hiddenlittleoasis

[hiddenlittleoasis]

At last a new story has seen the light of day!

Here it is! Please enjoy :)

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“There’s so many people here…” he paused as he leaned in close to her ear. “That must make you very nervous, young Willow.”

She kept her head down, focused on the list her father had given her of things to fetch from the market. Usually such a thing was her father’s job, but he had claimed to be too busy with the animals on their woodland farm that day. She whispered back, “I’m not supposed to talk with you in public.”

“And look at you already breaking that rule! Are you going to bring home a suitor for yourself or are you going to disappoint your old man further?”

“What? The list doesn’t-”

“Oh please! I’ve seen it countless times. The naive forest girl gets her first taste of the city and is swept off her feet by some handsome hunk, they run off to the forest, have babies, and so it repeats,” he dramatically twirled through the crowd as he spun his tale, not one of which spared him a passing glance. “Why else do you think your old man made up excuses for you to have your first trip into the city? You’re at that age to marry and further the family line..and you know what happens if you don’t!”

“He wouldn’t send me out alone if he didn't need to.”

“Well you’re hardly alone! You’ve got me with you!”

“For better or for worse…” Willow mumbled.

It seemed to be for neither better nor worse that Willow had company with her, as he spent most of his time teasing unresponsive strangers while she did the work.

Yet he could only spend so long before growing bored of teasing people who paid him no mind. With what physical force he could muster, he nudged an apple into Willow’s bag as she left one of the shops, and the stolen merchandise didn’t escape the eye of the storekeeper. The angry voice of the storekeeper as they started to yell at her was enough to startle Willow before she even could comprehend what was being said. He was already at her side, voice filled with urgency, “Run Willow! You know what they do when they think you’ve stolen something?”

“I didn’t!”

“They take your hands and chop them right off! They aren’t going to believe the strange forest girl, so get running!” Without another moment of hesitation, she did. Past all the wonders of the city, until he stopped her.

“Smell that Willow?”

“No.”

He carried on, ignoring her interjection, “So many wasted souls, all stored together in one place! You’ve never been to a graveyard before, let me show you around!”

“No!”

“It’ll keep that tasteless shopkeep away from you, people are scared of places like these. Oh look! There he comes now!”

“...fine!” His face twisted into an excited smile as she begrudgingly gave in and followed his lead.

“How sad for their dead,” he commented. “All these plants have grown over like weeds. Now young Willow, please tell me you do know what we’re walking through.”

“I’m not a child..”

“And?” Hollering of the frustrated shopkeep rushing past the entrance of the graveyard filled the silence as he awaited her response. After an awkwardly long pause he began to speak again, “A graveyard is where they store the dead. People are much more boring this way. If you take a deep breath..” He stopped in place to demonstrate, inhaling deeply and exhaling excitedly, “Oh one of these is still fresh! Come on Willow, I’ll be needing you!” As terrible as the idea was, she feared being lost alone in this place more than whatever he could need her for, so she followed.

“Ah! This one here! See how the dirt isn’t yet covered with grass and moss? The stone is clean and legible? This is a fresh grave, the body shouldn’t even be in that bad of condition! But the soul…” He inhaled deeply again, catching Willow’s concerned stare in his peripheral view. “Well? Get digging!”

“What? A dead body is in there! No way!”

“Willow.” He leaned in close, his obnoxious persona lost and replaced by something much more unsettling as he stared at her. “I said dig. You’ll be smart to listen.” Without giving her a moment to hesitate his hands blended into hers, and together they started digging. The closer they got to the body the more he became her. The more he controlled her movements and the more Willow’s consciousness dwindled. The more the frightened tears slowed and the world went quiet…

…then dark too.

“Well, this is quite the change of scenery!”

“It’s a prison cell!” Willow’s frightened voice sharply rose in pitch after having taken a moment to piece together her new environment. “What did you do?!”

He paused and watched her for a few moments before evenly speaking, “Well I would hardly start throwing around accusations, but since you don’t remember..” There was another moment of silence as he prepared for the oncoming scolding. “We may have been interrupted, and I am not one to share my food. So I just scared off the peanut gallery with a little fire.”

What came next wasn’t a loud reprimanding, but a quiet faltering voice, one too aware of the situation. This was somehow worse, “You…in public?”

“They think you’re a witch! Powerful, majestic, mystical…” He trailed off as Willow’s hands started to shake, the smell of smoke still clinging to her once borrowed form. “...yeah, they didn’t say it like a good thing.”

“They’ll kill me because of you!”

“Hey! Dying isn’t such a bad thing! There’s no more curses once you’re dead, unless someone-” the trembling hands around his wrist stopped him in his place.

“Please help me..”

“Oh dear young Willow, I would love to, but you know what that would take.”

“I’m not allowed to give you what you want! You made this mess for me so fix it!”

He pulled his arm away from her as her begging turned to demands, “Then my hands are tied.” He stepped back and slipped from her view, “Solve your own problems.”

Left alone for a crime she didn’t commit, the girl cried to herself over the destiny that had been given to her. The doings of ancestors long before her time had burdened their bloodline with this curse of containing something that was always doomed to break free. The people who this very burden was to protect now gathered the girl to kill her for it.

He didn’t return again until she was standing on the pyre.

“Forgive me..” his gaze strayed from her teary eyes as the strangers of the city tied her ropes. “I know you blame me for how things are turning out, but it was always going to come to something like this. Your family put in quite the noble effort and all…” There was no need to recount the history of the forest girl when her time left was so rapidly dwindling. His uncanny stare found her face again as he chose to get to the point. “They’re already lighting the matches Willow. Let me extend to you one last deal…a mercy before you go.” He reached to wipe away the tears on her cheek, phasing through her skin like a warm brush of a breeze. “Oh please, stop crying...”

His gentle request was almost lost against the roar of the spectating crowd as the match met the pyre, yet Willow’s gaze was fixed on him. She could blame him for every grievance of her short life, but he was the only one who was there with her through every moment. Perhaps there was no one better to stay with her as she died than he who, through some sick twist of fate, was her closest friend and her condemner. He finally spoke again once her cheeks were in his phantasmal hands and his body blocked her view of those in the crowd. “Renounce it.”

“Renounce what’s left of our curse. I can’t spare you from your ending, but I can take your life before the pain of what they’ve done reaches you. Come on Willow, make up your mind!”

She wasn’t given time to hesitate, the flames already reflecting in her weeping eyes. Her voice shook as she opened her parched and trembling lips, but her whisper was clear, and with her final breath, “I release you Salix.”

As the empty body of a cursed girl shriveled, from the roaring flames of the fire emerged an unnatural creature with a twisted smile and a devilish appetite for mortals.

[hiddenlittleoasis]

I'm super excited to be joining my first ever ArtFight this year!! Come check me out!!

[hiddenlittleoasis]

I promise I'm not dead, I've just been so busy with work, school, and sleeping that I haven't had time to pursue any hobbies or freetime TwT

[hiddenlittleoasis]

Thought I'd share an old poem I wrote a few years back while I keep working on a new short story to share!

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The sun shines brightly today,

And I know I can conquer the world.

I know that nothing is too big to ever stop me.

And it’s in my confidence that I build my plan;

To fly above it all.

To grab the universe by it’s strands of stars;

And hold the sky on a leash.

It’s today that I will not be stopped;

And today that I will be as big as the sun.

The day that I will soar just as high.

Untethered to the ground.

So I get to work.

I melt together these wings made out of confidence and bravery;

And jump out of the tower I’ve confined myself to.

The world below me shrinks...

I get closer to the glory of the sun...

Then it’s heat grows angry,

And it’s size strips away what I knew.

~

I forget how to fly.

Then I too, like Icarus,

Pummel to the sea.

~

It’s as I’m crashing I begin to realize,

My hands are too small.

Too small to hold the world together all on my own.

It’s while I’m sinking that I notice the sunlight shining through the water above me.

Mocking my confidence.

Taunting my failure.

It’s while I’m fading that I can feel the change.

My wings fall apart around me as my bravado does too.

The water fills my lungs the same way that embarrassment and doubt do.

Rushing too fast,

Restricting too much.

I can’t breathe.

~

So I give up.

I give into the waves and the tower that held me.

Give in to all the words I’ve heard before,

And the things I’ve told myself.

With nothing to hold on to,

I let go.

Every piece of me is lost with every feather that peels from my skin.

And I drown.

~

When I wake on the beach there’s a siren next to me,

Whispering words of confidence,

Promising I don’t have to give up.

She takes my hand and sings me her song,

She kisses my head and tells me I’m enough,

She holds my doubt and eases it,

Assuring she will be with me the entire way.

She cradles my heart as she teaches me to stand.

I relearn how to walk,

To sing,

To smile.

~

She tells me humans were never made for wings.

~

We build our home on that beach.

We build our life on that beach.

We learn our place in the world.

We learn to befriend the sun.

Together we walk among stars,

And fly between planets.

Hand in hand.

All while never leaving the ground.

~

The world spins with the ebb and flow of time.

The seasons change continuously,

Every turn bringing new things to life.

Feelings, challenges,

Canyons and mountains.

Yet we stand strong.

Grounded in our solidarity.

~

The sun shines a little dimmer today as I remember I’m too small,

And these hands shake too much;

Because I was never the one made to hold the world.

[hiddenlittleoasis]

Was playing around with my poetry magnets the other day and thought I'd share what I ended up with while I work on my next project!

[hiddenlittleoasis]

Here's my first writing piece of this account! (Posted below)

Shoutout to @cysketch for creating this lovely piece that served as my inspiration💕

Early bird songs are carried away in the morning winds, but not fast enough to keep the whistling of the feathered choir from sharing their work with the ears of young Poca.

The rabbit boy stirs awake to start one of the last mornings left of summer, shivering as reminders of autumn gust through an open window and out another. Even knowing of the unlikely chance of getting a visitor today, he diligently gets up. He hurries to ready for the day: pulling on a sweater, descending the stairs, counting stock, and opening up the door to the little home shop.

Poca breathes in deeply as another chilled gust sweeps through his home, rattling the children's toys hanging on display. Like most things Poca has for sale, it’s only thanks to the winds that blow through the high-rise that a layer of dust hasn’t made its home on all the merchandise. Many times Cherrise, Poca’s neighbor downstairs, has told him how foolish a shop so hard to reach is. Many times Cedeir, the friendly delivery critter, has crawled to Poca’s door, gasping for breath through jokes equating the climb up Poca’s stairs to a hike up a mountain. Many times Poca has just smiled kindly, opening shop again the next day with the same vigor as the day before.

Today is no different.

Right on time, just as every day, a box rolls up the steps with a huffing and puffing Cedeir behind it. “Must you order so many boxes to the summit of your mountain Poca?”

And Poca politely smiles.

Not long after Cedeir has left there’s a rattling below Poca that pauses as a window is pulled open. “Are you still insisting on running that shop, silly rabbit boy?” Cherrise calls out.

But Poca just smiles.

Soon it is midday. Tiny mice hurry from their cozy homes, dug out of some of the many boxes in Poca’s shop. They greet Poca eagerly with many excited squeaks. Poca greets each back just as happily, not by name for they have none, but by giving each their favorite unique snack from his shop before setting down some of the aging snacks out in dishes for the friendly mice to feast.

The morning winged choir returns shortly after the mice have had their meal, singing to Poca with a familiar tune. He is no stranger to the daily performance that his feathered company puts on in hopes of earning their dinner for the day, and politely applauds as the show finishes before setting out more dishes of old shop snacks. The birds hurry to fill their beaks before taking off to hide on the roof. Poca’s gaze follows them until they disappear over the edge of the fading red tin, contently admiring the creatures much smaller than him.

A petal falls from a disturbed window box as fleeing wings stir the plant inside, drifting down towards Poca, gently settling between his ears as he turns his gaze to the soft clouds of cotton floating by. The color fading from the petals and browning in the leaves that Poca has so persistently cared for serves as another gentle reminder of the cooler season rapidly approaching. Meanwhile the colors changing on the clouds reflect the day slowly drawing closer to a close.

For a while more Poca keeps watching the sky around him from his favorite spot; in front of a display fridge with his own name printed on it, hiding memories of a paint-filled summer night. As Poca watches the fleeting moments of summer, cherishing the last few memories they’ll make with the critters this year, an evening autumnal wind sweeps past Poca’s high rise, rustling the tired plants and biting at Poca’s fluff through his sweater. The clouds hasten their drifting just slightly as the breeze urges them towards the horizon, to meet with the sun that is rapidly setting.

The sun escapes the sky much quicker than it once did, and the nip of the nighttime air ushers Poca back inside his little shop. He grabs a little broom to sweep, searching for some activity to serve as an excuse to keep the shop open just a little longer in case of any traveler in need stopping by.

A new voice, almost swept away in the winds, “E-Excuse me?”

Poca is quick to turn around, and his guest continues on hurriedly when they see they’ve gotten someone’s attention. “Do you have water? My family is traveling, uhm migrating, because of the cold weather and my grandmother is very old and thirsty and…” Poca smiles gently as they put bottles into a bag, letting the older bird child go on.

Before the bird child can finish their extensive plea Poca is already coming around the counter, kneeling down and offering the well packed bag. “O-oh thank you s-sir! How much do I need to give you? I have…” the bird child starts to ramble again, but Poca makes no requests, only insisting on giving them the bag.

Watching the eyes of the bird child widen as they finally understand Poca’s kind offer warms a deep place inside Poca’s chest, fighting back against the biting cold of the night. “T-thank you sir!! I…I’ll tell my family about you!! Goodbye!” The bird child grabs the bag and struggles to take off with the extra weight, but soon soars off into the distance until they blur with the dark of the sky.

Cherrise would ridicule him, telling Poca about how he can’t run a successful business by giving everything away.

Cedeir would question him, asking Poca where he gets all his packages from if he isn’t making a profit from his sales.

Poca wouldn’t mind though, he knows the warmth he feels inside from the grateful smiles pays for so much more than a few snacks and bottles of water.

Soon Poca shuts off the lights and closes up his doors, hurrying up to bed.

After all, tomorrow will be a busy day.