Some Pretentious Stories of Mine

[Oddey]

Lately, I've had a fair bit of free time. I've mostly spent this on gaming and other things, but I have done some writing. I've sort of gotten into a rhythm of writing a bit every day, but it's mostly in the form of quite short stories. I feel like sharing a few here, but they're probably trying to be more sophisticated than they really are.

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The darkness of the once bright room seems to creep up from between the floorboards, seep through the cracks in the ceiling, spill through the slits in the curtain’s joining and even from the gap under the door. Night has fallen outside and there is no light. The moonlight is meagre, for it is completely blackened in the sheet of dark prickled with stars. Within the room, the bulb has gone out, the monitor dead, and in the spinning chair, an even darker lump. It utters something indecipherable, but it must understand what it means, for it does not repeat itself. As it curls itself closer together upon the small seat it occupies, the sleeping girl does nothing, for she is asleep. Thus does it shift and wither into oblivion.
A minute passes. The temperature in the room begins to drop. The bulb eases its way back on, the darkness being brought along from the outside gives way to the now faint glow of the lamp. The girl still lies asleep, unaware of what has just transpired in her room. She feels nothing but the dreams in her mind, where nothing is impossible and yet nothing possible at all.

The dawn vanquishes the night, though a bleak sheet of clouds clings to the sky with no intention of letting go, leaving the world in grey. The girl wakes up, without a sound or fuss. She lays there a moment, listening closely for sounds. It is then she hears a whisper. It comes from the closet. She lays still, the whisper fading back, only to resurge to her well-practised ears. Back in forth it bounds, from being distinct and quiet. Eventually, she twitches. The voice stops. So does she. For a time, nothing happens. Not the squawk of a bird, nor the tossing of another’s sheets. The whisper does not return, but the girl refuses still to move. As she begins to worry that the voice has deserted her, it comes back, quieter than before. She relaxes, but remains tense, so as to not move and break the spell again.
The voice continues its whisper, though it grows, never to a normal speech, but also a mumble or vague mutter. The murmur becomes clear, but still quiet. It gather volume, with each passing rebound. Still the girl holds herself still and tight to herself. The voice is not evil, she knows, but it makes her uneasy. As it grows from mere meek and soft-spoken monologue to a speech fit for a dinner table, she grips the quilt she has wrapped about herself tight. The voice is now shouting, yelling, screaming, hollering, its sheer power threatening to make her deaf. Still she lays still. Then the voice rebounds again, going back to a whisper, and dying with a soft final word.


Waiting

In wait, it lies. A predator of the day, yet a stalker in the night, its fangs tensed shut. Though it sleeps, its mind whirs and spins, with ideas and plans for when it awakens. Always it is ready.

“Wake up dearest!” shouts the boy’s mother. He’s not asleep, but he doesn’t want to move. The bed’s warm comfort, the almost watery tranquillity of lying within its sheets beckons him to stay. He curls himself together, as though to contract a final piece of warmth from its clutches. Then he casts off the blanket, a heroic and manly fervour burning within him to do as he must. But it’s too early in the morning, and he can only stumble out of bed, only just walking. It does not take long before he can however, and he picks out an outfit from his wardrobe. He enters its depths, searching for the one he feels must be for today, and at last emerges, a vibrant green shirt, and faded blue jeans, with a greyed out jacket to wear atop it. It seems to suit him, he feels, as he leaves his room.

“You’re not wearing that to school, are you?” asks his sister with genuine concern in her voice, fraught with condescension as his elder however. Herself, she is dressed in a shirt of black, a skirt of dark red, and a sweater brought along of yellow. The boy wonders whether she has any right to judge his style, and merely nods that he is. The reluctance in her voice is clear, but she seems to assent.

As they leave, the neighbour stares at him. His eyes are peeled upon the boy, and as they pass him by, his gaze does not break. The man then looks him in the eye for a moment, and begins to speak, but thinks better of it and leaves his words unspoken. What he had to say will never be known, and its effect never observed.

Later, as the day draws to a close and the boy walks home, he feels tired in his legs, and his joints ache from the long day. He slumps his way back to the bus stop, where he’ll be taken back home. The path to there seems twice as long as it did in the morning, yet he treks onward. It’s not until he’s halfway there that he noticed someone following him along. It’s unclear if it’s a man or not, for they are shrouded in a hooded coat of purest black, pants of clearest night and shoes of the darkest kind. Their hands seem hidden by the immense cuffs of their coat, but they carry something in them. As he nears, the boy tries to run, but finds his legs soft yet leaden, his breath persistent yet short. Still the figure nears him, without a change of its speed. At last, the boy seems out of will, and awaits the figure, as it nears him. It stops by his side, cocks its head slightly and seems for a moment to pity the boy. As though it thinks the boy couldn’t begin to comprehend its purpose.

In wait, it has lain, but now it emerges. Its beastly properties wildly swept away from its hooded face, not in anger, nor in rage, sorrow, happiness or any emotion.

The boy doesn’t come home. Never again does he hear his sister’s chastising remarks, nor his mother’s dulcet tones, or the neighbours passing remarks, held back in silence. Nothing. But he never felt bad about it afterwards.

Gold

There’s nothing silent in the woods; birds are a-flurry, the grass crunches below your feet, made stiff by the frost, fellow walkers and admirers of nature gossip about. It sounds wrong, perhaps. Not the quiet or peace that one thinks of instinctively, but it’s hardly ever that way.

One boy runs deep into the forest, ahead of everyone else, to find the calm and luscious tranquillity so fabled about. His feet carry him ahead of his mother, father, sisters and younger brother. Jack has legs, legs unlike the rest of his family. Where they stumble and slow, he only speeds up. It is these legs that bring him so far ahead. As they fall out of earshot, he doesn’t pay it any mind. He wants to be lost, just for the minute. His powerful limbs continue to force him to race forward, along the pathway carved out by myriads of walkers and trail-makers. He slows suddenly, disturbed only be a simple notion. How could one ever be free from trouble and the world around him, if he stayed on the path?

It tempts him sorely to leave, but instead he waits by the bench he has stopped near. While he sits upon it, he realizes the quiet of this part of the woods. There are still birds singing lightly in the air, and the occasional gust of wind, but otherwise, there is nothing. He still doesn’t feel as though he is in a truly silent place; he knows he is not, for the path below him. But it feels enough for him to relax for the moment, take in the fresh airs in the forest. He closes his eyes a moment. If I was to fall asleep, it’d be quite something, he thinks. But he doesn’t fall asleep. Instead he merely glances at his surroundings, letting his lungs pump air into his bounding chest.

In his waiting, his breath slows to normal. Then further down, for it is so calming to be alone in the woods. A stray thought comes to him. There are things he must see to when he returns home, work that must be done, things he must say and tell to people. How will he go about telling the neighbour for his father that they cannot pay him back until Wednesday? What would be the most time-efficient way to organize the wardrobe? Can he perhaps squeeze in a few minutes of spare time to tell Goldie about his new plan? Or maybe not the new plan, maybe something he’s had to say for nearly a year? As his thoughts collect into a brood that brews above his head, the clouds part suddenly, and a sole ray of light comes through.

The entire forest seems transformed, not a creature seems to stir, and even the grass has silenced itself for the moment of sunshine. Jack’s mouth smiles upon itself, appreciative of its own abilities, and his shoulders slump, wondering why they ever bothered to hold themselves so tightly. A sole leaf falls from the tree in the chilled air, and in the sun’s yellow light, it appears almost golden. Jack doesn’t notice it, for he sees nothing at all for the moment.

But it is merely a moment. Quick as it came, the sun recedes, and the feeling disappears. Jack spots the leaf only as it gently lands upon the forest floor. The sounds of chatter and talk surface now; his family must be catching up. Jack still smiles though, and stands up to greet them. Rather than wait however, he feels the energy taut in his legs again, and runs back along the self-same path.