Story: Swept Away
I've been writing a few short stories for the #0ddPrompt inspirations that get posted weekly on 0dd.company, and this week's is "Caught in a shallow stream." I immediately thought of something this time, and wanted to get it down before I forgot.
Mille swept the floor with the maximum possible apathy one can apply to a task; attempting any greater degree of not-trying may have been considered a form of trying in itself. The second-floor hallway of the highschool held more dust and grit than seemed possible, but perhaps this was due to the long lineage of equally apathetic detentionees responsible for maintenance.
The boy also detained here with her -- "Rocky" as he was called -- was employing an alternate strategy which involved swinging his broom in a manner which actually resulted in the hallway getting dirtier. Rocky was in for the impressively detailed genitalia artwork he had decorated the blackboard with. Mille was in for daydreaming.
Rather, for not paying attention. Again. But it was because of the daydreaming.
She had always been a little light-minded. A few short sentences or boring moments from drifting somewhere else, floating away as thoughts bubbled and spun and popped. Twisted and turned and wobbled on the winds flowing over babbling brooks and flowering fields and forests of
Blink
Rocky was side-eyeing her and randomly pushing filth around. His unique techniques and frequent cleaning-duty was likely the real reason there was so much sweeping to do. He was one of those boys that had become so used to detention it wasn't really a punishment anymore, just an assumption. The class clown willing to become the class janitor if it meant he could squeeze a laugh out of his classmates. He was harmless, and she felt a little bad for him -- while nobody disliked Rocky, he didn't really belong to any particular group of kids. He was just... kind of annoying.
It would help a lot if he was a little cuter. Maybe a bit taller, a bit more tanned, a bit more toned. Maybe longer blonder hair and thin curved eyebrows and sharp features, slightly pointed ears, golden laughing eyes, topless, covered in a sheen of sweat, looking at her curiously, the room hot and damp and smelling of moss and musk with a slight warm breeze. His strange companion creature by his knee, somewhere between a lemur and a bobcat, ringed wide eyes that stare through tiny pupils. The man smiles, gentle, warm, inquisitive. He holds out a hand toward her and
Blink
"You alright?" Rocky was standing in front of her, broom in hand, fully clothed, messy-mousy hair and stub-everything. "We're never going to be done if you keep up at that speed," he says, his own corner of the hallway apparently in need of disaster relief funding. "Lucky for you I'm not authorized to give out more detention for spacing out. Did you want to clean the boards, or can I do it?"
"I wasn't spacing out," she snaps -- a soft snap, however, like folding a mozzarella stick in half; for she had, undoubtedly, been spacing out. He takes her omission of board-cleaning preference as permission to take the task himself. He was probably just going to draw more dicks on them, but that was his prerogative. He really was a decent artist, if he'd just put some effort into drawing something else. She turned to tidy up the mess he'd made at cleaning and nearly fell off the stone balcony, her stomach lurching, one foot over an a chasm, a golden field below, a strong finger hooked around her belt at the crook of her back. The sky was the grapefruit colour of sunset, the man was smirking as he pulled her back a step, an apple in his other hand.
"Life is a bore but let us not be hasty," he says, his voice like a brass church bell through cotton, sturdy and singing but somehow muffled. Her vision, too, fuzzy. His creature stands at the balcony ledge facing outward, head craned to stare at her, but she sees only the beautiful man as she turns. He is fully dressed this time, white linen, soft, he smiles and the world becomes a different kind of fuzzy
"I'm glad you've come back"
BANG
She's shocked back into reality, her face inches from a hallway window. A dusty print of feathers and speckle of blood mark the other side of the glass where a bird has just met a violent sudden end directly in front of her face. Her heart skips a beat.
"Fuck was that?", Rocky, head poking out of the classroom door.
"Bird," she squeaks, breathless.
"No way, right in front of your face?"
"Yes?"
"Well you're either so gorgeous the birds are killing themselves to get to you, or so hideous they want you dead" the little goblin cackles, disappearing back into the room. Another man cackles to her left. A baby cries to her right. She is in a dense market, surrounded by chaos and creatures and colours. A man with a dog face sells fish to a child. A fish with a man-face hawks dried dog meat.
She is walking, and beside her he is walking, his boots clicking against the cobblestone. Upon his shoulder his oversized racoon, absurdly large to be hitching a ride, tail hanging past his belt. He strides confidently with pristine posture, looking toward her.
"We can't keep meeting like this", he laughs as he side-steps around an ogreish blue creature covered in sprouting fungi. "Eventually you need to stay long enough to tell me your name."
Blink
Blinking doesn't banish the daydream; she's still surrounded by the cacophony of the strange market. She stops walking, taking it in. This wasn't the blurry bubbly scene of a half-imagined flight of fancy. She can make out the intricate carvings on a wooden cart nearby, and she is assaulted by the layered smells of spice and sweat and shit, she spins about and stops when she sees him again, now returning from a stall, smiling warmly. That smile seems to mute out the chaos about her. He deftly produces an apple he's taken from the stall and proffers it to her.
"You simply must -
wake the hell up"
A short-fingered hand is waving in front of her face. Behind the hand, Rocky. Concerned? Annoyed.
"There you are. Fuck, that bird give you a stroke or something?"
She's not able to respond, still adjusting to the sudden absence of market noise
"I know daydreaming is kinda your 'thing,' but come on it's a bit much. Anyway, come here a sec" he's grinning, now. Pulling her into the classroom. She holds onto her broom for stability.
In the room she sees his latest work -- an even bigger, more detailed penis than the one that landed him his current punishment, painstakingly rendered in every available colour of chalk. There were others, too. Some had wings? How long had she been dreaming in the hall that he's had time to produce the Sistine-chapel of blackboard dick murals? She looks up at the well-dressed winged man behind the counter.
"Your name, miss?" he asks in a sugar smooth strange accent, adjusting tiny glasses and flipping a page in his tiny notebook. She pauses. What?
She feels a gentle poke in her ribs from an elbow, his elbow. He has his arm around hers and is dressed exquisitely. So is she, she realizes.
"Name, dear," he whispers, inclining his head to the angel man.
"Mille."
"Eh? I'm not giving you any credit for it, sorry" chuckles Rocky as he signs his name beneath his masterpiece.
She's dancing, he's leading. Strange music, off-kilter. The room is blurring as they spin. She's never danced like this before -- occasionally some viral dance practice but none of this ballroom-stuff. She catches sight of the animal, watching. Pupils tiny dots. He hugs her in close for another spin.
"Stay with me" he says.
"Stay with me" Rocky says. "Seriously is this like a medical thing, Mille?". She's holding her broom. He's holding her up. "Should I call someone?"
"Can I call you Milly?" They're back on the balcony, at a table set with candles. The creature is there, just at the corner of her vision. The man is so beautiful, his eyes are sparkling in the candle light. He holds out the apple and winks. "I held onto it for you". She takes it.
"Stay here, Mille, I'm going to get some help. Maybe sit at one of the desks." There's panic in his voice.
The apple isn't an apple at all, but something else perfectly round, deep red and shiny. She can see her reflection in the skin, the desks and classroom posters behind her. It smells like cinnamon. She takes a bite. The man smiles. The animal screams. The world lurches.
For two moments she feels like she's upside down in a carnival ride -- then everything snaps into place. Firm. Solid.
Goosebumps prickle her whole body as the cold night air washes over her. She coughs and sputters, her mouth full of bitter powder. She is scared. Sitting across from her the man is gone. There is only the creature, ringed eyes staring. Pupils dilating. Mouth split in a sharp-toothed grin. The candle flame goes out.
She blinks and blinks again through tears. Her breathing is heavy. Each time her eyes open, the creature is at the other side of the table. Grin deepening in the dark, eyes wide. She is awake.
She is on the other side of the glass.
Rocky turns, halfway out the door, to reassure someone of something. A broom clatters to the floor, startling him. A momentary feeling of great importance looms and then passes. What had he been doing just now?
He must have been daydreaming.