Having only been up a few hours it has already recieved a lot of attention, and inspired a lot of writing. So I thought I would share it with you along with a short it inspired me to write. Bare in mind it's a first edit lol, as my editor has yet to turn his eye to it.By Jossie Marie Solheim
She stand’s silently by, a finger pressed lightly to her pure unblemished lips, eyes such a vivid blue that they eat into my soul. She can only be about seven years old, this tiny little girl, with smooth blonde locks, protruding from the hood of her white cloak.
She signals for me to move closer, her eyes wide then turns and gazes through the small hole in the wall, barely bigger than a small marble. I ease forward, crouched low, unlike the little girl, I am too tall to stand here. She steps a side as I near, her tiny finger pointing to the hole, as I press my eye to it.
“That’s you isn’t it?” she whispers, as I gaze through at my lifeless body, laid upon the ground, my own cold lifeless eyes gazing back at me. “It was the poison,” she say’s the words a gentle hiss that send shivers down my spine.
“You took too much.” she say’s, her small hand resting on my shoulder.
“Am I dead?” I ask, the words catching in my throat.
“You could be,” she replies, “someday, like that, but your not yet, that’s what may be, not what will be.” I turn and look at her perplexed.
“I don’t understand,” I say, sitting back on my heels, trying to think, trying to fathom just what is happening.
“Nothing is set in stone, you have free will, can make your own mistakes, but you do not have to stand by those mistakes, you can change your path. It could just as easily be like this instead.” She says, cupping her hands lightly over the hole in the wall, and breathing air between them, as if trying to warm them a little.
I watch as she leans forward, check’s the hole, smiles and nods, and then indicates for me to take a look.
I move forward, somewhat afraid, and press my eye to the hole once more, I an old woman, laid in a hospital bed, people gathered around her, some young, some old, all of them solemn, the woman seems simply to be in a deep peaceful sleep.
“That’s a better isn’t it?” she asks.
“Is that me?” I question.
“Oh yes.” She replies calmly.
I press my eye to the hole again, but I do not recognise any of the people there, they are all strangers to me.
“Who are they? Why don’t I recognise any of them?”
“Because you haven’t met them yet.” She says.
“Where are all the friends I have now?” I ask.
“Do you think their real friends?” she replies, then sadly shakes her head.
“Who are you?” I ask, sitting back on my heels once more.
“You used to know me,” She say’s simply. “We ran through the waves, the spray flying around us, cooling our sun kissed skin and danced over the cliffs, singing into the wind. We were both free then, both innocent and unblemished, but that changed, you changed.”
“Not by choice,” I cried, my emotions bubbling to the surface painfully, then realisation dawning I added, “But those things, I did them all alone, you were not there.”
“Was I not?” she asks seeming perplexed, “perhaps we just remember it differently.” She says.
“I was alone, always alone, I liked it that way, you were not there, I’d have remembered something like that.” I snapped.
Once more she presses a finger to her lips, and then bends towards the hole once more, cupping her hands around the hole, and breathing deeply into it.
“Look,” she say’s.
I lean forward once more and press my eye to the hole, I see the cliff’s my childhood hide away, and I sit on the edge, gazing out across the ocean a small girl beside me, all dressed in white.
“Out across the ocean, out across the sea, on another island, there’s a place I long to be.” She says, reciting the words, I used to chant, all those years ago. “Out across the ocean, out across the sea, there is a home that’s perfect, designed with love for me.”
“Out across the ocean, out across the sea, there’s a place that free from heartache, the place I long to be. “ I said, finishing for her.
“I was there,” she said bluntly. “I heard your dreams, your wishes, your hopes, and I held them close, kept them safe, ready for when you’d need them again.”
“What good are hopes and dreams?” I hissed.
She did not respond however, simply leaned forward once more, hands cupped over the small hole as once more she filled it with her breath.
“Look,” she said.
I leaned forward once more, and through the hole I saw myself, cowering in the corner, as an all to familiar man rose above me like a demon, arm raised up, ready to swing, a belt clutched in his hand.
“Why are you doing this?” I asked.
“Just watch.” She replied.
Returning my gaze back to the images through the hole, I now saw myself bloody and beaten gazing down at my blood drenched hands, and then the words came to me again, that same rhyme spoken from my own lips, barely a whisper.
“Out across the ocean, out across the sea, on another island, there’s a place I long to be. Out across the ocean, out across the sea, there is a home that’s perfect, designed with love for me. Out across the ocean, out across the sea, there’s a place that free from heartache, the place I long to be.”
“Hope got you through, dreams of a better place made you strong, what good are they you say, yet they saved you.”
“I am not saved.” I snapped.
“But you can be, your free from him, free from the abuse, you just have to free yourself from the poison now.”
“I can’t,” I cried, “I need it.”
“You didn’t before, your hopes were enough once, they can be again,” She says simply. “Only you can change your destiny. Only you can end this now. It’s up to you if you end it alone, in a dirty room, with no one to hold you, or you end it surrounded by those that love you. Only you can do it. Only you,”
I sit back, my breaths shallow, thoughts running through my head, it seems such an impossible task, can I really shake this drug, really find that normal life, the life I always longed for.
“You can,” She say’s, as if reading my thoughts, “you can, you can, you can...” her words echo through my head, as she and her world begins to fade.
And I know that she is right, know that only I can change my life, only I can make my dreams come true, because if I don’t fight for myself, no one ever will.
© jossie Tyrellium
26, march, 2011
I'd love to know what you think and also to know if this picture prompt enspires you to write anything.
love and hugs Joss xx
I'll come back and fix the mistakes on this later as well as some of the sentence structure, but it's not to bad for a first draft lol.
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