ENNUI | #projectSMILES

1

The shadows on the walls seem to have a mind of their own. They warp and tease each other as if souls had been breathed into them. It was the little bit of mystique I could ease into the world, all for myself. They were fuzzy but still spoke wonders as always. The flashlight was burning through the 20th pair of triple A batteries since it first clicked on. I maybe did this way to much in my 16 years and maybe I was too old for it but it still made me smile and feel like I was accomplishing something, everyone kept saying I wasn't accomplishing anything but this spoke for itself. Not one other person I knew was able to twist their hands in front of a flashlight for hours and stay occupied. Did that make me weird? Yes. But did I care? No.
     The wall was its own piece of moving art, telling a story. This one I did often. The Rewritten (shadow-puppeteered) Tale of Little Red Riding Hood. It was nearing the end. The wolf's mouth clamped a unexpecting flower as Little Red scrambled away, leaving a trail of empty light behind her. The wolf melted away out of the flash light and Little Red vanished into the far distance. My hands danced away from the light's center and I clicked it off. I flipped the switch to the lamp on the shared dresser of me and my twin, Ada.
     Ada was everything I wasn't. She was athletic. She was pretty. She was likeable. She was perfect. She even arranged her side of the room to look that way. Pretty in Pink. Fuzzy bed covers and rugs with a pink curtain on her window, even with pink faux pillows to match. It got old after seeing it a thousand times and when Ada saw my disinterest in her colourful style she would switch it to a brighter colour. Last it was pastel purple, next it's going to be yellow, I'm sure. It got damned annoying.
     I look at the clock. It was on my side of the wall and was coloured a respectable burgundy. It fit the scheme of my side of the room which was random. The clock read 10:23. In exactly seventeen minutes Ada's eyelash-adorned car would roll up into the driveway playing one of her inspiration girl-power songs, just back from cheer. Of course she had learned how to drive (and of course she went for cheer) already. I was still working on the initial test or dreading the day my dad would drag my ass out to get it taken. I lean over to open my heavy curtains and turned the light off as the natural light filtered in. I was too lazy to take the black sheet off of Ada's curtain at the moment so her room stayed dim.
     I flop back on my bed and look up at the sticker-dotted ceiling. They were curling and peeling off. I had applied them when I was eight with a little help from Ada. She had done the occasional gel ones. Many of them had fallen off and left little sticky areas where godforsaken pieces of everything stuck to so there were blobby areas where dust and dirt clumped together. I began counting each sticker than lined my side of the room--marked by the connection of white paint to pink paint of my sister's side.
    One, two, three...forty, forty-one, forty-two...eighty-nine. No ninety.
     Another sticker had fallen sometime between last Sunday and today. I sit up in my bed. It fell on my bed but was likely kicked off when I was sleeping, if it didn't then it was lost in the folds. I flatten my blanket out before checking the floor. I looked at the vacuum in the corner. When had it last gone on? Was the sticker gone and unaccounted for? The dust compartment was empty.
     "I vacuumed yesterday."
     I turn to Ada. She was standing in the doorway in her gold and white cheer outfit. She had one hand with duffel bag slung over her right shoulder and the other hand held two pom-poms besides her long, perfect leg. I was so absorbed into my search that I didn't hear her come in. How long had I been looking for? I looked at the clock, 10:40.
     Side note: Mom and dad would be back in an hour and two minutes.
     "Why?" I yelped.
     She drops her duffel next to the dresser and lies the pom-poms on top of it, "You're obsessed." she chuckles.
     Ada walks to her closet and dives her hand in the pocket of one of her pair of jeans. She walks over to me and holds out her hand. In it is a single no-longer-sticky sticker. I take it and place it next to the pile on my side dresser.
     "Thanks." I mumble.
     Things like that made me go crazy. Everything must be accounted for. I had made the rule when our mother said that we lose everything. Ada lost eight things since then and I had lost not one, except the phone I had let a homeless person keep after they had snatched it out of my pants but that didn't count.
     "So guess what?" Ada muses.
     "What." I say non-enthusiastically.
     "Peyton asked me out. Again."
     "Again." I repeat monotone.
     Third time. Both times she had one day came home from that relationship pretty much in tears and begging for my comfort. Of course I would always give it, I'm not mean. Peyton Chase was Ada's addiction.
     She begins stripping down to change into a black dress. She changes quickly but takes her time with her hair and makeup. She jogs out of the room giddily 20 minutes later.
     "Have fun!" I call.
     "Have fun with yourself!" She calls back.

My parents find me sitting in the living room binging netflix when they get home. I'm more so breezing through a documentary series than binging nonsense.
     "Where's Ada?"
     I shrug, "Downtown somewhere. Peyton asked her out again."
     My mom sits next to me and elbows me, "Why didn't you go with her. Could've gotten yourself a new friend. Maybe even given your sister a run for that boy."
     I know she's joking. Ada was a lot more self-conscious than I was. I was hardly as flawless as an overripe banana. I chuckle and toss the remote on the couch, getting up. My father was already dropping his bags--about to take his seat on the couch.
     "If Ada can't pin him. I have no chance."
     I head to my room and close the door behind me. I make sure it clicks close before standing in front of the mirror. I look different than  Ada, dry skin, pale lips--droopy eyes. I radiated an awkward aura that people tended to avoid. It came naturally to me. Yeah, this girl wasn't giving anyone a run for their crush.