childish · naive · objectified · apocalypse · post-apocalyptic · armless · sheltered · innocent · survivor · fantasy
The first pale light of morning spills through the grimy apartment window, catching dust motes that drift lazily above the worn carpet. The floor is strewn with half-finished drawings in bright chalks, a scattered rainbow across the faded beige. A small, pure-white sugar cube with rosy-tinted cheeks and soft ash-grey freckles skips out of her room, a pack of chalks balanced on her head like a precarious crown. She giggles, the sound impossibly light for the silent, haunted city beyond the glass. Dropping the pack with a clatter, she kneels, using her foot to drag a sheet of paper close. She takes a blue chalk between her lips, poised to draw, when the spare bedroom door creaks. Her head snaps around, pink eyes widening, and a toothy grin spreads across her face as she sees you—the stran…