😺 The world is dark enough as it is, and I try to see the funny side whenever I can 😺 hufflepuff all the way! I love anything fantasy and a good twist too! Cat in pic is called sunny ☀️
😺 The world is dark enough as it is, and I try to see the funny side whenever I can 😺 hufflepuff all the way! I love anything fantasy and a good twist too! Cat in pic is called sunny ☀️
My fingers meet fabric and I suddenly remember my tail.
How I could swim for ages with my sisters, often skimming just under the surface of the sun-warmed sea - too frightened to break the water tension and end up angering my father.
My beloved sisters talking about the wonders of the deepest sea to the sandiest of shores. I would listen with rapt attention as they combed and braided each others hair in the evenings.
My father, king of all the seas, gently showing me as a child the best way to swim with the current so I could always find my way home. Letting me hold his trident and explaining its powers. My own treasures, a cave full of things I found while exploring. Then -
“Mom? What’s that?” A small voice shook me out of my memories.
My daughter Flora looked curiously at the pink tattered dress I was holding. “Come here, little Treasure,” I patted my knee. “Let me tell you a story…”
“There’s been 15 family slaughters in the past two months here.”
“I said we’ll take it! Not often you get to go camping for a price like that!” Ned said to the booking agent on the phone.
So soon, Ned, his partner Dave, and their daughter Amy went camping. “Is anyone creeped out that we’re the only ones here? And it’s completely silent, no birds or anything?” Amy asked her dads as they set up tents.
“No, not really. I mean there is a guy in the trees holding a big knife, maybe he scared the birds away?” Dave said, busying himself with the grill. “Who wants hot dogs?”
Noon turned to evening, and by morning the family woke up to a surprise. All their food was gone, and the grass had been burned into a message - LEAVE NOW.
“Hmm.” Ned mused. “Probably kids.”
“Kids? Kids took all our food and burned a evil message in the ground?” Amy asked, disbelieving. “We should go.”
“It’s only been one night.”
So they stayed. The second morning bought skulls around their tents, the third a huge dead deer torn to shreds which Dave cooked up. The fourth night it rained blood. Still they stayed. Until…
The fifth night bought candles and robed figures that accompanied them. They circled the tattered tents, and hummed until the family woke.
“All right! Let’s do this!” Ned announced, emerging. “You have violated the ‘sceptres and ghosts’ code by over killing. I am inspector Ned, this is a violation warning. Next time we will be bringing you in.”
The figures scuttle away, and the morning brings birds and a fresh supply of food back in their tents.
“What did you do, dad?” Amy asks. “I was so scared!”
Ned stirs his coffee in his camping mug. “I bluffed, hon.” And takes a long sip.
“Hello, children.”
“… we are in our 40’s.” I can’t help but say, bewildered.
“I’ve had a lot going on. Anyway, are you both ready to fulfil your promise?” The tall being boomed.
I looked at my childhood best friend, Andrew. It had been years since we’ve been in the same room, and he looks just as confused as I do. “What promise?” He asks. “Where are we?”
“I’m surprised you don’t recognise it. At a tea party you once promised each other that you would learn to ice skate together.”
I took in the scene where the being stood. A glistening sheet of ice surrounded by clean glass and empty stands. Looking down I saw ice skates by my feet.
“This is a weird dream. We were kids when we promised, remember? When our older sisters were on the same team and we were too young to go on the ice.” Andrew smiles.
I did remember. Hours spent watching our sisters play hockey, making up our own routines in the stands while we shivered and waited for our parents to pick us up.
We were ten, I think, then life got in the way. Our sisters went to different hobbies, Andrew moved away. Aside from a Christmas card and Facebook messages, we hadn’t talked properly in years.
“This is no dream. I am the promise keeper. If a promise it not kept, I will enforce it.”
“Even a pinky promise?”
The being nodded. “Especially a pinkie promise. You have the rink for a few hours; I pulled some strings. Make your own way home.”
“What? I live miles from here…” Andrew exclaimed.
“Not my problem. I have to go, someone has promised to try and get a promotion.” In a puff of snowflakes the being vanished, leaving Andrew and I in the floodlights.
I look at him. He looks at me. Collecting the boots, we head to the stand to try them on, smiling.
If poetry were a person, they would walk into walls, Their attitude would worsen, With each new fall.
“I was lost in thought About my breakfast haikus Now I’ve miscounted!”
Looking for hours at the clouds, A walking disaster of long words, Terrible at silence as they think aloud. Eternally sorry for not being an early bird.
Despite the jumbled mind, Ask a question and the answer they’ll find.
They always find
The right words
For all emotions
Even if
It takes them
A while.
The word from the tip of your tongue, Listens to every song sung. Finds rare perfect words that fill your lungs… Until a poem is carefully strung.
(Difficult to write this one - I have a small wrist sprain so sorry for any writing quality drop over the next week 💛)
“Yes! This whole time I was at your side! now - AARRRGH!” The ruler screamed.
“Yeah, I figured that out, ‘Fluffy.’ Most rabbits - even magical ones - can’t read.” I said.
The ruler pulled at his collar. “What is this?! What did you do!” Robes sweeping, he made to attack, but I pressed the charm in my pocket again and he screamed.
“In my world, we call them ‘shock collars’, I made it with magic crystals and charms from our travels. The material is from the mermaids, the connecting charm from the elven city, and the electric crystals from the centaurs. Only I can activate it, or remove it.” I tried my best not to smile.
The ruler stood, suddenly glowing “Then you will die!” Out came his hand, gathering magic. I just watched as it fizzled out.
“There is another thing I added after some research. Remember when we went after the ancient map at the dragons hoard? How I asked for the golden compass so I could find my way home?”
“… yes.”
“The compass has tiny fragments of magic resistance, so magic doesn’t interfere with the direction. That’s in there too.”
The ruler looked quite dejected. Then he brightened. “Guards!”
Men in gold rushed in, and I simply pressed the charm again. They watched him writhe.
“Are you ok, sir? Who is this?” One asked.
“She’s a - AAAAHH!” He manages to get out.
They look at me, and I smile brightly. “I’m a healer from a faraway land. The almighty ruler is in a lot of pain due to a curse.”
“No! AAHH! I - AAHH!”
“How do we cure it?” The same guard asked.
I wander over to the red-faced ruler and lean close. “If you have these men kill me or destroy the charm the collar will explode…” I whisper, leaving the charm in my pocket.
He goes quiet, getting his breath back. “Men, I am unwell. This … human is helping me. Leave us be.”
The guards go, leaving me in the glare of their ruler. “What will you do with me?”
The throne isn’t empty anymore, because I’m sat on it. “I have a few ideas. Sit.”
He does, and I can’t help but grin.
In the suburbs sits the eighth wonder of the world. It looks symmetrical to its neighbours aside from a blue door, which has been photographed hundreds of times. Inside sits Alex, a middle aged man who is growing tired of the crowds, and of explaining that it was all a joke online with his friends. Perfectly rectangular windows framed in white, neat stone steps leading to the door, black roof with brick chimney that coughs up a thin stream of grey into the sky.
Tourists gather on the streets, pluck grass to take with them, propose to loved ones and have family photos at 58 North street, now the most famous place in the world.
Alex tried to lean into it at first, but now he just wants people to stop writing their names on the pavement in chalk, to stop crowding him on his way out of the house with a million questions, to leave. He loved this house when he bought it, but now he wants to rip it apart brick by brick.
My dads tell me that when I was born, a seer had tried to kill me.
She had smooth dark skin and one good eye as dark as a cave, the other sealed shut and adorned with a silver patch.
She was my grandmother, and she kept telling my dad; “He will give you death, and you will love him for it!”
Even though our family was small my dads decided to cut her off. They were devastated as I grew that she could be there to see my achievements; my love for healing others, my determination to become a doctor.
I eventually moved from the tiny suburbs when I was 18, going to university, and so on until I became a doctor at 25.
My job was busy and I tried to make time for my dads, but life in the city was hard. I saw my mystical grandmother while I was there and waited with baited breath while she glided across the marble to see me.
She smelt of vanilla and coffee, and embraced me with a hug. “I did not understand, now I do. You will give my son death, and he will love you for it.”
I didn’t see her again, until my dad got sick. You might guess where this is going. Despite my best efforts, he slipped into a coma. Three years later my other dad got into a car crash and ended up on the same bay, with irreplaceable brain damage.
I tried to find a way to save them, but there was only one option. One cold January morning I was crying over having to take them off life support, and suddenly smelled vanilla and coffee. My grandmother wrapped her surprisingly strong arms around me and I saw her vision as she shared it with me.
My two dads smiling in another world, hand in hand.
I want to be graceful and fearless, Change into my true form like all the rest.
Smoothly change and grow, As delicate and cleanly as snow.
I can practice until the ice runs red, But my claws and teeth crash instead.
My body is so sore and tired from trying, Everyone else does it without crying.
It’s frustrating to see the whole pack, Gaining so easily what I lack.
My wolf can survive the artic cold, All I want is beauty and grace, A gentle transformation of souls, My moon filled fantasy clear on my face…
It was a perfect first date. Shame she is horribly cursed.
My original date had stood me up, so I was trying not to cry into my salad. Then I felt someone looking at me.
I could only see a family of four in front of me, and nearly choked on my cucumber when a picture on the wall waved at me.
It was a girl sat in a library, forever fixed to her chair. She wrote on paper; DATE STOOD YOU UP?
I looked down at my salad and tried not to give into the urge to look at the crazy girl I was obviously imagining.
Ten minutes later, the family got up to leave. I glanced to see the girl looking sadly into her book.
When the table was clear, I looked up again to see her looking at me. She wrote again; DON’T WORRY. NOT CRAZY. JUST CURSED.
I smiled at my empty plate. When the waitress came by I asked her about the painting. “I’ve been here a few years, it just turned up one day. Shame we have to get rid of it.”
“Why?”
She shuffled plates on her tray. “Higher ups want more themed pictures, they are doing the whole restaurant in a new style soon.”
I paid the bill and found myself wandering over to the painting. The girl perked up when I appeared. NORMALLY PEOPLE JUST RUN AWAY. She wrote.
“What happened?” I couldn’t help but ask.
She shrugged. NOT SURE, Came the paper.
I grinned. “Want to get out of here?”
She didn’t write this time but I caught the shape of her mouth: “yes”
I smuggled the frame under my jacket, and walk briskly out. No-one seems to mind. On the walk to the train - some distance from the restraint - I take out the picture.
We talk for hours, about everything. The train is delayed so I have a hot chocolate, somehow she tries a bit that I smear on the painted cup and watch vanish.
Then she asks me for my blood. JUST A DROP - SO I CAN HEAR YOU.
Using my keys to jab my thumb, I oblige. Her voice is a little rusty from disuse, but the rest of the night goes well. I hang her in my buildings lobby when I get home, bidding her goodnight.
A perfect night, curse and all.
There is only one job that really matters today, only one job that people clamber for every year.
Since humanity had spread and evolved so fast, every planet in the solar system had a singer to represent them and earth has me, Melody Dash.
I’m not scared of the audience, or of the competition, or even of losing. I’m scared that I will be killed by one of my rivals.
I’ve had to sneak into the backstage to be sure nothing happens, but when I open my dressing room door, there is a boy inside who is wearing a white suit. He looks surprised and I pull out my concealed laser gun.
One blast of blue, and the boy is on the floor, bleeding out on my rug.
Then security comes in, sees the scene, moves the body. Efficient.
My wrist bleeps with news. “Earth is at it again! Singing sensation ‘Tycoon’ has been killed by ‘Melody Dash’, who has been rivalling him since the start! Rather than a trial, earth has - once again - chosen ‘Melody’ as their representative! How long will she last before the next rival comes for the top?” It chirped.
I looked at the stain on the floor. I didn’t want to do it, but you have to in this career. Any other job entails cleaning or flying for hours in the dark of space… With this salary I can afford a real house with windows and everything. I wish I was born somewhere like mars, or Venus, where talent takes you to the top, not killing.
I’m still reading when a vent on the wall opens and a laser gun appears in a manicured hand. I remember something as pain explodes in my chest and blood spoils my dress. Sometimes, stars are designed to fall.
