Diamonds

By Amethyst Turner

Pressurize me

Press down on me

Shove me down

Knock me aside

But don't come back one day

And expect me to accept you back

When I'm a diamond

XXX

There were parties to go to around this time of year, family and otherwise, but Melissa didn't feel like going to any of them.

She felt deflated, a balloon popped in one swift, brutal brandishing of a pin. She wanted to stay home and cry more than anything else.

How unfair was it that before she even got the moment of triumph that would have come with breaking up with Trent, he'd gotten to her first? How was it fair that he got to neglect her and ignore her and talk over her and then sleep with another woman not two days after their fight? How could fate have twisted it all in his favor?

The girl he was in bed with had been a young brunette, pretty in the ease of sleep, ugly in the tightened state of wakefulness. Or maybe that was just what Melissa saw through the blur that was her rage.

Trent hadn't even apologized. He blamed her for it. You stopped calling, his excuse was. I thought you were done with me.

Another sob clawed its way out of her throat. Her sister squeezed her shoulder, sighing deeply. She might never find a man to love for the rest of her life, but at least there was her Ashley to lean on. Melissa sighed, too, and wondered if Ashley was living the right life, far enough away that people couldn't hurt her.

XXX

On the night before Christmas, Owl wouldn't stop talking.

Curled up on the couch across from their stockings, they drank their coffee and hummed along to Christmas songs on the radio, but mostly, Owl talked and Amaya listened a little bit.

Now, she was on the subject of how Christmas had been when she was a girl.

"Just awful," was her verdict. "My siblings would always wake me up too early because Ma and Papa wouldn't let them go downstairs and look in the stockings until everyone up. So everyone was all groggy and morning breath-y and wearing pajamas, and our hair was all messed up so in all the pictures we look like little Einsteins. And the gifts were always really cheapy little things that ended up in the trash, you know? Bubbles and, I don't know, pens and things--"

Amaya cut her off with a kiss so aggressive that she started to push away, instinctively. Then Owl relaxed, letting Amaya work her way around her mouth, biting gently on the tip of Owl's tongue. "Shh," she said. "You'll scare away the Christmas magic if you're too loud."

"Sorry. Am I annoying you?" Owl asked. She pulled back, flushed. Her lips were swollen with the kiss, red and delicious. Amaya went back for more, but Owl turned her head. "What was Christmas like when you were a kid?"

Amaya groaned. "I don't want to talk," she complained. "It's Christmas. Can't we just . . . you know?"

"We can make out anytime," Owl said. "But right now, I want to get to know you better. Don't you want to get to know me too?"

Somehow, Amaya already felt like she knew what she needed to. She could find out all about Owl from the way she smelled when she came home from her walks in the park and the way she smiled in her sleep sometimes. She could find out things that were more important than Christmases past, just by glancing at her. Just by touching her, by holding her. Why couldn't Owl understand that?

"I do," Amaya sighed. She held Owl around her neck, admiring the way her throat tapered into a neat little hollow above her chest. She kissed the hollow, running her nose along the cool, smooth flesh. "I just don't want to remember the past right now. I want to be with you, not people I used to know"

That seemed to do the trick. Owl wrapped her legs around Amaya's and smiled. "Okay," she said.

Minutes later, they were asleep with their legs still twined together, so deeply entrenched in their sleep that they forgot to get up and fill each other's stockings like they both had planned to do.

XXX

On Christmas morning, Daniel awoke to his cousins dive bombing his bed. He groaned and pulled his pillow over his face, too tired to open his eyes.

"Get up, Danny!" shouted Alex, clawing at the pillow. "It's Christmas!"

"I got a gameboy," Jamie exclaimed. He joined his brother on Daniel's bed, waving the little blue box in Daniel's face with a manic grin. "And so much candy. You got one too, and a king size Hershey's."

Daniel sat up and moaned. "Have you guys been opening my presents?" A small happiness settled over him. It was Christmas and his family was here all around him; what could feel safer?

Alex giggled. "Just a few."

"Okay." Daniel pushed his little cousins off the bed and rolled back over toward the window. "Go downstairs. I'll be there in a minute."

His cousins left the room, slamming the door behind them. Daniel could hear them tripping over each other to get downstairs first.

Daniel sat up in his bed, listening to the gentle buzz of conversation downstairs. He thought of all his relatives sitting around the table, watching his mother fill it with both traditional Indian dishes and some new implements: bread pudding and Christmas pancakes for the kids. He swung his legs over the mattress, knowing that he should go join them before more relatives appeared in his room to herd him downstairs.

Before he did that, though, he opened up his curtains and spent a moment looking out of his bedroom window, looking through the snow down at the house where, so many times before, he had seen those mysterious blue eyes and wondered who they belonged to.

He'd only been looking for a moment when a tall, blonde figure came up the sidewalk, taking long strides that left scattered footprints in the snow. Daniel followed her progress all the way to Amethyst Turner's front porch.

Daniel smiled. Maybe even guardian angels needed guardian angels. He slid away from the bed and went to join his family downstairs.

XXX

When at last the door opened, Owl wanted to throw herself into the girl's arms. She wanted to lift Amethyst up and spin her in the snow, take her away and never bring her back. But the girl peeked through the crack between the door and the crack, eyes hostile and wet.

"Amethyst?" Owl knelt down on the porch, feeling the cold seep into her knees from the wet, cold stone. "It's so good to see you, Baby."

Aimee looked at her with something like disgust and said, "Go away. You're gonna wake up Daddy."

The words hit Owl with a sharp pang. "Aimee, I know you're mad at me. I know you're upset. I would be too. But you have to understand, I had to leave. I needed to move on with my life."

Amethyst glared at her. "You didn't have to leave," she said.

"Amethyst, please. Just give me one more chance. I might not live here anymore, but we can still be great friends, can't we?" Seeing the doubtful expression on Aimee's face, she repeated, "Can't we?"

Giving a little sigh, Amethyst finally said, "Fine. Let me put on my clothes--"

"No, don't worry about that," Owl said. "I have something for you at my house."

"Okay."

XXX

Amethyst let Owl carry her out of the car and up the front walk. She didn't want to, but she wasn't wearing any shoes and her feet felt so numb that she thought she might fall over if she tried to walk on them.

Owl was warm and solid against her, just as she had been on all those nights they spent reading together on the couch. The smell of her was familiar, and the way her loose hairs tickled Amethyst's face as they flickered in the wind.

Aimee clutched Daniel's jacket closer around her. In the pocket was a little stuffed mink that had been waiting at the very top of the stocking, little paws preying on the edge of the fur lining. She thought the mink was wonderful, having achieved the look of an animal that seemed so intelligent yet looked so wild.

She wanted to show Owl the mink, but she didn't want to have to explain about Daniel.

The house where Owl lived now looked pretty with Icicles hanging from the awning like the gentle teeth of an ice creature. Snow glittered on the roof and collected on the tops of the cars.

Owl propped Amethyst on her hip and began digging in her pocket for something. Bits of snow blew under the awning, trapping themselves in Owl's eyelashes and on her lips. She found her key and twisted the lock to let them in.

Inside, the whole house smelled like vanilla and burnt sugar, sort of like the way Daniel's Christmas cookie had tasted, except for, this was almost pleasant.

"Come here, come here," said Owl, ushering her into the bathroom before she could take in the rest of the house. "Let's get you dressed, first." She produced a soft red sweater, a wide-eyed reindeer stitched into the front, and a pair of fuzzy green pants that felt soft as a puppy on her legs. Owl combed her hair and washed her face, wiping away the crud around her nose from a long night of sniffling and wiping too hard. She fixed Aimee's hair in two braids and twisted them both with red rubber bands at the bottom. "Lovely," she said when she'd finished.

Amethyst considered herself in the mirror. She smiled, almost surprised when the girl in the mirror followed suit. It didn't look like her, the shiny hair and rosy cheeks and bright, glad eyes. She turned her face in toward Owl's thigh and tried not to cry because she knew this warmth was temporary -- soon, she would be cast back into the realm of cold, gray, darkness with no one to save her anymore.

XXX

Hard times
Gonna make you wonder why you even try
Hard times
Gonna take you down and laugh when you cry
These lives
And I still don't know how I even survive
Hard times

-Hard Times by Paramore