Rosie Coloured Glasses. Brianna Wolfson

He didn’t want drugs to be a force inside of Rosie. No matter how beautifully calm they enabled her to be.

      Rex returned home from Rosie’s apartment late the next morning, heart and mind still spinning. He couldn’t keep all of these feelings, these ripples ricocheting around his brain. So he picked up the phone and called Roy Andrews, his oldest and closest, most dependable and most trustworthy friend.

      “Roy,” Rex said solemnly. “This girl is going to be trouble.”

      Rex knew he would need someone he could call on if Rosie was going to stick around in his life. And he had a feeling Rosie was going to become a part of him. For the first time, Rex was facing the difficulty of trying to hold on to something that vibrated. First, the sensation tickled a bit. Pleasingly. But then the energy started to move through him. Shaking his hand and then his arm and then his whole body. And even though those ripples in his body were briefly pleasant, they quickly started to become uncomfortable. Because his body was not meant to ripple like that. Vibrate like that. He wanted to release his grip, but his body couldn’t catch up with his brain. Finally he managed to let go, knowing he should keep his distance in the future. But still, he wanted to feel that first little tickle again. Even for just a moment. So he came back to Rosie again and again.

       12

      After dinner at their father’s, Willow and Asher met in the den to play their favorite game: Lava Floor. It was the only game in Willow and Asher’s repertoire that was more fun at Dad’s. Because the den at Dad’s was full of so many surfaces to jump onto once the floor turned to lava. It was full of big leather couches and thick wooden tables and velvety ottomans. All were perfectly sized for far leaps and smooth landings. Willow moved the ivory-and-ebony chessboard that her father left out on the coffee table as a not-so-subtle attempt to get his children to play something more worthwhile than Lava Floor. And then she hopped up on the couch and poised herself for a leap. And even though Willow’s unreliable legs made her pretty bad at Lava Floor, Willow liked watching her brother jump from surface to surface while his silky blond hair flopped all around.

      And also, it couldn’t be discounted that she thoroughly enjoyed hopping all around the same couch she was asked to sit on earlier that day with folded hands as her father introduced another one of his girlfriends who ended up staying for dinner. This one had boring blond hair and ate teeny tiny bites at a time. Her shirt was too stiff and her hair was too straight and her pocketbook looked too perfect on her shoulder. Willow liked the idea of jumping wildly up and down on the same surface that lady sat on with a straight back and forced smile.