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motownfiction · 2 years

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historic

August 14, 2017. One of those historic days, as far as Emma O’Connor is concerned. If she ever got the chance to go back and see a day in her life play out, that’s the day she would choose. She wouldn’t want to do it differently. She’d just want to watch it like a movie. August 14, 2017. One of the most special days of Emma’s whole life. It’s the day she met Daisy Feng.

As a kid, Emma was never very good at making friends. When she was very little, she tried – asked other kids to play at recess, sat down at lunch tables she wasn’t even invited to, brought Scooby-Doo fruit snacks to school because that’s what all the other kids ate. But it never really worked. She knew she was faking, and they knew she was faking. Nobody wants a faker for a friend. Even fewer people want a friend who watches reruns of Newhart in the 2000s.

And all her life, that seems to be the consensus. Emma O’Connor is too weird to have friends, too smart, too different. Every now and then, people like her, but they’re really just looking for help with their homework or an in with Mom at CCNY. Mom says her life would have been like that if she hadn’t moved to Michigan and met Sadie. The thought sticks in Emma’s brain, and she’s determined to find her own Sadie. She decides it’s one of the most important goals in life, much more important than finding a husband one day. Mom is who she is because Sadie loved her first, probably even before Daddy (though it would break Dad’s heart to hear it said). Elenore didn’t have a Sadie, and look what happened to her.

It seems like all hope is lost. Emma’s twenty-two now, the holder of a bachelor’s degree, and she still has no real friends to her name. No Sadie of her own. Mom shakes her head and says that’s ridiculous. She doesn’t need her own Sadie because she’s already friends with the real one. Just because she’s my friend doesn’t mean she’s not yours, Mom says. She’s trying to be kind. She’s trying to be understanding. But if she only knew how hard it is to strike out on your own. Emma shares all this, and Mom just draws her close and says she hopes that when she starts at Columbia next month, she hopes Emma finds a best friend who likes eating raw cookie dough, listening to the Easy Rider soundtrack, and looking at the moon. It seems impossible.

And then, like nothing, it’s August 14, 2017. Emma’s first day at Columbia, where she’ll earn her master’s degree in film studies. She’s shuffled into an office with another new student in the program, Daisy Feng. Daisy is a year older than Emma, four inches taller, and a million times more gregarious. When Emma opens her door and finds Daisy there, she looks at her from behind purple-rimmed glasses and smiles like they’re old friends. And somehow, even with her guard up high above her head, Emma knows it’s OK. Knows she should look at Daisy like they’re old friends, too.

Turns out to be the right choice. There’s nobody in the world cooler than Daisy. Her last name means phoenix, and she’s fond of saying she rose from the ashes (a year off between her bachelor’s and master’s, where she worked in a bakery and accidentally burned a few too many loaves of bread, on account of listening to the radio and getting distracted). She’s from Toledo, Ohio, land of Spaghetti Warehouses and some of the world’s most overrated sundaes. At least, according to Daisy, who couldn’t wait to get the hell out of there. She studies sixties counterculture in Hollywood movies, and her favorite movie soundtrack of all time is Easy Rider. When Emma asks her why, Daisy just nods and says, “I, too, had too much to dream last night.”

It’s not a lie, either, and you can tell. Daisy always looks like she’s this close to snapping her fingers and telling you she has magic powers. Her wit is incredible, but once she decides you’re her friend, that’s it. You’re her friend for life. Mom says she’s a combination of Daddy and Sam that way, which Emma’s proud of. If you can’t find your own Sadie, she thinks, might as well find your own Sam.

Before long, Emma O’Connor and Daisy Feng go everywhere together. Out for coffee. To the movies. To weird trivia contests upstate, where they take home the prize money every time, much to the townies’ chagrin. When Emma thinks she could fall in love with the second-year student in their women filmmakers class, she tells Daisy even before she tells Elenore; when Daisy finally kisses her bartender crush from that place upstate, she calls Emma into the bathroom and squeals with her about it. Before long, it’s a given. Wherever Emma goes, she knows Daisy goes. The best friend she’s always been looking for. Not a Sadie of her own. Not even a Sam. Just a Daisy.

Thank goodness.

#drabble #ch: emma o'connor #ch: daisy feng #asks #hopeoftheendless #this is less story and more description BUT i thought it was necessary #thank you!

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