It started with something small; a plain pebble with an odd swirl formed on top.
I found it on the stoop to my door, placed inside my cup I had forgotten to bring in.
I had been distracted in my painting again. I had dreams of making it big in the world, but people were not interested in pictures of what they already knew.
The world was a strange place filled with strange creatures. Humanoid, terrifying, other-worldly beings that hid in thickets, became the waters, or lived in the skies.
People didn't want to see that. They wanted something... more.
So, I tried. Anything to make a little extra cash to keep food on my table and clothes on my back.
I lived alone; I had since moving away from my parents many years ago. Once I was gone, I was out of thier lives. It worked better that way. In a way, it gave me fuel for my paintings stacked in the spare room.
The house I had was only a little stone one in a field. It was far from town and was ringed with a wooden fence so old that it looked like it would be blown over in the breeze.
Wildflowers spilled colour outside my door every day, and the air was always fresh.
Even though my fridge struggled to keep my food cold, and my fireplace was so choked inside the chimney it barely warmed the house, it was my sanctuary that no-one else intruded on, until the gifts.
First was the stone.
The next day was a blue daisy.
I'd never seen anything like it. When I saw it dropped beneath my kitchen window, I failed to realise it was fake until I bought it inside and placed it in a milk bottle topped with water that it bobbed up from.
Part of a toy? Maybe from a cheap store in town?
But why would it come here?
There was no hints of anyone coming here on thier own terms. The grass was still as wild as ever and my fence remained bowed to the flowers.
Someone was trying to startle me and I wasn't going to let it.
I was still on edge that night when I made vegetable stew topped with a few of the wildflowers from outside.
While nestled in my cane chair that creaked when I wrapped my knitted blanket around myself, I smiled gratefully at the stew warming my hands.
The house was freezing, but the blanket offered some warmth. My bed would be warmer with the thick covers I had layered on it awaiting me.
The thought of being snuggled somewhere warmer won me over.
I cradled the bowl of stew close when I shuffled to the kitchen for a glass of water to take with me.
The sink was below the window overlooking the field and fence. Trading my bowl for a cup, I let the tap run before dipping the glass under and looking out at the darkness.
Rather than meeting the moonlight basking over my serene property, I was staring straight into two piercing white eyes.
The sheer shock of them rattled my body into dropping the glass back into the sink and stumbling away.
They lingered for only a few seconds longer before disappearing.
I bolted for the door, not to open and inspect my intruder, but to fumble the chain lock into position and click the knob beside it closed.
Hurrying for bed, the cold covers offered none of the comfort I had been seeking.
I remained there, too scared to retrieve my stew beneath the window, and too shaken to pick out the broken glass from the sink.
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