Month: February 2022

You Can’t Go Home Again Part 4 – Conclusion

~ annemcsommers ~ 2 Comments

If you are confused, where part 3 is, please go back and check my Sunday late posting. This is a six sentence story concluding my Faerie stories You Can’t Go Home Again. It also managed to get the word dotage in, which has been stuck in my head for 3 months.

It took years, but Grace eventually learned to be happy in this new time, with a small job, then a GED, and then in the strangest of twists, the written word. Though she never wrote with the speed and fluidity expected of her, she spent her spare hours writing of the Fae, singing their praises to be more honest, and when her social worker found one of her pieces, things exploded from there.

Her work was called spectacularly detailed, marvelously realistic, and she could never explain how she came up with it, or the darkness she had left out. Soon she was old, three score and 5 years had passed, and she was more of this time than she was of another, but her sister still weighed heavily on her mind.

She realized in her dotage that this was her punishment, for rejecting the hospitality offered to her, and she could only hope that the fair folk would accept her attempt at redemption, as she walked into the forest, to a place she hadn’t seen in so very long.

She stepped into the circle, a crone bearing books, and out of it a starving maiden, joyous, and so Grace returned to her sister, knowing that their were far worse things that could happen than going hungry.

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Private Property

~ annemcsommers ~ Leave a comment

This one was supposed to be for Jimmie’s 250 words, but it got away from me a little. The age of the girl is a little fluid, and once again the inspiration was Faeries. I have a thing for the idea of the Fair Folk, and after recently discovering more that 40% of the missing persons in Canada disappear in British Columbia and most of those into the wilderness, I can see why people blamed them so much…

The first time she saw the girl, she had run away from home. Well not really, she just got very cross with her parents and fled the discussion into the nearby woods. The girl was sitting beneath a large tree reading and Stephanie wondered where she had come from, there was nothing around for miles. She wanted to say hello, but hesitated, something about the girl scared her and she didn’t know why.

She went home, put the strange girl out of her mind, and didn’t think of her again. She didn’t forget the girl though, and a month later when she stormed into the forest again, and saw her, she decided to confront the girl.

She cleared her throat, and when she got not response, she said loudly. “Excuse me, I am not sure if you realize, but you are trespassing on private property.”

The girl paused and then looked up, purple eyes squinting against the suns glare. “Oh am I?” The girl asked.

“Yes, you are.” She responded.

“Oh, I just came from over there,.” The girl gestured deep into the woods. ‘Would you like to join me for some tea, as an apology for the trespassing?” The girl offered.

She nodded, it seemed only polite, and so she followed the girl into the forest, to a cabin she had never seen before. They walked in, and there on the table, was a pot of tea still steaming, and two places set up. She started to look around, but her eyes were drawn back to the table, where the scent of tea was absolutely divine

She wanted to ask where the girls mother was, or how she knew to make tea, but the smell overpowered her. She had drank half the cup in a single gulp, and never realized her mistake. She was never seen or heard from again.

You Can’t Go Home Again Part 3

~ annemcsommers ~ Leave a comment

In a truly spectacular failure of the week, I wrote this last Sunday and never posted it. I would just not post it at all, but I am writing part 4, the conclusion to this for this weeks challenge, and you are going to be a little confused if you didn’t read part 3. Oops.

She knew that she had been lucky to be found by Delores, who took her in, fostered her, and took her to her many medical appointments for her “head injury”.

She knew not to speak of the fair folk, and without an explanation of how she came by her dress, or manner of speech, there was no way for her to refute the claim of injury.  The adults often spoke in hushed voices of something they called a cult when she didn’t know something she should, like what electricity was, or what a car was, or how to write with the proficiency of a trained scribe.

She didn’t like this strange new world, where everything moved so fast, yet so slow at the same time, and where she was expected to have the confidence of an elder, while not being trusted to so much as feed herself.   She had 14 years to her name, and if it weren’t for her father’s passing, she would have been wed with a babe of her own by now, but when she told that to Delores it only made the woman look sad, then treat her more like a child.

She was given pills to make her happy, but the only made it all fuzzy, as she mourned a life long gone, a family long dead, and the feeling of belonging she had once had.

Flight

~ annemcsommers ~ Leave a comment

Okay, this one is a little bit monster, a little based on an episode of criminal minds that included gypsies. Summary would be a supernatural family flees town when the secret is revealed, before they can get caught by angry people bearing pitch forks. Yup, its a weird one.

Before I could stop it, the blood from my cut fell and I watched it drop towards the table as if in slow motion. I started to run as soon as I knew I couldn’t catch it, not waiting for the gasps I knew would soon come as it hit the table and began to burn its way through.

“Jamie, whats wrong?”

I looked up to see my sister there, concerned, and I held up my arm to show her. “It hit the table.” I gasped out, and her face went blank, and then hard.

She grabbed my arm, and had me in the car and out of the parking lot before my friends had left the building. My blood was eating through the door frame as I couldn’t put enough pressure to stop the bleeding ,and I tried to focus on that instead of my sister barking updates at my parents. By the time we hit the highway I could see my parents car barreling down the middle lane, and we tucked in behind them.

We drove in silence for an hour, going nearly double the limit, and slowly my blood began to clot. When we pulled off the highway we didn’t slow, and quickly ended up at an RV park off of a dirt road. My parents didn’t chastise me, only cleaned and dressed the wound, covering it in salve to neutralize the corrosive effects.

My mother helped me strip] down and clean ]off. My long hair was chopped off, I was given glasses and a baseball cap, and an athletic outfit that was so far from my own style that I didn’t’ recognize it at first. The rest of my family had changed too, Dad’s beard was gone, my sister’s hair was in curls, and all of them were in matching track suits. It was abhorrent.

The car started on fire with a whoosh, as all out belongings were tossed in. We stayed long enough to make sure everything with my blood on it had burned, and then we got in the back of my uncle’s minivan. I wanted to ask when he showed up, but I was too ashamed, it was my carelessness that had caused this, after three long years.

“It’s not your fault.” My mothers voice startled me from my reverie. I looked up at her, and she continued. “It was an accident dear, it happens to all all of us.”

“We still had to leave because of me.” I sulked.

My mother was not one to beat around the bush. “Yes, we did. Did you want to leave?” She asked and I shook my head.

“Did you try your best?” She asked, and I nodded.

“That’s all we can do sweetie, try our best. Sometimes, sometimes our best isn’t good enough, and I wished you didn’t have to know that yet, but that’s life. I just need you to know is that your best is always good enough for me. I love you, you know that right?”

I nodded, but she wouldn’t let it go. “Right?”

“Ya, Mum, I know.” I mumbled.

“Good! Now get some rest, it’s going to be a long couple of days, and I am going to need you sharp if they catch up with us.” She grinned, and the sun reflected from her teeth, emphasizing the point.

I leaned back in my seat and tried to relax, hoping they didn’t catch up with us. I hated killing people.