Don't Mean Nothing
Don't Mean Nothing
There was cedar in the beginning and then there were candy canes.
They weren't peppermint candy canes, the bad ones, but the Skittles and rainbow-flavored ones. The ones that just tasted sweet and like cherries and together with the cedar smell lingering after winter, it was perfect.
It wasn't supposed to be cedar, it was supposed to be spring and dandelions. The coast of winter was just out of view but occasionally the wind of it blew over and the scent of cedar from the old and new trees blew with it.
A Christmas tree farm is nowhere to stay in spring but there they were; eating cherry-flavored candy canes and sitting on a tractor.
"You brought me cherry candy canes in April." A whisper as One leaned against the steering wheel. "They don't sell these in April."
Dangerous, the way they sat on the tractor. One with her back on the steering wheel, feet on top of the seat back. Two in reverse with her feet on the wheel. Both half falling off.
Either could fall. They didn't much mind, seeing as they hadn't yet in all the years they'd sat up there.
"Yeah. I found 'em at the store I buy mama’s flowers at, half off and all. I thought I'd pick some up." She shrugged. "I like 'em too, don't mean nothing."
One looked out at the new trees growing. "Yeah, don't mean nothing."
There was a moment, a pause, between One and Two as they sat.
"Thank you, though." A cherry-stained smile.
"O' course. Anything."
There was cedar again but it was warmer than it was before, the scent more unusual as summer made her appearance in the early throes of June.
They were out on the tractor again, staring at the trees growing to be ready soon. For every tree taken away, new ones were put into that old dirt.
It wasn't cherry candy canes this time though, it was mango. Fresh mango, straight from wherever, cool, and fat with juice.
"You found fresh mangos in Alabama?" Two asked. They'd switched spots, her feet were on the seat this time, One's on the wheel.
"What, like it's hard?" She giggled, the flesh sticking between her teeth and juice running down her fingers as she manhandled another piece of chopped-off fruit from the bowl sitting between them.
They would have eaten without waiting to cut them up but the skin was too bitter for their tongues.
"Stop quoting 'Legally Blonde' just cause." Two reached for another piece too. "Seriously though, how'd you get these? Your mama find 'em?"
"Nah. They was at that stand down by the church. They've got boxes of fruit from all over." She shrugged. "Don't mean nothing. I like 'em too."
"Yeah," Two said as she bit down. "Don't mean nothing."
A pause. A moment. Frozen even in the heat of Alabama summer.
"Thank you, though." A juice-stained smile.
"Certainly. Anything."
Cedar blew in from the future this time, instead of the past, heralding the closeness of that winter shore that had seemed much too far off not too long ago.
Blonde curls and brunette ringlets and cedar-smelling bows sat on the tractor once again.
One ran her fingers over the other's ribbons holding her pigtailed ringlets in place, cementing them as yellow bows. Hers were red.
They were sat side by side this time, each one foot on the wheel and one off. No shoes today, they'd taken them off the second they'd gotten home from school.
"You're better at bows than me." Two glanced in the rearview mirror. Blonde and brunette side by side, dark skin and pale in matching jeans and that soft red and yellow. "They don't look right when I do 'em."
"I practice is s'all. You'd be good too if you gave it a shot." One folded back onto the seat. Two reached out for her hand.
They stared out at the Christmas tree farm, listened to the birds yelling and watched the sun start its lazy trot towards setting.
"Thank you," Two said, not looking at One.
"Certainly. Anything," One responded. It was automatic, quick, sharp. An action that was unthinkably sewn into her. "What for?"
"You." Two shrugged. "Simple, ain't it?"
"Yeah."
A pause. A moment hanging in the cedar-tinted air. They'd had a lot of those recently.
"Thank you," One echoed.
"O' course. Anything." The same automatic link running through One was built into Two almost like an engine that kept her heart beating. Almost like an engine that kept their hearts beating. "For what?"
"Simple, ain't it?" She giggled. "You."
A cherry-stained smile met a mango one.
The Voice
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