On weekends, we took the bus to the mall across town, lingering at the Body Shop to dab vanilla oil on our wrists. We loitered in the bright glare of the food court, waiting for something we couldn’t have named, hair fluffed high, jeans pinned at the calves, smelling like fresh baking. I wore dark eyeliner and the deep matte red lipstick my grandmother had left behind, digging down to the bottom of the tube until every speck of it was gone, the colour irreplaceable. We wanted to be noticed. We wanted to be dangerous. We wanted to be sheltered. We wanted to be safe. My friend only told me her darkest childhood stories years later, when she shakily began to bring them out to the light. Back then, in the bright glare of the mall lights, we could cast no shadows.

From 100 Words: The Beauty of Brevity.  Word prompt: vanilla