Prompt: Into the woods
There's an old riddle I tell to the folks who come tired to the halfway house.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjFqLPpSaGZ
'How far can you walk into a forest?'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZ0wYnQW9sU
Some of them know the answer, some don't.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPDRByevy92
'Halfway. Now take your rest.'
The Wood of White Nights was my home.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhdbSKfzgtC
It was a place between two places where rarely people had a reason to stay. Two poor towns, farming areas, or so they claimed, because the crops always failed and never the baleful cry of an animal I heard.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡuYioZTtbiv
People had their own reasons for passing by the Halfway House, and I had my own reasons to live there.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡaGY05W5IMz
I suppose, if nothing else, it gave me something to do.
It was a hobby of sorts - I had always had a way of talking to people, and at the Halfway House I could learn about a different life every day. All the sadness and - occasionally - gladness that would lead someone to stay at a dying building in a forest full of dangerous beasts.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡC2KQ3j0cUe
For some, perhaps they were seeking something. Tales of lost treasure in the Woods, or old friends who stopped returning letters or calls. It's strange, really - the people who were looking for something were lost themselves.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡcR7W0AeKVy
The House provided refuge for others, a place where the outside world no longer mattered, a place where time itself failed to keep composure, a place where they could escape the judgements and expectations.
And I suppose that for a while it kept my interest. Lives and stories were precious things and the knowledge of each one was like a temporary high of intimacy - something that I could never have achieved elsewhere.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡoNs6F49yyk
But too soon, I learnt that life was like a loop, a pencil retracing the same track over and over again - I met the same people, the same stories, the same tired faces with eyes of broken promise.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjUnSsOi1Jm
There was nowhere else for me then, of course. So I stayed. And with every passing year, I couldn't help but feel that I was looking into the mirror every time I greeted a lost soul into the House. I was running. Away, or to, even I didn't know. But I was running, by staying still.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWNuIkntIBp
You see, runners inevitably hit a brick wall. For them, it was death. For me, it was an old friend who returned as a stranger under a rain-soaked sun.
'Welcome to the Halfway House.'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡC6Qq1THtrp
The girl was dripping, and the warm rays of light from the sky had done nothing to dry her. She was English - with those perpetual dimples and perceptive eyes - and her hair was dyed an angel white. She was short - and her complexion said that she couldn't have been any older than twenty seven.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWOjQIda70H
'You must be tired. Sit, please.'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzPZCO973nG
She remained on her feet, and walked up to me.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2oIAmht4Wg
'Do you know how far you can walk into a forest?' I asked her, seeing myself ask myself the same question from the inside of the droplets hanging at her eyelashes.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡnZkCmmBDPm
'Halfway, you bastard. It's me.' The moment that tears began running down her cheeks and not just residual rain was misty, like a watercolor - perhaps she was crying before she even entered.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ81aCPGa6HE
'Aria!' I embraced her, but only lightly, conscious of my suit getting wet. 'You're looking younger than I last saw you.'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEInXl3odO5
'Please don't give me that bullshit Al, I'm old. I'm too old for all of this.' She let go, and finally sat down. She never liked being told when to do things.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNirMb4aLQF
'Another one?'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ06oGFm1Adn
'What do you think? Of course it was another one.' She pulled out a few sepia polaroids from her satchel and gave a heavy sigh at them before handing the stack to me.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡsQaRokGkTJ
'What was his name?' Aria always picked the ones with the lovely smiles. Here - riding on his back in a park, laughing. Here - him making a mess of the spaghetti. Here - a kiss.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡn2QvBljiln
'Jacob. Jacob Ryans.'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8Jn7FvlYih
'He's very beautiful. You two look so happy together.' Here - both of them asleep on a couch. Here - a walk on the beach with a white dog.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ62JTsOOjO6
'Were, Al, we were happy.' She collapsed into an outburst of bodily fluid again. Crying, bleeding, orgasming, I never really got the differences. There's always the pain and the pleasure, and at the extremities, they merge into the one - like a great circle of emotions. 'God, Al, I don't know why I keep doing this to myself.'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjvz4u0lkx1
'Don't say that. What you do is a good thing. You give these men an extra few years of happiness. You know that all these people would have died if you didn't come into their bodies.' Us Muses could pass into any dying body and grant it with immortality so long as we stayed inside. She was the Aria - the outpour of raw emotion. I was the Allemande - the noble, the detached.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡFjTSktG522
'But you know what I took away? Closure. And not having that - that hurts more.'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWUkz0znHXh
'You can still fix things.'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡb08JFklDga
'Al, you know I can't do that. I can't tell them, I can't leave them in any way. I loved them all. I love them all.' She took the photos back and took a long look at the one by the beach. 'The dog was called Marbles. You like riddles, Al? Why's the dog called Marbles?'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2VJcvWt7jT
'You tell me, sis.'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBUGvoE8wJj
She laughed. 'He's batshit bonkers. But adorable all the same. We got him from the adoption place in - I don't even remember. But he was heard barking from the sewers. His previous owner left him there.' A corner of the English girl's smile appeared and faded just as quickly like an imprint from the past.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjzGjAm2HMf
'I just don't know why I keep making the same mistakes.' She folded the photos.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrm05UCpWcF
'Well, sis, life is like a loop - '814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWLYdWKnPMO
'Can you just shut up for once, Al? Not all of your goddamn philosophies are goddamn right. You're stuck here for what you've done, how can you say you know about life?'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvRMxHG1tI3
I stayed silent. She was in a mood.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡceIdCI53j0
'It's like a spiral.' She said, suddenly. 'You always think you're heading somewhere but you just keep going round and round. You know the funny thing about spirals?' I didn't interrupt her - it was rhetorical, and I would only frustrate her further. 'You can draw an infinite number of spirals. An infinite number of lives. They get close, but the only place they really touch is at the center, at the end. At the end of them all.'
Having Aria around was always difficult, but I know she did it for me.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGvoGzNC3g4
You see - I couldn't actually leave the woods. I had made a mistake, a long time ago. Aria takes photos of the world for me, with an old polaroid that she never found the strength to throw away. After a few decades I had had enough of the cities and mountains and lakes, and I asked if I could just see her life.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhVu77mXdYq
It was always about the love, for her. I never understood why. But she would purposefully try to find the ones who were in a healthy relationship, the ones whose boyfriends or girlfriends were always by their hospital bed.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡamROgUXgjL
And once those dying bodies woke again, she would never let those people go, not until she had to leave. She stayed with each one only five, ten years - you see, the bodies don't age once we're inside. To keep us safe, she left before it would become noticeable.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGDWXWSu53M
I suppose I should have thanked her more than I did.
'You're still here.'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡo3cACwnBhQ
It was morning, and Aria was sitting, the English girl, in the dining room. She had never stayed longer than the night before. 'I need a break from it all.' She sighed.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡKFrZTTtmn1
'You're at the right place.' I took the place beside her. 'The cornflakes are shit.' I reminded her. 'Have the yogurt.'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNq4ro7fas5
'How did it feel, Al?'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡy1z78KNPT8
'How did what...'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2WMsQtvKmd
'To do what you did. To do that to all those people.'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ54A3kHzkL7
'Why are you asking me this now?'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUKUFhrUITD
She laid her head into her palms. 'Because nothing has changed.'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJyZgcFh6cd
She didn't want to say it, but I knew what she was thinking. She was tired of being trapped in this world with me.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHi03CWz4V5
'Sis, I'm sorry.'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8v7dRlCwoK
She looked up, crying again. 'But were you really?'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8zKQXUTRio
I couldn't answer that. One option would be a lie and the other would break her heart.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡwnP7TYElrb
I stood.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHS0iHhefBd
'I'll go get you some yogurt.'
'Do you ever wish you could die?'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxFbtZGvktK
Aria was slowly retreating into a shroud of depression.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBC0SyMMYQZ
'No. There's so much to live for.'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGGeF3nXY7G
'But I've seen it all. There's nothing left.'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbxxg4dkIWs
'Don't say that.'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSnCsWom0wo
Even I was surprised at how much she cried those few days she stayed at the Halfway House. It bothered me. I never wanted to see her like this.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡfTAZyp5OH7
And it was only then that I decided to do what I knew was possible several, several years ago.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡwYCUwZPw0a
'Sis... I can get you out.'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡU7KtQoFsPN
'...what do you mean?'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡuliHyeOruG
'I can get you out. I can get you back home. But you have to be patient.'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUcGQn4sY7w
'...I don't understand.'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqn2YCVXEWj
'Back home, sis. Away from all of this.'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYAiyo3BXEB
'But how?'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTXr7uHOO1Y
The tears had stopped and I knew I had made a promise that I couldn't bear to break.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡodGJz2EyXb
'You'll understand tomorrow. Sleep on it.'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡl2Sj8TlKYv
She turned away again.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡj7KR139oDm
She didn't say thanks - reminding me even now how I had mistreated her before.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2FmxdX0nds
'Remember. You'll have to be patient.'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡH3tlBYiaP3
I wait a few moments for a response before I close her door.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUYQehKj00D
It was time for me to leave. To run away, to run towards.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2gH7YRRAyV
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An English girl with hair angel white, kneeled before the gates of her home.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgUh8yYDkLW
'Father?'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡT3HEtI9Fkc
'Aria. You know you're not allowed here.'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡyXR0S4jcZq
'It's not Aria.'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7qY5dEhyq1
Muses could go only into dying bodies, of which there were none in the Wood of White Nights, where time itself lay tired.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡOjpGOyA9ln
But there had been one - a girl with cancer, who should have died seven years ago, who woke at the brink and came to the woods.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡO73h7ndiK8
'Allemande?'814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgbIHMkqJ8n
I could feel him, ready to send me back to the forest in a single spin of the landscape.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡLk4R9adrRm
'Wait.' I say.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡeYrc30PBlS
I know what I need to do to make things right. I know what I need to do to pay for my past. I know how to send Aria home.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgh6MlV5j5v
Because I realized, longer ago than I believed, that I was wrong. Life didn't have a simple shape, an order - life was a mirror, in the corner of the universe, in which you could see eternity, and the reflections of a thousand others -814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡAfXEXA6oTx
And so I will suffer the reflection of the suffering I caused.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡu3nGAfOFpw
I had been running - not away from the forests in fear, not to the forests in hope of comfort, but to hide from the forests that festered within myself.814Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡsprk816JZM
And when all the pain finally ends, they will offer me the heavens once again in forgiveness - but I would stay only a moment to say farewell - and return home, to the Halfway House.
