her jetty.
Everyone knew this was her jetty. She had been sitting there for nigh on eight years. She was unwrap her skirt, put it down as her towel, drag out her notebook and pencils, and maybe her walkman too, and sit there. When she felt like it, she would go into the water and chat with the surfers, maybe asking them if she could see them in action so she could sketch them. They would usually oblige.
And if she felt like it, she would go dance up and down the shoreline, swaying, dipping, and bobbing to her own mental beat. And if she felt like it, she would go zooming around the beach, imitating the pelicans and other shore birds she so admired. Most people had given up on trying to get her to act normally. She had been doing this since she was little. It had become a matter of course
Today, though, was just for sitting. She would sit and wait for her answer. It didn’t matter if it came today or not. She would wait. There was always time to wait. Regardless of anything else, she would stay on her spot and hope for a quick answer.
She had laid out her wrap skirt like a towel, had slipped her headphones on, nad was hanging upside-down off the water-side of the jetty. As per usual, she had become bored. She had waited half the day for her answer, and none were in sight. Now she had new questions. Where’s food? Was particularly popular at the moment. Usually she went across the beach, scavenging anyone’s leftovers, or went to beg some off Jordan and Steve at the local greasy spoon. Her face had begun glowing red, and some tourist children had taken up a staring game with the weird kid hanging off the jetty. She was winning.
Eventually, the boys got bored as well and scarpered off to the seaside to dig up shells. Bright merely sighed and continued the game with a cloud above her. Her veiw was shortly interrupted by a pair of very masculine legs. She had managed to befriend some of the surfers with her odd nature and constant requests for a sketch opportunity. So she wasn’t surprised when the legs’ owner plunked his board in the sand next to him. She began weaving back and forth against her cement support, vaguely disappointed her game had been stopped. A friendly face bent down to look at her. Her face lit up, almost as bright as the current sun.
“Fosky!!!” she squealed, falling off her jetty and rolling so that she could get a decent hug around the poor guy’s legs.
His name was actually Fox, but she called everyone but something else. At the moment, though, he was too busy struggling to stand upright and in balance to think about his name. Her grip was too tight, and he fell to her level. He would have landed on her if she hadn’t decided to try and touch a seabird before it flew away. It avoided the touch, and scuttled down the beach. Fox didn’t seem to mind the odd attitude. He sat up and brushed as much sand off his wet arm as he could. He watched Bright get up and “fly” back around to where he was sitting. She plopped down next to him in the sand and laid her head on his leg, looking upwards into his face, squinting because of all the sunlight. H looked down at her, quirking his eyebrow at the strange-ling. She merely beamed back.
“Fosky wanna talk ta Bright-ne?” She asked singsong. “Maybe ya could answer one of Bright-ne’s questions?” She asked again in the same tone. He pulled them both upright.
“Erm, depends on the question, I guess,” he replied, not quite sure what game the girl was up to. Bright beamed again and put a very happy expression.
“Good! Then Fosky knows where Bright-ne comes from! Right?” she asked the poor surfer. His expression dampened a bit. He’d known her for a while, and had been expecting something like this from her at some point. She picked up on his mood, and turned her glaring grin into a tiny smile of melancholy. “Fosky dun know, huh?” she stated.
“Sorry, Bright. I only met you a year ago, remember?” She just looked at him with that irritating smile. They stood like that for a while, before Fox remembered why he was here again. “Oh yeah! Almost forgot!” he said while fumbling for something he had put in his bag. He must’ve found it, but by the time he looked back up,Bright was busy zooming knee deep in seawater, being a pelican for now. Fox just smiled and sat down next to the jetty to wait for her to come back.
By the time she did, dusk was falling. He didn’t really mind, though. He liked to watch her odd behavior and how other people reacted to her. He hardly knew anything about her, except that she seemed a little vacant sometimes. It wa okay with him, though. She came back, dancing her way over, swinging her arms over her head and wiggling around. Fox stood up.
“Are you ready for your birthday present?” he asked sweetly, wondering what she would say. It culd be predicted, actually.
“Yes yes yes yes yes!!!!!!! Wanna get my present!” she nearly yelled, hopping up and down on each foot. Fox decided to tease her a bit and let her hop for a while.
“I dunno. You didn’t seem to want it earlier when I got it.”
“But I am!!! I am I am I am I am!!!!”
“Hmmm......okay then!” he said, chucking the little box at her. He hoped she’d like it. Knowing her as he did, he knew better than to go for big, expensive, or fancy. So instead, he had gotten her...
“Ooooh!!!! I love it! Yay!!!” she was skipping around the surfer in a happy little circle, waving her new gift in the air. It was a sparkle pen, in a golden color. He thought she’d like it. Apparently, she did. Bright stopped skipping and came to a halt in front of the tanned boy. She smiled at him and fell forward onto his chest. This was new to Fox.
“You okay, Bright??” he asked as he pulled her gently up. She was still smiling like a madwoman.
“Fosky ‘membered today. Bright-ne’s happy now she gotta friend an a pretty pen. Fosky is the nicest person on the shore.” Then she hugged him. Quick but tight around his waist, and she was off running to her trailer. He could see her hand up waving goodbye at him. She was shouting something, but it was lost in the distance growing between them and the wind off the water. So he just stuck his hand up and waved back. She disappeared under the pier, and he headed home.
Good Job, =)...nicely done
It's good! Wheeee! I like it!
Sankyuu all! If anyone wants me to post some more of it, I'll try. As soon as I write it..-^^-'' And if anyone wants to check out other fanfics I've written, please look for NekoChirri-chan at
this site. I look forward to writing more and possibly posting here! Thank you again for teh nice comments!