Bit by Bit, Piece by Piece

[MessengerOfDreams]

Bit by Bit, Piece by Piece
I send myself to you.
Some short stories.

Let's Dance For Awhile

Let's dance for awhile.

Under the stars, in the fields where the grass grows up to our thighs. Let's pretend that it's not raining and the wind isn't blowing your jacket above your head. Let's pretend that the bramble isn't waiting at our feet, tripping us at every step.

Let's dance for awhile.

Let me pull you close, kiss the side of your head, lead you across the world and back. This is our world, this wild field of dreams, and it's all I need right now. The rest of the world, its tragedies and suffering and emergencies can proceed without us. I just need this moment, right here.

Let's dance for awhile.

The rest of the world is heavy on my back, so wrap your arms around me and relieve this burden. The world is divided into love and hate, and I've had my fill of the latter. John Coffey only wanted a companion and for people to stop being ugly to each other. I can only manage one of these things, but that's enough.

Let's dance for awhile.

Let the raindrops disguise the tears on my cheek. Let the wind disguise my trembling legs. But please understand that when I pull you so close to me that you can feel my heartbeat, it's because I'm trying to comfort myself too.

Let's dance for awhile, shall we? This dance could be all we have.

-------

Anew

She wakes up in a blank space as a blank space. She doesn't know what she is. She lost who she was. She is a formless, baseless being.

She blinks once, twice, trying to find structure in all of this hazy nothing. Is there a path? A guide? A way to find herself? Is there even a herself to find?

The scene shifts with her mind. A labyrinth forms around her, encasing her within its map. She shrieks in surprise and closes her eyes, even more confused than before. She doesn't move until the walls stop growing and the ground stops rumbling.

She forces herself to stop shaking and opens her eyes. She sees the walls around her, only they're not solid walls. They're shelves, and through the faint cracks between the contents she sees light.

She makes herself pick up the first book she sees. Removing it from its brethren, she observes it. Cold, cobalt blue on the cover and crisp and clean on the pages, she's intrigued already. She's glad to know she is still in a realm she can understand. She knows books. She loves books.

She breathes easier, forces a smile, and starts reading. By the time she is finished, either a minute or millenia later, she is satisfied, and her smile is real.

She goes to place the book back, but finds herself intrigued by the empty space that the book once held. There is light shining through, more powerful than before. Through the space, she seems more shelves and books, standing tall within the mystic, endless sky. The entirety of this cosmic library appeared endless to her.

She wanted more.

She wandered the hallways, tracing her footsteps carefully. She found different books, different genres, different eras of writing, and all of it was hers.

Eagerly, she continued to read. And she was happy.

Some books enthralled her. Some comforted her. Some taught her. Some inspired her. Most weren't explored beyond its cover and beginning pages, but the ones she kept reading were worth sorting through every book she didn't complete.

She learned from this infinite fountain of knowledge. She discovered herself anew. She found what she liked, what she desired, who she wanted to be within the tales of someone else's creation.

As days turned into years, or not a moment later, she found herself embarking on a new adventure. She had amassed a pile of the books that meant the most to her as she traveled the halls looking for something she had forsaken for the comfort of the books.

These books were alluring. They lulled her into security, always entertaining her but leaving her with an aching, empty feeling. They were a marvel, but they weren't enough.

So with her favorite books, she found her way to the exit. She had read so many stories, but now was her time to create her own.

She still didn't know who she was. But that was the adventure of it all, finding herself. It was one she was ready for.

As she traversed the exit, she opened her eyes into a brave new world, hers for the taking.

She couldn't wait.

-------

Sunshine Loves the Rain.

Sunshine loves the rain.

She loves the simple things about it. The lovely chill it brings when it hits her skin, the dramatic touch it gives the landscape around her, and the roaring sound the cascade unleashes as a million little pieces of sky dive towards the ground. Rain could make any given place feel more alive.

Sunshine loves the rain.

She loves everything it brings with it. Nutrition for the world and all living things, a thin glaze of water on the sidewalk that parts like the Red Sea every time her boots walk through it, a peaceful and melodic atmosphere for her creativity and inner being. Such small little drops had a habit of being so very large in their own ways.

Sunshine loves the rain.

She loves how the rain is her juxtaposition. She's called Sunshine because she always has the brightest spirit. Her very presence could illuminate a dark cave. Her cheer is infectious, lighting up even the darkest souls. At least, that's what he tells her.

Sunshine loves the rain.

She loves it because she appreciates how different it is. The clouds above her would congregate to release it, the gray obscuring the blue skies above her. Every raindrop is a release, freedom from a cage or freedom from a heavy burden. Rain is unrepentant, it forges on despite what others thought, and it doesn't obscure any of its intent. In those ways, raindrops are powerful, like an endless mass of fearless soldiers.

Sunshine loves the rain.

She loves it because it gives her faith. It gives her comfort in who she is, reassurance that it was something worthwhile, and confidence in that being as she herself marches on in life, whether jubilant, tragic or mundane.

Sunshine loves the rain, and she thinks it's a shame that everyone else thinks so negatively of it. To them, it's a nuisance, a discomfort. To her, it's beauty, comfort, reassurance and good company. Being with the rain is worth the cold shivers and soaking wet skin, because the goosebumps peak her sense of being and the tiny drops of water make her feel alive.

Sunshine loves the rain, because even if it is seen as her polar opposite, the rain is a part of her.

Stay Awhile

Stay awhile, my friend.

Stay awhile, so that our kindred spirits may embrace even in our silent stillness. We're alone no longer, and we've finally found what we've been looking for.

Stay awhile, my dear.

Stay awhile, so I may take the light and happiness you bring me and exchange it for my passion and loyalty. I'd never dream of letting you go, because I've waited so long to hold you.

Stay awhile, my song.

Stay awhile, so I may hear the cadence of your voice and enjoy all that it delivers, so I may feel the unique texture of your skin and keep in sync with your jubilant footsteps. I want to memorize everything about you because I want it all to be mine.

Stay awhile, my love.

Stay awhile, so I may share my adventures and experiences with you, so I may show you the magnificence in your reflection, so I can write a word or two in the legend of your life, so I can become as unforgettable to you as you are to me, so I can give you what you like. I want your companionship, your hand in mine, your kiss, your passion, your desire, your faith, your warmth, your courage, your trust, your light and your heart- that's all.

The world is too dangerous of a place to traverse alone, and I've waited so long for you to sit here with me. So won't you stay awhile?

I promise you won't regret it.

[MessengerOfDreams]

Based off of this song. One Of These Mornings by Moby ft Patti Labelle.

One of these mornings, it’ll finally happen. It won’t be very long before I’ll be gone. You can try looking for me, if you want to waste your time.

You can look for me around the market, where I would drift through silently, observing the latest offerings from homegrown farmers while the wind blew my jacket around my sides. People would politely pass by me as I hovered around the tents, looking for something to interest me. Soon I’ll be out of their way.

You can look for me around 5th Avenue, where I’d face the ground as I walked, even when I crossed the streets. I’d admire the texture of the maroon sidewalk and avoid looking up at people because they simply did not interest me. Sometimes I’d rest against the side of a building, under its shade and occasionally that of a surviving tree left alone just as I was. Soon there will be one less shadow along the red brick.

You can look for me around the forest trails. Perhaps the place I was most comfortable in because it made no difference to nature if I was there. We were able to acknowledge each other respectfully and let each other be. I loved to run through as fast as I could, never stopping for a moment until I couldn’t go further and would collapse onto the grass. Soon there will be fewer footsteps to track through, no spot on the dirt indented by my exhausted body.

You can look for me atop the bridges, where I would gaze at the river intently, tracing the boats as they churned bubbling streams skyward while passing through, whether with lightning speed or steady movement. I sometimes wondered what people must have thought to constantly see me standing there, often not moving for several hours. Soon there will be one less person to move when the drawbridge goes up.

You can look for me on bus 2149. I always took the back seat along the left side, right by the window, the same bus every time. The people there would always leave that seat open for me, even if the bus was full, even though they didn’t know me. I’d get off at a different place every time, since I didn’t care where I ended up, as long as it was on that same bus at the end of the day. I’d stare at the window, watching the sights breeze by as we sped down the boulevards. Soon the back left seat will be available for whoever wants it. But will anyone take it?

You can look for me in the bookstores, wading through a sea of trillions of words that I could never bring myself to say, words I could only read in envy, wishing I could be possessed by the power that they held. Nevertheless, I was merely a spectator of gods in the world they lived, and the word of god was not my own. People would see me, hovering over the shelves, making my selection carefully. If I could buy every book in the store, I could, but soon so many books will be left for the opportunity of others still around to read them.

You can look for me in the one place where I realized my full potential. Once upon a time a woman named Elizabeth drifted through the art galleries, wishing that her meager drawings could transform into a masterpiece that could be presented among the others, a god among its kin. Time was never on Elizabeth’s side, but she spent her life looking for the place that would inspire a masterpiece fit for a king. As time began to drift away, Elizabeth, always on her lonesome, slowly began to realize that the amazing places she needed to inspire her were the places she already had been. The places that were her only company throughout her life.
She began to blend them together, connecting them with the string of her memory, a menagerie of the few places who knew who she was, knew she was alive. And somehow, it worked. It was amazing, and it was accepted into a place of notoriety Elizabeth herself would never receive.

One of these mornings, I will be gone. You can look for me at any of those places I always used to be. You’ll never find me there, and I’ll never find myself there again either. No one will notice I was even there. I was just a wisp in the wind, floating through, transparent as ever. The drawbridges, bus seats, bookstores, markets, forest trails and downtown boulevards will still look the same as they were when I inhabited them. I’ll miss them dearly. I wonder if they’ll miss me.

Those places, exceptional only to the eye of the one soon to be departed, will be all that remains of me. One single sketch, worked on laboriously through the last of one’s strength, will be the legacy I leave. Those few places will be highlighted, and as people recognize them, recognize the beauty within them, that they exist proud and true, perhaps they’ll realize that was where I used to be as well, once upon a time.

One of these mornings, I’ll draw my last breath. It won’t be very long, and there will be little fanfare about it, a fitting end to a small, lonely life. You won’t be able to find me where I used to be, but at one small corner of a museum not too far away you’ll see Elizabeth’s legacy, an anonymous lone girl walking through the towers of all that was important to her, and maybe there you’ll find me, a small wisp of pencil in a large world, and for a moment I’ll be alive again.

I’ll be gone, but a small fragment of me can still be found there, if you know where to look, if anyone looks. Even the perpetually lost can be found one time or another.

[MessengerOfDreams]

How did you find me?

I never saw you coming. I didn't expect you in the slightest until I found you. It was strange how many times I saw you until I was surprised at how different you were from the crowds. So much sameness, so much gray, and then...

...an anomaly.

You are unique. They say everyone is unique in some way, but you are unique in every way. You are alien to this world, and you are extraordinary for it.

People don't seem to notice what they are in the presence of. They pass you by, regard you as normal, or even as nonexistent. You are just there to them. I look at you, a luminous figure within a crowd of gray similarity, and I wonder what I see that no one else can see.

I'm glad that I know you. I'm glad I found you along the walls and hidden in the corridors of the places I took for granted. I'm glad you noticed me. I'm glad that you stayed when I talked to you.

Wallflowers always bloom healthily in pairs.

Your way with words is stunning. Eloquence is such an alluring trait to me. People who know how to speak with finesse know what they're speaking about, and know the implications of what they say. When you spoke, I listened, and I was more than eager to speak back. I was surprised at how dynamic our conversations got, how much gusto and passion leapt from every word, our voices fluctuating through so many colors. It was enough to make me forget that no one else spoke to us the way we spoke to each other.

You tell me sometimes of the places you've been. You speak dismissively of them, seeing them as mere stops on a larger journey. My life and my travels are the journey, and I never know where I'm going, but some of the places I've been are heartstoppingly gorgeous. They make me forget about all the tourist traps, deceptive alleys and valleys of the shadow of death I've been through.

You are fascinated at what I see. When I tell you about where I've been, you truly become alive. No longer are you the standout wallflower. The stars are in your eyes and the sky is the limit. You are radiant.

I see you, every ounce of potential fully unlocked, and I truly see you. It's an amazing sight. I wish I could possess the wonder and hope you have when I tell you the tales I lived, because they weren't always as fun to live as they are to tell.

You ask me to take you there someday. It's the pie-in-the-sky dream we both cling to, because we're dreamers, and what is our life without a dream? I plan to take you to all the skyscrapers, the gardens, the alleyways, the bridges, the bus stops that made me who I am today.

But someday, do the same for me.

Years later, I still don't quite understand who you are. Perhaps that's not true. I know who you are, what you've seen, what you've fought, what you love and what you are capable of. But I still don't know how.

Take me through the cornfields, my friend. Show me how the stars look from within their depths. Drag me, running and screaming, across the train tracks. Lead me through the main street of your downtown, no matter how beige or unremarkable it may be. Let me into your world. Let me see what you see. Let me trace your story, find out how you became the stellar being you are today.

You always speak of home with disregard and resignation, yet the peace and quiet within the cornfields is one I envy. We always seem to want what we don't have, don't we? I don't need to stay. I just need a moment where you and I are the only two people within miles. Can wallflowers bloom best in the dead cornfields, retired after another harvest? I think we can manage.

An enigma is not simply born. She is built, growing in her own corner of the world where she finds her own calling and unravels the code on the seed of a wallflower somewhere within her heart. Somehow, even in a crowd of thousands, she shines brighter than them all, and somehow, in a crowd of thousands...

...she finds me.

To this day I still wonder how I was ever so lucky, so promise me one day you will show me how you got there. Even if your road was not as luminous as you, it still brought you to me, and for that, it's the most amazing path I'll ever set foot upon.

[Ridder]

And here I thought you were gone for the forever. Welcome back to dead general art forum Modo and his illustrious long walls of text no one ever bothers to read except by like three other people



Because honestly ain't nobly to gime 2 b litterit.

[MessengerOfDreams]

Yeah, lol, I know basically no one cares, but what the hell else am I gonna do?

[Ridder]

Yeah, lol, I know basically no one cares, but what the hell else am I gonna do?

PUBLISH A CRIME NOVEL? MAYHAPS?

[MessengerOfDreams]

Because that went so well the last time. XD

(...sort of have one in mind)

[blue]

Wow... Amazing stories. Bravo. *insert french words here* Il est grande. This is the first thing I read. please don't get me for this if i think wrong... i don't know this site THAT much yet.

[MessengerOfDreams]

For my friend Rory.



On the road again.

Seems to be my life nowadays. Sitting on a bus, peering out the window, going from one place to another. Stop for a few days, go again. Travel a little bit more, see if this is the place for me, decide it’s not, then go again. I’ve never been very comfortable in my own skin, nor have I found a place I can be comfortable in.

So off I go again.

Find another place. This isn’t it. Too many people, too much noise. Not good. So I leave again. New place. Not enough people, I may as well be alone. I leave again. Funnily enough, on the road there are too many people but you’re still alone. When faced with the choice I pick neither yet both.
Very indecisive.

I try and find my place. Try to find a way. Try to find what’s good for me. I haven’t been very good at that. I’ll find it someday. Faith keeps a soul strong, after all. It’s what the preacher used to tell me before he told me what was wrong with me. What my teachers told me before they told me all the things I couldn’t be. What everyone told me before they told me not to get my hopes up.

You can see why I left. You can see why I keep leaving, because I’ll find more people like them.

Still going on. I want to find somebody, anybody, one person I can rely on other than myself. The life of a sojourner is not a glamorous one. I do not feel like the Man with No Name; I just feel like someone with no name. I am not a cowboy. I am not a prophet. I am just confused.
I need more than faith. I need proof.

The roads are the same, but the surroundings are different. Sometimes I am tempted to hop off a bus in Laramie, Wyoming. Monticello, Illinois. Even Portland, Oregon. Just walk around and never get on another bus again. Can’t do it. Don’t have the confidence to start again.

Get off another bus. Get something to eat. Return. The bus is gone. I’m alone.

Not much I can do. I just have myself.

I want to scream, but that would scare people. Screw them, I’m scared. I settle for kicking the vacant bus stop poll a few times.

Someone asks me what’s wrong. She’s a nice girl after I talk to her. Calls herself Amber. Very odd. Large eyes. Daring green hair. Dark skin. Nice way with words. I don’t recognize a few of them. Comforting touch. Somehow gets me to spill my life story in a span of ten minutes with no provocation. Doesn’t mind that I get choked up. Just hugs me. She’s a bit too close, and that scares me. But she’s all right. I want to trust her. I already do.

She welcomes me to Minnesota. Asks if I’m here to stay. I tell her that apparently I am. She smiles. Tells me it will be nice to have another cool girl in town.

I decide to stay. I think I mean it this time.