Below is a work of fiction that I wrote as part of a generative exercise with a writers’ group I’m in. We read an excerpt of ’s recent newsletter on orienting the reader with context-appropriate details, and each worked on a writing something from a first-person point of view that would allow the reader to know both the hair and eye color of that first-person character, in the least cliched way we could manage in under fifteen minutes. In case this exercise speaks to you, give it a try and let me know how it goes.
My mother braids my hair every morning before school. She sits me down on the step stool facing the television, but even then I'm not allowed to turn it on.
Be still, she tells me without telling me, jerking my shoulders straight when I hunch over, bored already. I glance past my own reflection in the curved surface of the CRT screen to watch her brush out the tangles that have accumulated in my hair overnight. Her face is scrunched in a scowl, and it's my fault.
"Ow, you're hurting me!"
She ignores that, pulling me up so I sit properly again.
I find something else to focus my attention on, to distract from the tightness of the first twist of braid as it gathers on the right side of my head. The window next to us has this handprint streak across it, and I don't know if it's my little brother's or mine. She won’t notice it right now, but she'll blame it on me either way when she eventually does.
At school, the other kids pull at my hair, and when I get home, it’s the first thing my mother asks me about.
Doesn't it tickle your nose when your hair is falling all over your face like that? Why can't you keep it tidy?
For a moment, I look back down at the floor. There's a small pile of black hair that's starting to form around me, and I make a mental note to pick it up before she asks me to.
Sit up. She jerks my head to the left as she starts to work on the second side. My eyes start to water – that was too hard. In the reflection of the CRT I see her look up at the clock.
We're already late. She rushes through the rest of the braid, tighter than normal.
Now look at me. She turns me around in the stool so I'm looking directly into her eyes. I try to hold a smile so there’s one less thing to scold me over.
Her own dark brown eyes look back into mine for a millisecond, but then they dart around my head, checking if the braids are even. She nudges the right one into place and tightens it again.
Everyone says that we look alike, but I can never tell if she thinks that's a compliment or not.
Okay, get your things. It’s time to go.