Just listen to the rhythm of my heart

I set out on my own to do chores. Listening to the Darkness, I sat at a red light and picked up my my hair clip. The stereo screamed in a deafening falsetto and I tried to put my hair up before the light turned green. Twirled it up, clipped it crooked. Twirled it up, fell out of the clip. Twirled it up, clipped up like a cockatoo. Got mad and threw the clip across the car. The guy in the truck next to me was grinning. I tipped him a salute and peeled away.
 

In the mall, I snuck into the bookstore and took pictures of the children's display cases for my class project. I pretended to be only pretending to be interested in the sappy Christmas books.

In the dollar store, I loaded my arms with holiday crap. At the cost of our sanity, I deliberately purchased a silver jingle bell for Gavin, as he has been shaking a jewelry box for 2 days to pretend he had one. From the racks of tacky Christmas accessories, I pulled out a red and green hair tie with tiny tinkling bells sewn all over it. Oh, that will annoy the heck out of Mike, I thought, and threw it on the counter with the rest of my loot.

The Kanoehe library was full for a weekday morning. A group of uniformly dressed missionary boys stood by the new books display. I moved closer to them, eavesdropping. What do a pack of 19 year-old boys in church suits talk about at a library? One was bragging about his Rolex, explaining all the ways to detect fakes. Disappointing. My hair jingled, and one turned and looked at me. His name badge said "Elder William". I don't know the history of this "elder" business, but I need one that says "Old Crone Holly". Before my noisy hair could get me thrown out of the library by the reference librarian in the snowman sweater, I finished my homework and ran to the car. I waved at the cop shop and nearly drove into an oncoming van as I exited the lot.

Class was a smorgasbord of end-of-semester foods. We walked over to the cafe afterward to watch Mike sing and shovel pie into Gavin. Batting my eyes attractively at Mike, I inhaled a sip of diet Coke and coughed myself violently off the chair. "Real sexy there," he said. A classic Mustang sat next to our Jetta in the parking lot. Its deep metallic blue paint looked like candy under the street light. I ran my hands over it. Spread my arms across it. Mike looked sadly at the VW and bent into the trunk. "MIKE!" I yelled, hoping to see his head jerk up and hit the door. He screamed, "STOP DOING THAT!" But I need my hobbies.

Good day.