Writing Prompt

Wooden rack put in place Baby pink Traced with lace

Pooh Bear onesie Hung with care “Little Monster” t-shirts Fill the air

Glittered skirts A flower dress Pinks and purples Nothing less

Peace sign symbols Stars and hearts “Orlando Florida” “Let’s Do Our Parts”

Polkadot raincoat Yellow class shirts Picture day outfits Concert skirts

Jeggings phase Removed pink lace Neutral colors A hat from ‘The Lakes’

Crop-top cuts Sweater collection Array of colors A robe for graduation

College merch A summer dress Business casual An organized mess

Empty hangers A suitcase packed below A rack laid bare A life continuing to grow

I stepped into my walk-in after my shower, my damp feet making warm footprints on the cold, wood floor. The door shut behind me with a loud click. Dust flew around as the air displaced it, scratching my throat and tickling my nasal passages until I sneezed. It was eerily silent. I usually kept my clothes in an unkempt pile on the blood red chair I used to be able to see in my room. I didn’t usually spend any time picking out an outfit, preferring to throw on the first jeans and t-shirt I unearthed so I could get to band practice quickly after waking up too late. But today was important. I was about to go on a blind date and I hadn’t been out in a while. I was getting older and starting to panic about dying alone; it was time to get serious.

I took another step into the closet, turning to my left. Dresses with scratchy sequins lining the busts and silky smooth skirts lined one wall. All were still vibrant greens, reds, and blues, having been barely used. I would probably feel like a deer learning how to walk in those - they looked completely foreign to me. I turned to my right. Fancier jeans, without holes, were folded within small cubbies like a clothing store. I pulled out a pair of soft black jeans and held them up to myself in the built-in wall mirror. The waistline ended before my hips flared out. I’m pretty sure I got these in college when I was doing so much coke that I dropped to 100 pounds. I threw them to the side and looked around again. Above the jeans hung about 30 t-shirts and blouses - some with colorful flower patterns, some cropped with snarky logos, some velvet, matronly hand-me-downs with small holes. I held out one of the more worn t-shirts, a faded pink and yellow tie-dye with a black raised logo that read, “Girl Power.” I cringed and stepped back from the wall, uncomfortable memories of high school cropping up. I looked ahead and saw the entire back shelf littered with a multitude of used gift bags, empty, half-open boxes, and broken hangers. I huffed in frustration. Maybe I’d just wrap myself in one of the boxes and go. I stormed out of the closet and pushed the door closed behind me. I walked over to the pile of clothes heaped on my red chair and just grabbed the first thing on top. A purple Led Zeppelin T-shirt and baggy flared black jeans. I guess it was better to just be myself up front and hope this guy didn’t run for the hills.

She lightly traced her fingertips across the items hanging in her wardrobe, from right to left, then back again. Some of the garments were cotton, while others were cashmere, velvet, and silk. Yet each item, regardless of the texture, felt delicate beneath her touch. The items, carefully and intentionally arranged by color, material, and pattern, were not merely clothes. At least, they weren’t to her. Rather, the garments in her wardrobe represented who she was, at a certain time in her life, and who she was becoming. And of course, they all smelled of her, of her favorite perfume.

Her purchases, certainly, could be considered frivolous to some, but to her, the clothes in her wardrobe were not merely a haphazard collection of items. They were not randomly strewn together. Like the art she opted to spend money on, each garment was specifically chosen, with the color and texture of each piece very carefully considered. And of course, some of the clothing items had a profound meaning to her. She had developed, as ridiculous as it sounded, even to her, a certain sentimentality for a few pieces.

One, in particular, had provided her with a sense of protection in one of her darkest hours. It had been one of the only creature comforts she was allowed to hold onto in what she now referred to as her “unfortunate hospitalization,” and it had, in many ways, been her shield, keeping her warm as she paced up and down a cold hospital hallway. Alone.

Perhaps it was materialistic and superficial to think of a clothing garment that way, but she didn’t allow that to change her mindset. Rather, she much preferred it to the sad reality of that situation, which was that it had been the thing she clung to when she realized that so many people in her life did not actually care about her. It had been the item she wore as she waited, hour after hour, in that cold, white walled hospital, for someone, her mother, her friend, to rescue her, or at the very least, to visit.

Though of course, no one ever came. No one gallantly rode in to save the day, in spite of the fact that they were only an hour away. No one sat with her and told her everything would be okay. No one said they loved her. No, no one ever did for her what she would have done for them in that situation.

Instead, she had sat alone, waiting all day for a familiar face that would never show. And now, she valued that garment of clothing more than she did so many people in her life, and she made no apologies for it. After all, why should she be sorry, when they obviously were not?

She wears her color on the inside, shades of yellow and orange as warm as the sun, they give her energy for the day. Blues and greens that are like a walk on the beach, when the nostalgia sets in and she wants to remember. All of her sparkle is in there too, billowing and twirling, it’d be hard to catch if it ever got out. Red when she’s fired up and ready to go and purple when she’s feeling just a little bit royal. But on the racks and in the drawers, its solid and serious, kind of redundant. Blacks, grays and all shades of denim. Predictable and dependable, ready to go. What’s on her back or in her closet doesn’t matter, it’s what she wears on the inside that you feel when you’re near her.

Canon: Pre-series, shortly before Balki arrives.

Larry carried his basket of clothes into his bedroom and set it on the floor. He removed smaller piles from the basket first, then the larger piles, arranging all the piles on his bed. He put socks and shorts in one drawer, while another drawer had a variety of solid color tee shirts. The tee shirts were often paired with his collection of button-up shirts, which hung in the closet.

Larry opened the closet door and pulled out one empty hanger at a time. He had a color scheme in which he kept the shirts. If he was looking for a certain color, he could find it easily. There were solids, stripes, and plaids. He hung the shirts one by one, keeping the color scheme intact.

Next came several pairs of slacks. He set those on the ironing board set up in front of the window. Finally, he had sweaters and sweater vests. Those had a similar color scheme for easy finding. Perhaps he was a little obsessive compulsive about the color order, but he had gotten shirts that went with both a tee shirt and a sweater. This offered him more variety in a smaller amount of clothes.

Larry closed his closet and moved the basket over by the ironing board. He would work on ironing the slacks later. Feeling accomplished, he retrieved his camera and decided to get some pictures that he hoped to sell as a photojournalist. He did not want to be stuck working for his landlord at the discount store for any longer than he had to.

“Some day, Appleton, some day,” Larry told himself and headed out.

-End-

On floor a basket filled with my avoidance. Accumulated sweat and dirt and lake water in a basket with a couple shirts pants and wet wet socks. Above the wafting laundry are the hoards of sweaters. The occasional piece of formal wear stuck on a velvety hanger in the back and floofy skirts clipped in. Searching for what to wear evokes the click clack of hanger given its so tightly packed in only the tops of the hangers truly move. Everything else tucked wank wad into the drawer of the dresser beside me, but only the bottom drawer. The wood infusing it’s smell into every crevice and stitch of anything placed with in it.

All of the clothes in her closet call her the best dressed. Black catwoman style bandit prepared for her next theft. Lavish showcases get swept where usually the loot is kept. Thief in the night is quick, swiper already left while you slept. You didn’t know when you met, the thoughts she had in her head. She steals to get ahead; Mona Lisa portrait. Don’t even think of getting revenge or else you’ll wind up dead. Go do something else instead, like enjoying time with your kid. Your possessions is like an auction and she has the highest bid.

Milky leather jackets of Italian fashion a combo of silky and sultry all in one black dress, for a night of sin that’s sure to impress head to toe, a package without a price, sparkly boots one day, heels bring the spice Nipples showing through a tee, My one and only vice. Daytime calls for a humble denim look, But still make them question just how long it took

Black and white A little purple Not much color Maybe too purposeful

White shirts Dress shoes Black skirts Anymore clues

Work clothes All look the same No need for variety Same old game

Jackets and dresses Fill my closet Hot messes Very modest

Dress for success Back suits the key Don’t try for less Attorney is me

Tessa🦋

My wardrobe seems to be disappearing before me, yet it keeps growing. If you look inside you see the abundance of color. You can tell the season immediately, summer. Almost all of my sweater have been packed, ready for a new adventure in a colder state this winter. My closet however stands filled to the brim. Colors and fabrics of all sides hang for curtains. To the left we have my shirts hanging next to the dresses on the right. I’ve bunched groupings together. My rompers, which tend to be colored in polka dots that seem to fancy for simple outings. Jumpsuits that are beautifully stitched, but used on the occasion of banquettes dance. The few dresses that are thrown on on a pool day. They are littered with a missing stitch hear or there, and buttons down the front of another to take off simply. My grouping of exploratory clothes are together most of all. Cosets covered in white ribbon. Lace jumpsuits. Bustiers covered in fruits that make me want to strut like a move star. They are group together because I wnat to be in them, but have the fear of walking out in public with them.