Ficly

as yet untitled, pt. 1

When my daughter was born it looked like her face was melting. And Caroline was so proud.

“I did it, babe,” she sobbed through gritted teeth, still gushing amniotic slime, “I made us a Picasso.”

We called her Harmony, and soon she was two with chubby cheeks and ringlets. Men in suits gave her butterfly kisses and big paychecks to wear their diapers and sit in their carseats in high-end magazines. The mayor awarded her a key to the city in honor of her rare beauty. I thought she looked like a smashed Jack-O-Lantern. However, I was always more of a fan of Impressionism.

In the afternoons, Caroline would take Harmony to the social clubs, and for five minutes a day I was allowed to hold the girl while my wife dripped hot candle wax onto her face until she resembled a Jackson Pollock painting. Then she’d be squeezed into an asymmetrical dress made from a lampshade skeleton and carted off to the bourgeoise. I looked forward to rainy days, when I might glimpse a pool of water collecting in the dent in her head.

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