2.1.0

Agate Amita was loved when she was little. She is loved now. There was, however, a time in her life when she was not loved.
Some people have it easy; they have always been loved and perhaps always will be. Others have it harder; perhaps they were never loved. Mayhaps you, my dear reader, are one of these. Maybe you are thinking to yourself right now, why would she be throwing herself a pity party because at a certain time in her life, she was not loved, even though now that time is over? Well Agate would like to say to you, dear reader, that if that happens to be your way of thinking then you are getting ahead of yourself. She is not throwing myself a pity party, only simply stating a fact; there was a time in her life when Agate was not loved.

It came as a shock. At the time of the accident, Agate was five, so she remembers very little of it. There had been rain pouring down the windows of the minivan she was in; the drops had been like little beads of glass, illuminating the night that went on outside the warmth and security of the minivan. Then something happened, although Agate was never sure what. Bright lights filled the cabin-like space that she was in, and she felt herself jerked around in place as the van spun, out of control, through the night. She remembers the sick feeling of no longer being able to identify which way was up, and crying out for help. At the age of five, the consciousness only knows how to care for oneself, so that's what she did. She screamed from the safety of her secured carseat for someone to make sure she was okay. Her mother, on the other hand, seemed to her to have left the van altogether by the time it had stopped moving. There was no one in the front seat, no one there to accompany Agate's screams but the cool night air.
Her mother was found before the minivan was. The funeral was held a week later.
Yes, she had a father. Alcott Amita seemed a great man. While his wife was alive, he seemed the perfect father: loving and caring, sharing parenthood for Agate equally with his wife, holding a full time job as a banker. Yet after she was gone, Agate noticed a change in him. Maybe he was always this way and put on a show for his wife, or maybe something in him broke with her death, but Alcott stopped being the great man he once seemed to be. He rejected Agate outright, and put her up for adoption within the month that his wife died. When Agate lost her mother's life, she lost her father's love.
For months, she was transferred from one foster home to another. Everyone was too nice, trying to be understanding about something that they didn't understand. Finally, she was adopted by the Drifters. Mrs Drifter and Mrs Amita had been best friends since the first day of their college careers and had both had children in the same year. Agate started her new life with a new brother and a new set of parents, and was once again loved.

1.1.1

After coffee has gone cold, it begins to taste as though someone dropped brownie crumbs into a glass of water and swirled it all up.

I should not have thought that. I look into the coffee cup and think I might barf. I pour it down the drain.

The night is still in control of the sky outside, and even though it it morning for me, I can still see stars outside my kitchen world. As I rinse out my coffee cup, I wonder who else has glanced up at those stars over the decade. Oh, what an insightful poet I am. I now think that perhaps I could be the corniest person awake on my side of the world.

My kitchen is bright, the yellow walls reflecting the light around the room as if daylight was streaming in. Our kitchen, I correct myself. Not that no one else is around to claim it. My roomates are still all fast asleep, their own adventurous dreams greatly outweighing my cold coffee in importance. I never have been able to make coffee, even the instant stuff seems beyond the reach of my intelligence. In fact, food of all kinds seems to be beyond my comprehension. I eat breakfasts of apples and lunches of carrots because raw food is infinitely better than anything that I could make. The one instance of grilled cheese I tried ended in the firefighters explaining how to light a gas stove. I choose a banana for breakfast.

I set my foot outside the door as the stars are disappearing. Thirty minute walk to the studio. No one else in my studio will be leaving their homes for hours yet. The best time to be getting work in is when the sun and myself are the only ones communicating. Time to get started.