Sin Fronteras Spring 2018 Sin Fronteras 2018 | Page 22

Shards
Jimena de Obeso
She was blue. Bath pastel bubble blue, the kind you only get to see in the
movies. Her hair was also blue. And her dress. And her face. Everything about
her was covered in it. Painted in it. Made of it. She walked through the marble
door as neon lights flashed through her flowing mane. And she couldn’t help
but feel the chills going through her spine. Chills that turned to sparks at the
exact moment in which her trembling hands brushed the metal bar, fingers
grasping hard at the sight of illuminated stairs. She breathed in. And out. And
took. One. Step. Forward.
Stares. From everyone. From everywhere. Eyes covered by a thick layer
of admiration mixed with idolatry and a touch of green tinted envy. Eyes, looking
at her like the sun looks at its moon. Nostalgic, distant, and wanting. As if the
intensity of their stares could feed her, a rush of ecstasy flowed through her
veins. This was it. This. Was. It. It was everything. With every step she took the
power inside her kept growing. Making her stand taller, prouder, painting a
golden crown on top of her head. She wanted to savor the moment, to feed on
it forever, but before she could even wrap her mind around the idea of its
ending, it was already there.
She was red. Blazing charcoal burning red, the kind you only get to see
in your dreams. She was fire, light in everything the blue dulled out. Pretty. No.
Beautiful, like a goddess taken out of a book. Walking slowly behind a fainting
blue mane, stealing the looks around the room. It was her they were looking at.
And suddenly, the crown felt too big on the blue head. As the crowd
zoomed in like buzzing bees to get a better look, she felt how someone tossed
her aside. Discarded her, as if she had been obstructing the view of the better
one. Falling down onto her knees, she felt the world tumbling down. Columns
of blazing fire eating the room, asphyxiating her on the ground. The fire stopped.
Slowly, as if time had stopped entirely, she looked up only to catch a
glimpse of red fabric just above her. Tilting her head, the crown already broken
on the ground, she found sparkling ruby eyes, looking down on her. Smiling.
Taunting her. Hissing on her bleeding ear, whispering to her to stay in her place.
The room went dark. So she rushed to the bathroom, too ashamed to say a word,
and stared at the mirror hanging on the wall.
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