Twofer! Writing exercise: Mint a Metaphor & Invent Structure

Mint a Metaphor

I discovered the pair of red heels when I was five. My mother, as usual, was hosting a charity luncheon in town at Tabitha’s Tea House over on Charity and Main. This time it was for a shelter for victims of domestic abuse. The shelter itself wasn’t in our county, heavens no. In fact, Kingston had the lowest domestic crime rate in the state. The beneficiary shelter was in Paxton, the closest thing to a big city for almost sixty miles. In fact, the more prideful or intoxicated inhabitants took to calling it “the little big city”. Most everyone else just called it Hell.
Anyway, Mama was in town on that particular afternoon and my nanny, Jenny Sue was busy trying to get the dirt off my favorite Sunday dress. Normally, she’d just have Ella, our maid, clean it, but she had the day off on account of her baby, Jeremiah, running a fever of 108. Mama said Daddy would be angry ‘bout Ella staying home, but Jenny Sue offered to make sure the housework got done before Daddy got home from his fishing trip with the Mayor of the next county over.
I wasn’t looking for anything in particular. Usually when I managed to get away from Jenny Sue—which wasn’t hard especially when that ranch hand, Cash Belew, came ‘round for his wages on the first Friday of the month—I’d just sit in front of the open closet door and watch the shadows of the trees outside run lovingly over my Mama’s pastel dresses. Sometimes, if I was bold, I’d run my own small hand down one or two.
This time, as I was trying to count the number of eyelets on a summer dress, I noticed the corner of a black box, peaking out from behind Mama’s best shall that she’d only ever worn when Daddy was sworn in. I didn’t even realize what I was doin’ until it was sitting there in front of me on the floor. I opened the lid and my eyes right about popped outside my head at the sight of them. They were the most beautiful pair of shoes I ever did see. I remember how the shadows of the branches parted just enough for the sun to kiss the deep red suede, caressing each dip and curve and stopping with a flash on the silver tip of the heel. I wanted to try them on so badly, but Jenny Sue called me down for a washing. I could hear her on the stairs and shoved the box back into the closet and ran to meet her at the top. She asked me if I was riflin’ through Mama’s things again and of course I didn’t tell her about those high heels.

I woke up from a dream about wearing the heels and all I could see was the shadows from the moonlight trees dancing across the curtains of my four-poster bed. The voices were muted, but my ears were so attuned to them that I could’ve heard them from a mile away. I crawled slowly across the snowy linens, careful not to get tangled in the new nightgown Daddy had bought on his way home from fishing. I didn’t understand what they were saying so I opened my door and made my way down the hall, prayin’ that the wooden floor would keep my secret. The door was only opened slightly, but I could see their shadows on the wall behind the bed. I’d never heard Daddy sound so angry. Not even when Samuel accidentally left the coop open and lost over thirty chickens. Mama’s quiet voice soothed where his electrified my nerves. I’d only ever heard the word “whore” when Mama first mentioned today’s luncheon to him last month. Maybe he just didn’t want Mama helping those girls in the shelter. I held onto this thought as I saw the red heels hit the wall.

Invent Structure

In Love and Death

1.

My father is a taxidermist. My first real memory is of waking up in my crib and looking into the eyes of a grey kitten we would later nickname, Frisky. My first meeting with Frisky didn’t exactly go as my dad had planned. Apparently the cat was to be my reward for saying my first word, but instead of being excited about the prospect of a new toy, I took one look at the kitten’s eyes and burst into tears. I don’t remember my father racing into the room nor do I remember throwing Frisky from the crib. But whenever my dad tells the story, he came racing into the nursery, alarmed by a change in my cries, and found Frisky on his side beneath my crib, head bent at a curious angle, and me clinging to the bars of my bed, staring at the body on the floor. As soon as my father lifted me to his chest I stopped crying, but remained fixated on the animal lying on the ground. My first word may have been “Mama”, but my second was “sleeping”.

2.

When I was in fourth grade I convinced my father to participate in career day. It took two weeks of straight begging until he finally looked me in the eye and said, Meggie your friends aren’t going to understand what I do, but if you really want me to do, I will. Of course I wanted him to do it. The truth was, I didn’t really understand what he did either, I only knew he brought things back to life in a way in the cool basement of our house.
The class was quiet as he slowly wrote his occupation down on the chalkboard in front of us. My bouncing knees kept hitting the bottom of the desk all throughout his speech. I work in a mortuary, he told my class. He explained how it was his job to prepare a body for viewing and burial. He thought people should look their best when they were put into the ground. I didn’t understand at the time why he didn’t mention Frisky or any of the other pets in our house. Someone asked him if the dead people smelled bad. Another if he had been the one to put makeup on her grandmother when she died last Christmas. He answered all of their questions calmly, but he never once mentioned the magic he worked after a death, nor did he look at me. Something triggered in my brain.
I raised my hand to ask my question, but the bell rang and I forgot.

3. 

My mother died when I was eight months old. I don’t remember at all when she was alive, but I think he must have shown me her picture often at a young age because I remember her face. When I was seven I found their old home videos and watched them religiously. She was one of those natural beauties.
My dad both loved and hated to watch them, but he never said no when I wanted to pop one into the VCR. When I asked him as a teenager, he told me I had been the one to find her dead. She’d come into the nursery in the predawn hours. My dad was asleep in the other room when he heard the change in my cries. It was then he found her body on the floor in front of my crib.

4.

My father didn’t get into taxidermy until after her death. In fact, Frisky was his first success. As I grew older our pets grew bigger. When I was twenty I asked him why he started. Love, he said to me as he trimmed the nails on a golden retriever I had found in the street and wanted to name Vincent. When I made the assumption that he loved his work, he was quick to correct me. He told me he was the one who prepared her for burial and the hardest thing was seeing the lifelessness in her expression. I loved your mother, he told me as he gently combed Vincent’s hair, and I wanted to find a way. He paused and I started to ask the one question I’d forgotten since he’d talked about fixing people up during my fourth grade career day.
Dad, I began, have you ever—
I couldn’t finish because something in his eyes told me the answer and the already cool basement became an icebox sending chills up my arms. He gestured to industrial looking steel door, which I knew was where he kept the bodies prior to his working on them. I’d never been curious enough about his work to open it before. As I place my fingertips on the handle, my father’s voice broke the silence.
You were so young Meggie, and I just didn’t want you to lose the ones you love.
Frisky? I asked.
He took a deep breath and told me how we used to sit out on the porch in the evenings and when he started to come around on a regular basis my dad put out food for it. I’d just worked up the courage to pet the kitten when he found Frisky lying on the side of the street.
My hand closed about the steel and I took a deep breath before opening the door.
Mom?