Outer Space / Carry On | Michael Clifford AU

7.

I was actually excited for family movie night that night. I needed to keep that lock on my imagination, so it wouldn't wander off and paint more earthquake invoking portraits or start thinking things it shouldn't be thinking.

Sitting down on the black couch. Watching Dad turn the tv on.  "What's his name?" I asked as Dad selected the movie on the tv. It was Joan's pick: Pretty in Pink. "The guy that directed this?"

"John Hughes." Dad answered first. John Hughes directed Pretty in Pink. 

Chronicling everything made it easier to keep the key in the lock for the time being. Joan ate three sugar cookies. 

"Busy minds seldom have time to wander," Charlie said to me once. I don't think he gave me that advice with the intent that I'd use it this way. He meant that busy minds needed to be stilled so they could wander and process and imagine and feel and think about the colour of Michael Clifford's pink lips and how it's possible for DNA to even produce such a colour...

Ugh. This was easier when I was in Science and head first in a list of baby names."Wait," I said, as Dad was about to press play. "I didn't tell you my names. I came up with them in Science."

Dad looked amused. "How does baby names come up in Science?"

"I was running an experiment on the quality of life of kids named Rocky," I said, knowing that was still his favourite boy name. Joan and I were definitely on team Anything But Rocky. "Conclusion: their lives sucked."

"Did you get your sarcasm from Science too?"

I nodded, "Like you always say, it's a really good school. So good you can learn multiple skills in one class."

Dad laughed, no, bellowed, as he usually did. I'm pretty sure my brother or sister had already guessed they had a big friendly giant as a Dad. "What'd you come up with?"

"So, for a girl, Sage," I ignored the pained expressed gracing my Dad's face at that moment. Joan sat beside him beaming. I really liked Sage. It was a good, strong choice for a baby. It didn't matter, though, I thought for sure the baby was going to be a boy. "And for a boy, Copper."

Dad reacted less pained than he had to Sage. "Do you mean Cooper?"

"No, I mean Copper. Like The Fox & The Hound... remember?"

The couch shook with another one of Dad's laugh. "You want to name your brother after a dog?"

"A noble one," I defended. "He didn't kill his friend even though it was in his nature to. Don't you think that's a good lesson?"

"Just as good as any lesson that could be found in Rocky. And there's seven Rocky's," he said with a confident smile "That's a whole plethora of lessons right there."

Joan poked him. "Strong argument there," she teased. "Is that how you win all your work cases? Present the judge with lessons from Rocky?"

Dad ignored both of us, dipping his head down towards Joan's belly. "I can't wait until your earth side little guy, I'm outnumbered with these two."

"And you're so sure he's a boy?" Joan looked down at her belly, rubbing her hand over it.

"I'm fifty percent sure," Dad said.

While they'd been talking, I'd already pressed play on the movie. "Hey," I interrupted with a grin on my face, pointing to the tv. "We could always name him Duckie."

"No one is naming anyone Duckie," said Joan.

"Or Rocky," I added.

"Or Copper," Dad finished.

"We've still got a few weeks to go," Joan said patiently. She could be in labour and she still probably wouldn't let it get to her that the baby didn't have name.

"Only two weeks now," I pointed out with raised eyebrows. "Which doesn't inspire much confidence given that you've had almost nine months."

"Don't you know better than to stress out a pregnant woman?" Joan asked, but she was smiling. Really smiling. The lock burst open and suddenly Joan's cheeks were flushed and there were tiny, cute woodland creatures braiding flowers into her hair.

Then, my stomach lurched. Flowers in her hair... 

No, I blinked, sending the animals and the flowers and the rosy cheeks away and back up to whichever brain neuron delivered them. It felt wrong to be here smiling at Joan and a bunch of imagined forest animals while the rainbow portrait of Mum, with tiny flowers painted through her blue hair, sat upstairs on my desk, unfinished.  It would probably always be unfinished.

I didn't say anything else for the rest of the movie. Afterwards, I went up to bed but I didn't rush to the Lonely Hearts Club like I usually did. I sat at my desk and stared at the portrait of Mum for the longest time.

I flirted with the idea of giving her silver stars in place of eyes, but it didn't feel right. I brushed the idea away and waited for something to come to me. Anything. The longer I stared at it, the more frustrated I got. I had nothing. My head was empty. There was nothing in it or on the paper. 

Not a small gust of inspiration, or a lightning strike of life. Not even a passing tumbleweed. My creative surge had crumbled in on itself and my imagination was locked away without a key to open it, just like I'd wished for earlier.

I jumped into the Lonely Hearts Club quickly, just to say hi to everyone. That night, I didn't dream of colours or wake up in the middle of the night with a desperate need to paint. In fact, I had the best sleep I'd had all week. 

When I woke up, the world had never felt more ordinary.

i'm so excited you have no idea. this is really where the story starts to pick up and i hope you love it