fragments

I want to write stories, pretty ones, about ladies in sparkly red dresses, and a mommy who cries. About fairies and foxes and bears, and frightened little girls who do big brave things, about wolves who swallow stones and about sisters who cough up diamonds. I want to make something new, and beautiful. But sometimes the urgency of it makes me sad. Like I'm still trying to cancel out all the bad things, all the ugliness. I shouldn't need to do that. I should create nice things just because I want to. Just for myself. Not to make up for other people's actions. Sometimes I feel like that's what I'm doing. But not always.

What if the sister who spoke frogs and lizards and creepy crawling things was the nice one? What if it saved her from a dismal life, married to a greedy king? What if the diamonds and rubies cut like the faceted stones that they are, and never stopped coming up, with every word, every careless hum, every painful clearing of the deeply scarred throat, until she choked on words whether they were spoken or not and her panicked eyes pleaded for an end? But I guess it wouldn't matter what was in her eyes. Because her husband wouldn't be looking into her eyes, would he? He'd be watching the emeralds sparkle as they fell into his open hand.

I do love delicious fragments of story. Maybe someday, when I'm better, I'll be able to string them together. Or maybe all they'll ever be is fragments -- and delicious, still.