Our final assignment for my Brief Encounters course was to write a short story between 1400 and 1600 words. This is mine.
———————– The Trees ———————–
He pulls a splinter out of his finger. He should probably get a new shovel. The handle of this one is just falling apart. It cuts into his hands as he resumes digging. There’s sweat dripping off his nose and more slides down his spine. He takes off his old newsboy cap with a hole in the side to wipe the sweat off his forehead. The sun is directly overhead. It’s not the ideal time to be planting a tree, but she doesn’t like the dark. He glances at her.
She’s still asleep in the shade of the oak nearby, hands folded delicately on her stomach. Her blue floral dress lies against her skin, revealing the enticing shape of her body. His fingers itch to trace their way from her curly brown hair to her toes. A breeze blows her skirt a few inches up her thighs. He bites his lip. Those few inches beckon him to move closer, to reach out, to take control and cut the dress off her skin.
He grips the shovel tight and forces himself to look back at the hole. Focus.
It takes twenty minutes and three more splinters for him to determine the hole is both deep enough and wide enough. He drops the shovel and looks around. The vegetation of the forest hasn’t strayed passed the boundary set by the grass around the cabin. Even the animals keep clear. A squirrel peers at him from the side of a tree. He holds its gaze until it darts to the ground and farther into the woods.
Then he stares at her.
She’s always so beautiful when asleep. Her face relaxes away from the stress of the day, and she even smiles sometimes. She’s doesn’t do that much when she’s awake. He doesn’t know who the smiles are meant for, but he always claims them. He claims the subtle pink of her lips and the gentle curve at the corners. He claims the crinkles at the corner of her eyes and the dimple on her left cheek.
She’ll scowl when she dreams, too, and he claims those. He claims every twitch of her hands and every time her toes curl. He claims her hands when they find their way into her hair, getting tangled in the ringlets.
He claims her beauty, piece by piece, even if it’s not meant for him. It’s nice to believe it is, to believe he deserves her in his life. It’s nice to believe he can be given something precious to protect, that someone so dear could love him.
He glances down at himself. There are three more holds in his jeans, and his once-white shirt is now a kaleidoscope of dirt and grass stains. His hand runs through his hair. It’s greasy. He should shower and change before waking her.
But as he starts to move away, she stirs. He sits beside her and waits for her to reveal the two things he can’t claim.
After a minute, her eyes are open, and she turns them to him. He doesn’t move. It always takes time to get used to them. One is the deepest blue he’s ever seen, ice cracked open to reveal clear depths below. The depths hold all sorts of creatures fighting for attention. They flash by so quick he can’t catch them. The other is dark, so dark the iris blends directly into the pupil. The creatures here are on the surface, stare at him with accusing eyes. They claw into his brain and pull him down into her head. They demand she be heard and seen and respected. They demand he treat her well.
She blinks. Her eyes scan the other trees lucky enough to be accepted into his yard. They settle on the one waiting to be planted. He takes a deep breath. He’ll adjust to her eyes. He always does.
‘Come inside,’ he says. He helps her to her feet and puts an arm around her shoulders. ‘I want to shower before we eat.’
She doesn’t say anything. Her voice is the same as her smile. She never uses it unless she’s asleep.
The steps that lead onto the cabin’s porch creaked and the front door whined as it moved. They entered the room directly to the left, where two twin beds rested on a polished wooden floor between worn wooden dresses and walls made of logs stacked atop each other.
She sits on the bed to wait. He grabs his clothes, goes into the attached bathroom, and closes the door behind him. He wants her to watch him, but she’s too pure for that, and he needs to treat her well.
He emerges only ten minutes later, relieved to see her still sitting there. Her eyes don’t lift from the floor to admire his suit.
He caresses her cheek. ‘I’ll go get us our dinner.’
The kitchen is across the hall. He already has peanut butter and jelly sandwiches made with a piece of triple chocolate cake just for her.
The front door whines. He takes the food into the hall to find her in the front doorway. Her mouth opens and closes. She wipes her hands on her dress. One hand cautiously points outside.
He smiles. ‘We can eat on the steps.’
She nods. Her body relaxes.
They don’t speak as they eat. She watches her food. He watches her, memorizing her high cheekbones and the gentle curve of her jaw. The first time he saw her features, her head was thrown back in laughter. It was as if she looked to the sky to thank God she could feel such pleasure. A roller coaster rattled by behind her. She plucked at her t-shirt, which was soaking wet and clung to her.
He watched her and her friends eat their lunch and reapply their makeup. She highlighted her eyes with gold and her lips with luscious crimson. He couldn’t let her go. He couldn’t lose her light-footed walk or the way she covered her mouth with her hand when taken aback. And he couldn’t let her go back to whoever gave her the bruises. So he followed her.
And it was worth it. It was worth every meal they had together, every bruise that faded from her skin, and every smile in her sleep.
Her eyes slip closed. Her body goes slack. He’s just fast enough to get his hands under her before her head could hit the wooden slats. He brushes the hair from her face.
‘It’s okay,’ he whispers. ‘You’ll be safe soon.’
He glances at the cake. It’s only half gone. The serum must have been stronger than he thought.
She’s light, lighter than she was when he first brought her here. It’s not too difficult to carry her over to the hole and place her gently in the dirt. The sun disappears, and he looks up to find clouds drifting across the sky. He stands. There are darker clouds following. He should hurry.
He picks up the shovel. In the few minutes it takes to cover her, a light drizzle starts to fall. He goes into the house, retrieves his cap, takes off his suit coat and tie, and then steps back into the faint rain.
He takes his time planting the tree over her.
‘She played soccer.’ He removes yet another splinter and keeps digging. ‘Most of her friends were on the team with her, but they were mean. You should have seen her when I brought her here. This is better. You’ll protect her, won’t you? The trees are always willing to protect people.’
A gust of wind blows through the trees. It causes the white noise of the forest and rain to get louder, the leaves almost yelling at each other instead of murmuring. He looks up. The real storm will be here soon.
He manages to finish getting the dirt in the hole just in time for the storm to start. Thunder reaches his ears from a few miles away. Rain comes down so hard he can barely see the tree in front of his face.
He pulls out his knife and leans close to carve her initials into the bark. S.W.
It starts to pour. He’s drenched in a minute, but he doesn’t leave. He prays for everything about her, from her beauty to her purity and happiness. He prays she’ll have her favorite foods and prays she’s smiling outside her sleep.
He picks up the shovel. The thunder is getting closer. It’s ripping its way along the hills, warning everyone to find shelter.
But he takes the time on his way inside to move across the yard and trace the initials carved into the other trees.