WHAT THE CHOCOLATE SAID

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     crossorigin="anonymous"></script> P.S. I may have used all the chocolate bar titles in my story. Credits go to …🍫The ‘titles’ of the chocolate bars sold in Fortnum & Masons, London. 🍫

Here is my story:

It was amazing to watch the sunset from her deck. Soon, the day would be night. All the wild animals would find their resting spot in the meadow. A cool breeze blew outside.

She found her blue scarf on the back of one of the Adirondack chairs. She had bought the chairs last summer during her beach vacation. Roberta began to wrap it around her neck to keep the cool air from reaching her face. As she wrapped the flannel material across her chin, she noticed the leaves. They seemed to float gently in the air. The gentle breeze of the evening stirred memories of laughter.

Thinking back, she could remember people laughing happily while listening to music. These memories enticed Roberta to go to the cabin set in the forest. The cabin was once used as the McLanahan Homeschool. Now, it was considered Roberta’s writing nook. The woods were a place of solitude from the world’s noise. The cabin wasn’t too deep in the woods, so she didn’t feel scared. Those memories of laughing were of her siblings and her mom dancing and playing.

Roberta felt at ease on her walk. The bright moon illuminated the autumn night. The only thing was the lows and highs of her depression. It was hard for her to lose her mama. Nothing was the same anymore. To add to that loss was the fact that she lost contact with her brothers and sisters, too. Roberta was all alone.

Her co-workers at her job as a journalist did ask how she felt, and her reply would always be great. I feel great. When she looked within, she often felt like curling up in bed.

Her comfy blanket, which she used at night, provided warmth. She would listen to an audiobook that would eventually drift her off to sleep. But whenever she was asked to go out with her friends from work, she would always decline.

She wanted to stay home and cuddle with her cats. Her reality was a life of solitude.

There was something about a person reading to her that relaxed her. Maybe it was because her mom used to gather us around her chair. She would read us the latest Golden Book. Listening to her read was one other thing we did at the cabin.

Roberta found a clear path that would lead her to the cabin. A path that she remembered had fewer holes in the ground that could trip her on the way there. She started dreaming of her mother.

Her mother, Daniela Rose, was Italian. Her mom met her dad during one of his deployments to Italy. She would tell us at the dinner table that it was love at first sight. Then she would glance at my dad and wink.

My father retired from the Army at age forty. We then moved to London for him to work at an army base there permanently.

She remembered her mom’s own battle with macular degeneration. It left her mom in a state of exhaustion. Her mom would often apologize for her lack of providing us with proper raising. I never knew what she meant by that. We felt secure in her love. Any raising that she gave us made us feel secure. We loved Mama.

Her kids would line up in a row on the way to town. We would play a game called, In Her Footsteps We Follow. We would step on her footprints left on the sidewalk by the dew of the morning.

Another thing my mama loved was chocolate. She enjoyed walking down to the store to gaze at the names of chocolate bars. The bars on the shelves with the brightly colored wrappers had distinct names for each one. The showcase shelf looked like a row of books waiting to have new owners so they can be read. My mama would pick one to use as our theme for the day. We would role-play as fun and creative tunes came from our singing. We enjoyed sampling the sweet chocolate of the day.

I remember a time when my mom wanted us to wear our best clothes. She wanted us to have breakfast in Bogato. Our family was huge. Three girls and three boys. So, to save money, my mom was willing to be our teacher. We spent those school years with our siblings. We learned from each other and grew together as a family. We were also studying geography that year. So, with our lesson, we learned that Bogotá is the capital of Colombia. We gathered around the porch steps for our formal breakfast. We drank our pretend coffee. We also ate our pretend fruit, muffins, and eggs. That was a fun day.

My mama was so beautiful. To see her standing there, she was a pretty lady who had such a kind soul. Her favorite color was purple. Our mom looked like a porcelain doll.

Rose in a violet dress with her auburn hair and fair skin—you would think she was a porcelain doll. She was perfect in every way. Like I said, my mom’s name was Daniela Rose. She decided that her girls would have flower names also. Daisy, the oldest, was the shy one. She loves to read, sit by the lake at our house, and paint. Lily, the middle girl, was the adventurous one, always taking a risk. On the other hand, I was the thinker. I loved to write stories. I also enjoyed telling tales to my younger siblings. We would gather as we sat by the fire we made in the cabin fireplace.

Some of my tales were of our animal friends. One tale is about the obedience of Bubbles the dog. Bubbles was so active. She also loved us kids with so many enthusiastic jumps. We found it hard to control her excitement. She was a good dog, but age got the best of her. We were walking to the cabin one day; we noticed her still body under the cabin porch. That was a sad day.

Bubbles gave me several ideas for tales by her cute little personality. I always told my brothers and sisters that she dreams in marmalade.

Bubbles loved the orange jelly. My mom infused it with mandarin orange pieces, and we used it on homemade biscuits.

  Bubbles waited for the Elusive Lord Hoppington to return. She wanted him to sweep her off her paws for his visit. The two would ride off into the sunset while forever chasing Supernovas or catching the peculiar bees of Salt Bay. Such wonderful memories.

I finally reached the cabin. I paused for a minute before I went in to catch my breath. I walked up the cabin steps of the front porch. I decided to sit on the porch swing. I wanted to finish my mug of coffee that I had made at my house. The soothing liquid was cold by now, oh well.

I continued to think of the latter days of our adventures with my mom. I came to the one that began on one hot summer night. It was a stormy night. The storm wasn’t expected. Her laundry was hanging on the clothesline outside. It had to come in before it got drenched. Mama got the last of the towels off the clothesline. She was headed back to the house but slipped on a tree limb that had fallen by the cement steps. Her head hit that hard cement, causing a concussion. As I said before, she was already a sickly lady with her muscular dystrophy. This event caused her descent into darkness.

Her mind was never the same. Our fun times with our mother ended that night. Experience turned into memories. My siblings and I eventually got older, and each one of them moved all over the U.S. in different states. None of us took the time to keep in touch. I was the only one out of all six of us siblings to stick around.

Our house became my house. Our cabin, along with the precious memories of brighter days we shared as a family, became my cabin. I was the writer of the family. I preserved our memories of better days. I sealed them in the pages of my books. To last forever.