julie and raechel's house

• pink warm & heavy but in a cozy way; jake & jessie always trailing around; the cluttered shoe/"mud" room; the downstairs lights always being off & all of the walls a soft/worn pink; an item from the day/night's most recent meal carefully covered with tinfoil always resting patiently on the dark stove-top

robyn's house

• yellow & stuffy (like pollen) and the air 35% thicker & stagnant but in a good way and all of the doors wooden & all of the carpets thick

the high school blue science bathroom

• there was always a cold draft & the slightly-open window let you smell the outside (and told you that some anonymous girl was recently smoking in here); the light was always dimmed & it was hard to look in the mirror & there were always things written in the 3rd bathroom stall (approx. ~3% of which my own words); its scent was almost always a distinctive mixture of sunchips, cigarettes, and bleach (in that order)

the high school auditorium we had drama rehearsals in

• dim & confining but also warm & inviting; kim eating snacks and sitting on top of tables or on the edge of the stage with her legs hanging down (so she could hop off immediately as soon as our drama teacher walked in) & andrew singing 'hey jude' in a cringey yet endearing still-a-sophomore-in-high-school kind of way

the bicentennial / running track on summer weekend mornings

• "nippy" & dark-blue frosted mornings that grew gradually green & muggy, spreading out from the sun warmth to become green foresty happy; those tiny pretty summer bugs that would come swimming out of the trees at me while i'm changing the song on my ipod & wearing my blue running shorts

aj & brook's kitchen

• thicker, clean cabbage air & pinesol washed on the scuffed-up floors; exercise equipment stuffed in the living room corner beyond all of the toys

the living room on blanchard street

• always felt very high-up (altitude-wise); the green perforated curtains always flowing up a lil from the wind (mom always had the windows open); can't explain the scent but it made my nostrils flare a little and i always felt low-key guilty & sad upon entering because the first thing i'd notice was the black burnt imprint on the arm of the green tufted loveseat (that sat across from the green tufted sofa mom loved), from the time in 7th grade when i had friends over and we made whimsical spontaneous decision to bake cookies (in the most chaotic & haphazard manner imaginable) and after "rescuing" the tray of cookies we nearly forgot in the oven, i came to present them to everyone on the living room sofa and illogically rested the pan on the arm of the loveseat and heard a sticky scorching sound and pulled it away to find i burnt it..

my freshman year dorm room with logan

• small & tucked & green & stuffy sunshine; the wooden closet door always left open; my red corner table the first thing you see when you enter; phyllis playing bad 'brand new' covers on guitar downstairs with the door ajar vs. lily straightening her warm blond hair in the 3rd floor washroom vs. name/faceless upperclassmen boys loudly longboarding down mellen street when you peer nosily outside down the window

elise & ana's dorm room

• the coziest room i've ever experienced; christmas lights around the room all year long & the shades deeply drawn; all the lights off (substituted with campus-banned candles); bridget jones diary playing lovingly to all of us from a tiny tv

the earth science classroom

• clean & crispy & FREEZING with nice black leather chairs and sam wearing birkenstocks and mike hand-rolling his cigarettes beneath the desk and sarah needing help adjusting her chair because she's disabled and small and sweet and i'm grateful because the four of us feel like a good little group together

the ames library in easton

• the air conditioner vents under the tables & blowing the cold air onto my ankles & i just finished lolita walking around easton in the thick august summer heat because i couldn't go home

my first job

• the same jingle repeating on a loop on the speakers & a bell jingling every time someone enters or leaves the store & me hating to organize the clothes but liking to straighten the cereal boxes; the cleaning supplies aisle smelling strongly of clorox & chemicals; mike's small blue garden gloves to hide his hands vs. him peering through the windows to watch me at the register during his cigarette breaks in the dark rain; chris's red polo shirt, jingling keychain & ipod blaring ugly awful alt rock from low-quality speakers

working at berryline

• everything crisp & clean & a nice blue; the air conditioning always top notch & my yellow smock always on; white plaster dough & mochi on my hands & the smell of yogurt inescapable; stacks of big carton boxes in the basement & my ipod plugged in to practice chinese audio clips for class; will with the afro & skateboarding shoes playing grizzly bear songs; chris talking to me about mad men episodes; closing up & washing the dining tables in the evening, starin' all wistfully n longingly out of the dark massachusetts avenue windows out at the pretty boston evening lights that are all flickering on or off; riding my blue bike home in the cold secret thrill of the dark

my first ~real~ "job"

• "non-profit" & clean & vegan; my bottle of vanilla handcream from lush perched on my desk & my trader joe's salad for lunch; the tables are all black, new & shiny and everyone wears fancy suits or talks about "eating organic" with big plastic utensil smiles and it's friendly but empty & sad and in the washroom it all glistens so white