Economy and Jealousy

Posted on July 10, 2009 by Phoebe 83No Commentshttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.phoebenorth.com%2F2009%2F07%2F10%2Feconomy-and-jealousy%2FEconomy+and+Jealousy2009-07-10+21%3A02%3A00Phoebehttp%3A%2F%2Fphoebeeating.dreamhosters.com%2F%3Fp%3D83

I sold my car. I now have enough money to pay off my credit cards, put some in savings, and get married.

I might write about cars tomorrow–a life history in four and six cylinders, what it means to be mobile. But right now, I’m pleased with my writing, and I wanted to share this:

“Nestor,” I said. He didn’t look up, so I repeated the name, louder this time. He flashed his gaze up at me. For a second, an image sparkled in my mind: sunset on Andromeda Prime, deep red light burnishing to brown. Then it was gone.

“Yes?” he answered softly. Too softly. It was like he had no back bone at all. I sighed.

“We’re bringing you with us,” I said. “Away from here. Some place safe and not so . . . morbid.”

“Yeah!” Eb interrupted suddenly, brightly. “We’ll take you to my planet. Andromeda Prime. It’s a beautiful place. Very green. Not quite so fluorescent as this, but there are many plants, and much blue-green water. What’s the color called? Turquoise? And the sky is a sort of purple. It’s very warm there now. Nearly high summer. We can take you on a barge.”

I turned to Eb, narrowing my gaze, staring. His eyes were huge and black—his pupils almost seemed to spill over to the whites. It was an expression I’d seen before, plenty of times—one I’d heard matched to his eager babbling often enough, too. But never to anyone else. That sort of excitement had always, before then, been directed at me, and only me.

But Eb didn’t even notice how I stared at him. He was too busy watching Nestor rub his hand slowly against the back of his neck.

Dee notices Eb noticing Nestor. I love awkward love triangles, teenaged jealousies. I want to write honestly about those things, even when the parties involved are aliens.