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write-the-tea-blog · 5 years

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Number 3

I breathed deeply, forcing the last scoop of canned tuna down my throat. I never could stand fish, especially not salty fish, but everything else was either stale or well on its way to getting mostly inedible. And I love chewy Oreos as much as the next guy, but they’re not the recommended source of energy before a night raid.

Why night, you little future baby may ask? Because zombies are like Titans: completely inactive at night.

And rotting to Valhalla during the day.

Look, I’ll describe them later. In my handbook for those who never had to live through this. And I know there will be people after this shit has cleared itself up.

Slightly more pressing matters dogged me then, though. I plucked the backpack (Batman) and small duffel bag (Dora the Explorer) from their crates under the bed and let a length of rope down from the second-story window. I had barricaded the doors and windows downstairs so well they were entirely impenetrable to anyone, including myself. Adjusting the bandages over my chest to allow me marginally less discomfort, I shimmied out of the window. Because really, shimmy is the only word that suits my actions. Butt-first (fear of heights) I edged out of the window, previous rope-burns flaming anew. Quickly, I tumbled down to solid ground, Dora and Bruce bouncing against my calves. I prayed to any deity that may have been listening to keep the place safe while I was gone, and that no zombies could suddenly move at night or scale fraying ropes hanging from repurposed suburban living structures.

Divinity having been begged, I frisked the tourist guide pamphlet from my flannel pocket. A few nights ago I had seen a campfire in the near distance and marked an approximate location on my map. I just didn’t know if I would find any supplies there, but greed (or perhaps masochistic curiosity) got the better of me and I could wait no longer. Keeping my eyes moving between the map, the street and the stars (you have no idea how much practice you start getting with navigation) I headed in the general direction of the pre-marked destination.

If you haven’t seen zombies after the sun has set, there’s really no way for me to describe the feeling, but I’ll try anyway. It’s sort of like, well. You know that feeling of being watched that you get when entering a forest or field alone? The sort of trapped uneasiness, only you’re not quite sure what’s brought upon the experience? I think that’s the closest sensation this comes to. Or being locked in a department store all night and you can’t be completely sure that those silhouettes are just mannequins and your phone’s on 2% even though you’ve been using the torch very sporadically to conserve it as much as possible. Only the mannequins are zombies. And if the sun decided to rise only slightly earlier than you previously expected chances were slim that you would see the next safe sunset. That’s the feeling. General unease that’s only partly irrational.

I remember one night, one of the earlier nights of this whole ordeal. I hadn’t seen any member of my family since I was 16, nearly four years ago and I think it’s safe to say that, even after all that time, I didn’t take my father’s death particularly well. But I like to think that most sons fall into a nervous breakdown after they’ve spent the better part of an hour rinsing dad bits off themselves and their clothes.

Even as I lifted the chair leg (early days. I didn’t have any heavy bats yet and I swore off guns) I could have sworn I spotted recognition in his eyes. Or maybe the twist of his cheek. Maybe his rattling groan was one of pain. Maybe he didn’t recognize me.

But that doesn’t mean I’ll ever get over the feeling that his last word was the only name he had ever known me by.

Kiera.

Anyway, that was the first night I had ever allowed myself to get truly drunk. I had been tipsy plenty times before the whole world was handed to the dogs, but I paced myself. Not that day. First time I stole, too. I don’t remember what I drank or where I went, but I remember the night of the hangover. The night I broke down and properly cried about my family and, yes, myself. If I ever saw any of them again, it would more than likely end with one of us dying. It was also the first night I had ever touched one of the zombies. I had gone without human contact for nigh on a year. I was desperate for just a simple conversation if nothing else. There was this prune of a thing that had been caught by lack of light outside a nearby department store, I’m sure she used to be somebody’s favorite grandma. Perhaps she baked cookies or made the best hot chocolate (secret ingredient – a dash of brandy) for her grandkids. I was drawn to her for whatever reason. I hugged her so tightly I can’t believe she didn’t burst open under me. And for hours I cried into her shoulder, pouring out my whole life story. She’s the only person I’d told that much to, in the only time I wasn’t wary of the undead.

Two days later, I hadn’t even realized it at the time, I killed her. Flattened her head with a wrench. Now every one of these half-sentient night mannequins reminded me of her.

When I turned into the deserted street I had first seen the other camp from a deadly cocktail of fear and shock flooded my system. There was the small orange glow of a well-tended campfire, but it was blocked by vicious silhouettes and shadows. It took me a moment to work out that the jerky movements were being puppeteered by the fire’s spitting flame, and not the sudden new fact that zombies had picked up immunity to darkness. Carefully, I inched forwards towards the camp, willing my thundering heart not to give away my position. And for nobody to be home.

Only once I reached the fire itself did I begin to grasp how lucky these people who settled here were. Many of the zombies were stuck mid-lunge or sprawled on the ground in awkward positions, as if the sun had dipped just as they had launched themselves into the air. (Zombies are surprisingly adept jumpers, it’s their main mode of attack). I didn’t see any other people around, a fact that simultaneously relieved and disappointed me. With the fire blazing as it was, I would have expected a comfortable dinner in the midst of being prepared, or at least a can of beans rolling around nearby.

Nowadays, everyone had a can of beans.

The emptiness of it all perturbed me. Was the stuff hidden? Where? There was nothing here but two empty crates and a rumpled, slightly mildewed sleeping bag. I couldn’t have gone through all this work for nothing.

And that’s when I heard the unmistakable sound of a gun cocking right behind my left ear. I froze, all the known (and a few unknown) hairs on my body standing rigidly to attention. I started to cautiously raise my hands.

I don’t think I need to explain how disheartening it is to feel the barrel of a gun kissing your skull. Even if you haven’t been fortunate enough to live through the experience firsthand, I’m sure your imagination can fill in the blanks (oh I’m hilarious).

“Put your hands down. Turn around slowly.”

What do you want me to say? That I had a hidden pistol in my secret thigh holster and as I turned around I shot the weasel in her face, watching in satisfaction as her grey matter spat into the fire?

No. I’m not that badass. But thanks.

I did need a moment to take her in though. (‘cuz the apocalypse don’t care about no gender stereotypes, if the girl’s a sneaky hitman, the girl’s a sneaky hitman.) Her skin was so dark it melted out wherever the firelight didn’t hit her. And when it did, she glowed like a phoenix. Her eyes were filled with steely amounts of self-assurance and determination. Despite her waif-like frame and the fact that she barely came up to my chin, I was more than ready to roll over and do whatever she said. There was no doubt in my mind that she knew exactly what she was doing with the gun in her hands.

“What do you want?” She asked in a voice that made her sound like a radio personality and a history professor at the same time. Not something I assumed was any easy feat.

“I… uh…” “I’m listening, lady.”

Okay, not exactly. But thanks for trying.

“Right. Right. I guess there’s no real point in lying to you. You’re obviously a really smart person.”

I doubt she could tell I was being serious and the gun, which until recently had been pointing closer towards my kneecaps, reared back into my face. I was reminded briefly of an angry cobra.

“No shitting you. I was hoping you would have supplies I could borrow-“

“Supplies you could raid,” she tersely corrected.

“Raid, yeah. But it turns out that you don’t have much here and I have plenty so do you want to come back with me to my house?”

I honestly have no idea who said that last part. Was that me, or was it the complete idiot that sometimes likes to take control of my mouth when pretty girls are involved?

She raised one impeccable eyebrow in question and I prayed I hadn’t said the last part aloud.

“Why on earth would you ask me that?”

“I have no idea. I’m a nice guy?”

Thankfully, her weapon lowered and she ran one hand through her springy curls with a sigh, as if thinking over the idea of being lead by strange men down a darkened alley to an as-yet unseen house where there may or may not be sweets waiting.

Yeah, if I were in her position, I’d shoot me. Mace at the very least.

“Okay,” she replied with a curt nod of the head, “Lead the way.”

Who was she?

Putting my confusion and discomfort aside, we made our way through the town streets to the house. She never once let me forget there was a gun trained on my kidneys.

“Voila,” I revealed the tattered rope to her.

“This can’t possibly be the only way in,” she looked at me, the expressive equivalent to ‘how could you be such a moron?’

“Hope you’ve got good upper body strength. Want me to hold the gun for you?”

Misreading my intentions completely, she hugged it tighter to her body.

“Not a chance, lady,” there it was again. I put time into this, I’m more convincing than that, surely, “and I’m going first. Who knows how many accomplices you have waiting in there for us.”

I nearly laughed aloud at the thought, but obliged to her wishes, stepping aside and even trying to give her a leg-up (that resulted in a kick to the breastbone) to climb quicker. Once she had reached the top and decided within herself that the house was clear enough, she allowed me to join her in safety.

“And where are these bountiful supplies you bragged about?” She asked, arms folded and a quiet smirk on her face. There was something right then that was undeniably attractive about her.

“I think you’re exaggerating slightly.”

“Or you were,” she shot back. I think the attraction began to fade right then.

“Okay. There’s seriously no need to blow my balls off. The stuff’s downstairs.”

“And we’re going to abseil down there, too?”

“I’m not that much of an adrenaline junkie. I kept the stairs intact so far.”

“So far?” She grinned.

I grinned back and lead her into the house’s kitchen. Honestly, what the hell was I doing?

You could almost hear the choir sound by looking at her face when I opened the fridge. The house’s generator kept a few appliances running and in the dim glow of the light from the icebox it was clear to see how malnourished she truly was. There would have been no way for her to survive as long as she did if she met everyone who crossed her path with open arms. A sick feeling told me that the conversation between us could have taken a dangerously different turn.

“Holy shit. Is that tuna?”

How surprising, somebody getting excited over salty fish.

“Please eat all of it. If I have to open another can I think I’d die.”

She looked up at me in childlike wonder that was only ruined by how clearly I could see her bones under her skin.

“Just take it slowly, or you might make yourself sick,” I warned, “And vomit takes forever to get out of this carpeting.”

“I’m not an animal,” she replied and proceeded to consume the tinned fish in a way that proved just how much of an animal she actually was. I turned away, unable to wipe the grin from my face. If she noticed, the fish was far more important than my judgment. In a matter of minutes, she had inhaled five full cans. With a casual toss over her shoulder, the last can jumped into the unused sink. She let out a small burp.

I looked back at her, but if she was blushing the darkness hid it well.

“Well, thanks for that. Us girls have to stick together at the end of the world, don’t we?”

“There’s only one girl here,” I divulged suddenly.

She looked puzzled, as they always do, and then slowly the understanding breached the surface. This was the make-or-break moment. I always feared the worst.

“That sucks, man. No HRT in the apocalypse, right? So do you have dessert after all that fish?”

I grabbed on to the counter, but besides that, I didn’t allow myself to show any more shock to her reaction.

“Of course. But only if you aren’t vegan.”

As it left my mouth I realized how stupid what I said was.

She gasped, slamming her hands on the counter, “Are you telling me tuna’s vegan?” A grin spread across her face. It looked so much better than a scowl.

“There are cookies in the bread tin,” I disclosed. Her head swiveled around the kitchen, confused, until I pointed her to the top of the fridge.

“Ouch. Got a ladder?” Her arms crossed defensively over her chest.

Only then did I realize how short she was, really. Of course, I could see that she was short, but everyone kinda looks the same height standing next to Impending Doom.

“Sorry,” I winced, walking over and lifting down the bread box with ease and handing it to her, “Alone for so long, you forget the little things.”

“If that was a jab at my height…”

I clapped my hand over my mouth, “No, no! I just meant that-“

“I’m kidding, relax. You’re easier to spook than a mouse. Coerced with blanks, feeding strangers, freaking out over puns. It’s not the end of the world.”

Silence blanketed us for a moment. Because it was. I don’t think either of us had allowed ourselves to believe that until now.

“I think you’d make an excellent survival partner,” she said, breaking the silence.

AUs

Zombie Apocalypse 1. I haven’t seen a real person in forever, and I’m really sorry for kissing you when I saw that you were an actual person.

2. You and I spent hours before bed arguing over what to call the zombies.

3. I was raiding your campsite when I realized you have no food, do you maybe wanna come with me? I have lots of supplies.

4. You were hiding in a tree and you kept throwing acorns at me, and do yOU KNOW THAT THERE ARE DEAD PEOPLE EVERYWHERE WHY ARE YOU SO CHILDISH?!

5. We were hiding out in a car, and I know we just met, but its freezing so let’s cuddle.

#zombie apocalypse #zombie #short story #transgender #dystopia #end of the world #tuna #writing #writeblr

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write-the-tea-blog · 5 years

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Dancin’ (a Guardians of the Galaxy fanfic)

{words: 1560}

The Milano had seen much on its voyages across the galaxy, present for many of its captain’s antics, but none quite so entertaining as his dancing.

“You gotta put your hips into it. Feel the music. What’s it saying to you?” Quill thrust his hips forwards, eyes closed, heels spinning. Aware of nothing but the music and the passenger he so badly wanted to teach.

“It is saying,” Nebula replied, sinking her teeth into the perfectly-ripened yarrow root, “that you are an idiot, Peter Jason Quill.” She wiped a stray trail of sweet juice off her chin with the back of her hand.

“You know you want to! Just dance, let yourself go for once!” He reached for her and she instinctively slapped him away.

“Okay, that’s cool,” never falling out of time to the song, “angry blue alien still angry. I get it.”

She glared at his dumb, jovial grin, twisted on her heel with more grace than he would ever master, and stormed down to the ship’s hold. Who did he think he was, trying to coax her into something as undignified as dancing? What did her sister ever see in him?

Her sister...

She pushed the intrusive thought deep down into her memory, hopefully not to be found for a long time, and then only with all emotional ties weathered and beaten from it. She flicked the crown of the root into a damp corner. The fox would probably eat it when he thought nobody was looking. Disgusting.

Ducking under a low archway, she moved along the unkempt belly of the ship and up a curiously sticky ladder towards her Spartan room. Nothing but her bed and a few spare parts for her implants. A metal drawer and a plain white bedspread. She crawled on top of the covers, head on pillow, legs curled up to her chest in the fetal position. A habit, perhaps, from when sleep could mean the difference between life and death, but not a habit she was in any hurry to be rid of.

She would never admit it to any of the other residents of the Milano, but she was scared. Scared the others saw her as an outsider. That they blamed her for Gamora. Scared to be alone. Scared they would leave her.

And how she ached to have danced with Quill earlier that afternoon. How much he seemed to enjoy himself, to throw the galaxy aside and lose himself in the voice of... who did he say it was again? Bowie? Bishop? Against her better judgement, she activated her recent memory file, blue hologram dimly lighting the windowless room.

“Elvin Bishop. One of the most brilliant minds of the 20th century.”

She breathed deeply, choking back a strangled hiccup of a laugh. She found it insurmountably entertaining to watch how his face contorted into joy, nostalgia and superiority when he described music. But also a wrinkle of sadness around the eyes, as if remembering a past he wished was the present. She had no way to know that the song he had played for her that afternoon was the same one he danced to with her sister. For gapingly different reasons.

She hadn’t shut off her memory tape and let the smile grace her lips, watching her friend sway and spin to the words, mouthing the lyrics as he danced. She almost didn’t notice the twitch in her foot, moving to the same song her throat had started to hum. Watching the tape on repeat for hours and hours through the evening. Rocket had been meaning to ask her a few questions on bomb construction, but never crossed the threshold into Nebula’s room. And as much as he hated to admit it to himself, he didn’t think he’d ever seen her happier. He grumbled under his breath as he left, something about shouldering the responsibility of the whole ship in the midst of idiots.

To Drax, the day ended when Quill’s digital time device read 20:37. A deep slumber, dreamless, easily engulfed him. Rocket wired his weapons for another three hours, gnawing at the end of yarrow root he had found in the hold after he left Nebula’s room. Quill had passed out in the pilot’s seat, leaving only Groot awake as Nebula stole herself back up to the room she had been in earlier. Her Groot was more than a little rusty, but she picked up enough to know he was saying things to a player called the theReaLthunDeRgOd that would either make Rocket blush or beam with pride. She kept walking.

Fascinated in the engineering as she was, she had allowed Quill to teach her to work the cassette player. The one that now had Yondu’s toys stuck along the top. This was her goal. She only hoped he hadn’t moved the cassette.

To her relief, it was still there. She hadn’t even realized how shaky she was until her exhale. Her whole body trembled. Why could she not manage the same amount of detachment here as she did when she killed? It was just dancing. Besides, nobody would know.

Tentatively, her finger pressed into the chunky grey switch. The one with the faded triangle on it. The song blared through the speakers at full volume. She jumped back with a squeak of surprise and then lunged for the volume knob, cranking it almost to mute. Nervously she looked around. And waited. Fifteen minutes later and still nobody had come up to investigate the noise. She let her body relax. Slowly, she increased the volume. Comfortable, but not too loud.

She had spent hours attempting to work out the pattern to Quill’s movements. Even now, with the equations she had finally settled on, there were so many anomalies. Nevertheless, she followed it. The entire dance a perfect copy. Her face stoic in concentration. Her limbs stiff.

“You can’t do it like that.”

The voice startled her and she instantly stopped, carefully backing away from the cassette player.

“It was left on. I came up to switch it off.” She glared at him, leaning against the frame of the ship as languidly as he was. And smiling, too. Who did he think he was? And how long had he been watching her?

“Please, Nebula. Let me show you.” He had walked over to her, holding out his hand expectantly.

She wanted to retaliate. To once again spin around and storm off to her room. But the prospect of spending the next hours sleepless in her bare room seemed so... lonely. Despite herself, she wanted to learn.

“I’m copying you exactly. I’m sure of it. How can what I’m doing be wrong?” She kept her voice level, killing the pity that threatened to invade it.

Quill chuckled and retracted his hand which Nebula obviously was not going to accept. She shot a volcanic glare in his direction and he obliged, coughing away the laugh and apologizing.

“Just tell me which of the steps I’m getting wrong,” she averted her eyes, hating having to admit her failure.

He shook his head in faux exasperation and stepped towards the player, twisting the orange shock of hair sticking out from a troll on top of it around his finger.

“This isn’t a choreography. You’re not Jennifer Grey. Jesus, Nebula, dancing is fun. It can’t be taught the same way as shooting or stealing or flying with set rules to follow. The only real rule to dancing,” he had that expression again. The one Nebula loved, “is that you have to enjoy it. Listen to the music and move where it tells you to.”

The tape was wound back to the beginning of the track and the oh-so-familiar notes touched upon Nebula’s auditory sensors.

“It’s a slower one,” he had told her that afternoon, “Perfect for a beginner.”

Instantly, Quill began to dance, the steps and stages completely changed from the ones Nebula had worked so hard to master. She stood there for a moment, just watching him as he breathed in his element.

“Are you just going to stand there until the song’s over? I thought you were better than that, Nebula.”

She contorted her lips into the beginnings of a smile and slowly, self-consciously, began to sway her shoulders.

“Good. Good!” He beamed at her, dancing closer, “Keep going. Listen. What’s it saying?”

“It’s... it’s...” she struggled.

And suddenly she heard it. Limbs and heart overriding everything her brain was telling them, she danced. The music was clear, the rhythm pulsating through her. She beamed. She swayed.

She danced.

---

Quill and Nebula’s duo parties quickly became a nightly occurrence. It should have taken its toll on them during the day, but dance became even more rejuvenating than sleep. Together, solo, it didn’t matter. It was a healer, one better than time. When they danced, it was as if Gamora were there, too. Dancing sensually against Quill in the slower songs, the fast ones compelling her to jump up and down around her sister. Within those 300 songs, Gamora still lived.

#learnt that yondu's a marsupial while writing this #is that common knowledge i just haven't been privy to?#like this is kinda unnerving #is that even true?#also mantis isn't here cuz she's away on a business proposition or something. to bake cookies for lil kids #guardians of the galaxy #marvel #drax #groot #rocket #gamora #nebula #quill #starlord #star prince #star munch #dncing #writing

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write-the-tea-blog · 5 years

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Born to Beg

{word count: 1320}

I grip his hand tighter, colours flickering, fading, waxing, waning. It’s cold. Too cold. I can hardly breathe and neither can he, chest struggling to keep his lungs full, dried blood (his blood. my fault) coating his mouth, a crusted trail from his soft, bluing lips down to his chin. I choke back my tears (my fault my fucking fault) and gently brush his cheek with my other hand. I want it to be warm, I want him to feel what I’m feeling. I want to see the chocolate of his hair, but the colour is draining from it as each precious second passes.

“Patroclus, please,” I say in a chocked whisper, turning away to catch my breath.

I should never have listened to him, never have given in to that warm smile, those soft arms, his slim waist. Oh, philtatos, how could I have been so stupid? I sent you to your death and you went with all the loyalty in Greece.

The dark, sweat-soaked face of Automedon pushes through the covering of the tent.

“Get out!” I yell, accusing, “Get out of here! He’s... he’s... because of you!”

(no achilles, no. you know this is all you. all i had to do was deny him, to be as brave as the songs will remember me. to go out and fight the war i was destined for. and because i thought i could, what? hide from the fates? curl in on myself and and hope they don’t find me? and now the only person i’ve ever loved is paying for my mistakes, the weight of my actions crushing him. idiot.)

But it’s that much easier to blame others. Blame Automedon, our best friend, the one who steered my chariot whilst brave Patroclus stood holding my spear, wearing my armour. Blame Hector, the enemy, who stabbed him thinking he was me. Agamemnon. Whose arrogance drove me into our tent in the first place.

Blame the Gods.

Oh, how easy it is to blame them when you have nothing left to lose. Where was Pallas, sworn to protect us? Where was Thetis, where was Poseidon? How could they let Phoebus’ cruel hand undo the armour I had placed on him to protect his gentle heart? What were they worth?

But blaming won’t wake him. The scarlet (black. no.) stain still spreads across his chest, like a weed that keeps growing back every time you pull it out. The spear anchored in him, a trophy, evil and sneering. I want to pry it loose and hurl it across the dusty ground, cover him with cloth and crawl into bed next to him, letting his gentle, fleeting breaths lull me to sleep, my arms wrapped around his torso.

(small, cautious steps. rabbit or deer. even with the thunderous stampede of battle, i’d recognize those footfalls anywhere. my heart leaps in spite of myself. home. he’s safe. i rush to greet him as soon as he opens up the tent. his muscles under his clothes are taunter than they were the year we sailed here. his lips more familiar than the journey home. his mouth holding on to the taste of fruits and olive. of late nights and early mornings. i never want to let him go. much rather i trace his collarbones, his shoulders, his spine with my fingers infinitely, but he pushes me away gently with his quiet smile.as if here were ashamed by his own happiness. i swear i didn’t know what i was doing. i swear by the gods it would have been different if i had only known.

the best of the greeks? my gentle patroclus? to me, of course. but i could never have predicted the fates shared my sentiment.

‘they need you. you’ll win this for us,” he begged, on his knees, gripping the hem of my tunic. one move away from supplication.

“don’t. stand up.” i pull him to his feet and he collapses into me, soul fracturing.

already as good as dead.

“we both know i can’t go out there.” i kiss him. just below his eye.

he nods. eyes averted. we thought the fates meant me, and i couldn’t face the thought of hades receiving me without him.)

A violent cough, the first sign of life from his cold body coaxes a whimper from his throat and shocks my world into brilliant iridescence before heartlessly sucking it back into the ground. Tiny, malevolent tendrils of colour remind me of his struggle and that it really is blood threaded through his hair and dripping over the curves of his stomach.

(stripped almost bare in front of me, arms held out expectantly. the last thing i want is to cover him again in my cruel, foreboding armour. it takes everything i have to remind myself that this is what he wanted.

“you’ll stay in the chariot, won’t you?” i plead, securely fastening and re-fastening the breastplate. he shifts, adjusting to the unfamiliar weight now resting on him. his hand grips my shoulder.

“you forget. i have trained. for eight years into this war i have studied with odysseus, fought with diomedes. thrown spears with ajax. i am nearly as capable with a horse as automedon.”

“and me?”

he grins in reply. cheeky. a promise, but quickly he’s serious once more.

“all they need is a reminder of the weapon on their side. you’re the best of us, but they need you as a symbol more than a man. your helmet, your chariot, it no longer matters who’s with them.”

“you’ll stay in the chariot,” i repeat, “automedon will drive you through the battle and back. you don’t get out. you don’t kill anyone.”

he kisses me quickly, a kiss i would have held on to if i had known it to be our last. a kiss i would have followed up with a goodbye. instead, i didn’t even watch him leave the tent.

i had known him since we were children. and in all that time, all those decades, not once did i tell him i loved him.)

Briseis is the only other person I will allow near his body. They had always been close, but the only reason I contend with her presence is that she blames me, too. More than I blame myself. She dribbles strong cordial down his throat, but the wet, gasping sound that ensures moves me to retaliate.

“You’ll kill him!” I cry, shoving her away.

“He’s already dying! Are you too blinded by your own pride to see even that?” She glares at me, voice of a viper.

(death was not in my thoughts at all when Apollo stripped the armour from his fragile body. i had no reason to see it coming closer when Hector’s spear pierced his unprotected flesh.

I ignored the startling second colour was stolen from me, pinning it on the lack of sleep and excess of nerves.

his dinner reached a comfortable temperature when the hand pulled back the entrance of the tent.

“just in time.” a nervous laugh, smothered by relief, “i thought i would have to eat alone but...”

the hand i reached for was not his.

the pain bored into the eyes of antilochos was enough to make me stumble.

“achilles -”

“he’s not. he stayed in the chariot. protected by my armour. nobody would have been able to reach him. you’re confused.”

“i’m sorry, achilles.”

“stop! stop acting like he’s dead! he’s not! he’s not... wait here. he’ll be back soon. and you’ll see, you’ll see!”

our best soldiers are defending him as we speak, bu there’s no telling how long they’ll be able to hold out against troy’s forces. you have to come with me.”)

His eyes fluttered open and my heart skipped a beat.

“I’m here, my love, I’m here. I’m not leaving you.”

Brisies frowned, but I ignored her air of confusion. I watched her leave the tent, colours dimming further with each footfall. (dimming? why dimming? he’s alive. he’ll be okay.)

“Achilles,” he spluttered in a hoarse whisper, his rapidly constricting lungs prohibiting him from continuing. Carefully, I lifted his head into my arms.

“I know. I know. Me too.”

Tenderly, my lips pressed against his clammy forehead.

“You can rest now,” I spoke through the kiss.

The moment I broke contact, both his world and mine were plunged into permanent monochrome.

I wouldn’t want to live in a world of colour without him anyway.

#achilles #patroclus #writing #writlbr #born to beg #greek #mythology #retelling #trojan war #achilles and patroculs #love #death #homer #the song of achilles #history #sad #black and white #words #short story

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write-the-tea-blog · 5 years

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Spilled Wine cover image

#spilled wine #hyacinth #apollo #story #greek mythology #iris

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write-the-tea-blog · 5 years

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Spilled Wine

{1378 words}

The First Letter of Apollo

My sweet Hyakinthos, what agony it is to be kept from you all these days. I know our meetings must be restricted, you and I both have important positions to uphold, but that will never stop me from missing you. It is like the sun has gone out over Olympus, like there is no more light left for me. My heart aches for you, my arms miss the warmth of your body they once wrapped around. The color of your eyes, like sunsets and wine spilled into a clear fountain, haunt my dreams and fill the morning skies. The garden I planted in your name flourishes, it couldn't have grown better than if Demeter and her daughter had grown it themselves. I remember the soft, brown curls that my fingers threaded through on cold night and lazy day. It feels as if only hours ago you and I collapsed onto each other after that long run in the sweltering sun. A sun that was dulled by your beauty pitted against its own. History will call you many names, and our story will be torn, patched, fabricated, altered, plagiarized. But always remembered. It was me and you, and only us, no matter what name they put you under. But history can only remember the events, stripped bare of meaning or emotion. You are more than the Spartan prince they remember. You are more than the shepherd king they will treat you as. You are more than black ink and foreign symbols etched onto paper. We will meet again. In different bodies and an alien time, but I will still be me and you, oh you, will be more perfect than my memory gives credit for.

The Last Letter of Hyakinthos

Apollo, I'm so sorry. The idea of you alone pains me too much to think of. You speak as if I'll see you in a few weeks, and you and I both know that is not how our legend is written. I know of the garden, I visit it often. The flowers are full this spring, the bees making quick use of their nectar. Don't fill your mind with illusions of a future out of reach. I loved you just as much as you loved me, perhaps even more so, but I am disillusioned by fantasies of us. They are painful. They rip my soul instead of healing my heart. Our circumstances are different now than what they once were. I am no longer there and you never have to be here. They call me Hyacinth now mostly. A few even say Iris. After the first ever letter you sent me the moment of our separation. Do you know what it feels like to lose your own name? To have the strongest bridge to your soul burned and trampled? How can anyone be anything without a name? Your poetry, your overstrung metaphors, they've gotten worse than what I remember. But I love them. They're you. They're your honeyed voice singing to me on that hilltop where I first met you. They're your warm, soft fingers laced through my calloused ones. I can still feel the lips that freed those metaphors on my skin. There are nights when I can't imagine an eternity without you, and days when my body shakes with the tears I cry for you. And there are days when I'm peaceful and I can see that beautiful, contagious smile right in front of me, and nights where the memory of you keeps me warm. You were always the reason. For everything. The pain, the pleasure, the memories and the future. It was always you. It will always be you. Whatever happens next, I will be brave. For you. Knowing that, through the thin veil of the past, you are watching me. You are there, holding my hand, holding me. Your delicate kisses planting fields of hyacinths over my body. Wrapped in your cool sheets in misty mornings, tender voice calling out the music of the gods. I loved you, I still love you. I've made peace with our story, with our fate. I am honored to be a tragedy of Apollo.

After

Apollo was burned by his action. It clawed at him and defiled him more than any earthly plague could ever accomplish. He tried many times after that day to meet his beloved - to enter Hades and ask for his love back. He bargained with the king of the Underworld, brought extensive gifts to the queen. He constructed tunnels and secret entrances, but each time, Cerberus would find him and succeed at keeping the prince and the god in their rightful worlds. Hyakinthos had heard of Apollo's many failed voyages. It warmed him, to think of the poetry god's unfailing determination. After all the stories he'd heard through the centuries of his unfaithfulness, he was starting to believe they were true, that all the experiences were one-sided and Apollo had only chosen the prince to prove he could if he wanted. The prince that would take no wife, the prince that left his reign unmarried, but not alone. Chosen by the surreptitious hand of a god. Slowly, through the millennia, the name of the gods were forgotten, left to die, covered in dust and unspoken deeds. This draining of power used to scare Apollo, but that was before he could feel how weak the border between him and Hyakinthos had become. The immortal was dying, and he was happy. -- The last historian closed her book, locked it away and never spoke of it again. In thirty years, she was buried under a laurel bush, and with her, the international pantheon was buried, too. Nobody remembered their names, their powers, their rituals. The gods had died. Hades was filled with powerful souls, able to control the circumstances of their deaths mortals never knew was possible. Their phlegmatic spiritual figures were encased in bodies as flawless as they had been in their prime. Apollo was ecstatic: finally, this was the day he had been waiting for all those centuries. He needed to find Hyakinthos as soon as he could. He could think of no-one better to spend eternity holding on to. The god searched the Underworld for years. He mapped the extensive network of caverns and labyrinths, reunited with old loves who had quickly lost their appeal, but nowhere could he find the one he was searching for. Hyakinthos sighed forlornly, seeing the one he had waited for, but having no ability to call out to him. His soul had become weak with neglect and was completely invisible to anything in a body and hardly noticeable to another bare soul. He had no way to tell him this, that by having a body he was making the rift between them even wider. Instead, Hyakinthos cried with Apollo's pain, tried to caress his shoulder, to hold his hand, but to no avail. They were there, together, but separated forever by the same power that had united them in the first place. Apollo was ready to give up. What was the point of existence if there was nobody to share it with? Why have a body? Why experience anything? An anguished cry escaped from his mouth in the place of the song he was so well-known for. His soul broke from its vessel... ...and immediately crashed into another. Hyakinthos was overjoyed. Here he finally was, they could see each other. The wait had payed off. Emotions far too strong for anything dead to experience cascaded over the bonded spirits. Not death nor memory could hold them. They were together, they were free. Above, on the post-extinction, unpopulated earth, the sun rose for the first time from behind the heavy dust blanketing the planet. Centimeters below the surface, a tiny seed shivered. Its protective coat split open and the virgin green stem tentatively pushed its head out and into the welcoming warmth of the sun. The plant grew quickly, soon developing a vibrant bouquet of flowers of the deepest purple. The sun beamed down with an all-encompassing yearning for the flower, a soft ray of pure light falling gracefully on the newly-unfurled petals. The flower blushed under the sun's tender kisses, tilted its stem marginally to the side, and slipped into perfect, unmatched bliss.

#writing #my story #spilled wine #apollo #hyacinth #hyacinthus #hyakinthos #mythos #greek myth #mythology #retelling #adaptation #genie #love story #short story #lgbt

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write-the-tea-blog · 5 years

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#writing #cover #calligraphy #author #genie #mythology #myths #pantheon #moss #satyr #air #earth #fire #elements #iraha #daimhin #gaelic #singing #music #lyre #creation #love #love story #nature

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write-the-tea-blog · 5 years

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Iraha and Daimhín

Iraha was travelling over a coastal forest one late afternoon, when prickles along her arms made her stop. She had never felt anything like this in her life, and her curiosity drew her to investigate. She disguised herself in human form, her desired vessel, with pale skin, blonde hair and opal eyes. With the grace of the autumn breeze, she stepped lightly into a meadow in the middle of the trees. The blades of grass barely bent under her weight. She stopped and strained her ears, trying to figure out what sound had made her feel so peculiar, when, just inside the tree line, she saw a quick, white flash. Slowly, the shape of a man started to form against the trunk of an ancient yew. His dark, wavy hair lay over his eyes and his fingers plucked at the taunt strings of the ivory lyre he held as gentle as one would a fledgling. Iraha smiled at the sound of his instrument molding into his low, soulful voice – the sound that had made her fall in love for the first time.

She didn’t notice his legs until she had advanced nearly halfway across the glen. They ended in sharp, black, two-toed hooves, and the slender, fur-clad legs themselves blended perfectly into the gnarled bark of the yew. His naked torso began just above his navel, and there wasn’t a hair on him between his legs and the top of his head. He stopped playing when he saw her, smiled with a comical glint in his eye. Iraha was at a loss. She had never been in this sort of situation before, and tried to think of what Tergián would do in her place.

With only irreplaceable seconds to spare, she remembered how disastrous the love god’s attempts could turn out, so instead, she smiled shyly and averted her eyes downwards. The satyr advanced to Iraha’s modest stance, the grin never leaving his face.

“Why did you stop playing?” she enquired quietly, still unaware of how to approach the situation.

“Beautiful women are quite the distraction,” he replied, bowing low, “Daimhín at your service.”

Iraha curtsied as he rose, blush tainting her pale cheeks, but instead of giving her name, she took his hand.

“Please, sing for me?”

Daimhín sang many weeks away with Iraha lying at his feet. He sang of love and lust with vigour and passion. But occasionally his songs would turn dark, sinister, his voice falling lower and lower, the twangs from the lyre growing further and further apart. It was songs like these that made Iraha’s breath catch in the back of her throat, and her body fill with an abstract, powerful longing. But a longing for what, the goddess could not answer.

They never left each other’s company for years, Daimhín singing songs showing Iraha the shadowed areas of the forest that not even Fleurei herself knew about. Iraha, in turn, gave Daimhín a lyre fashioned from crystal, inlaid with yew, the delicate strings glimmered like spider’s silk and the whole instrument was lighter than air and sweeter-sounding than water in a stream. She told Daimhín that whenever he held this instrument, he would never tire of his art. When singing, his voice would never falter, and when his fingers ran along the lyre, they would never miss a string, or accidently brush a wrong note. He was overjoyed by his gift, and never once did it leave his side.

But one day, Iraha did.

She had been summoned by Fleurei to settle a dispute between the goddess and the ever-antagonistic Phykom, who was threatening to plague mankind with an all-encompassing war.

She could not explain any of this to her beloved without him realising her divine existence, so she kept details to a minimum.

“Go,” he told her, his hands resting lightly on her forearms, “Go and, when you return, I will be here, waiting.”

She kissed his cheek with tears in her eyes before running off, deep into the forest.

What felt like only a few hours with the gods was years on Earth. Many summers had passed without Daimhín hearing anything of Iraha, and he was so driven by the madness of his love that he could stand the wait no longer. He was certain that she had perished, or run away with a man better than he. No woman could be away that long without him hearing any word of her.

Casually, and without any fear in his heart, he made his way back to the glade where they had first met. He smiled fondly upon it, and began to quietly sing the same song he had sung when she had emerged from the forest. He remembered how her feet seemed to barely touch the ground. It was the happiest memory he had

Carefully, as not to prematurely damage his skin or cease to play his lyre, he lifted out a steel blade with an opal hilt from the small moleskin pouch he carried across his chest, fastened with deer sinew. He had chosen that particular blade because the hilt reminded him of his beloved’s eyes.

Beloved? He never even knew her name.

With a wicked grin, he plunged the blade into his heart, all the while singing, and crumpled to the ground.

His voice never once faltered as his life ebbed from his body an into the soil beneath him. As his vision swam, he thought he could see his one love, racing across the meadow.

Still, he kept singing.

He had seen Iraha, and she was in anguish. Quicker than a storm, she reached Daimhín, bleeding out into the ground, his voice as rich as ever.

“What have you done? What have you done?” she whispered through her tears, lifting his head onto her lap, caressing his face, his hair, his horns. He grinned slyly up at her, and never stopped his song.

Iraha was in anguish. She raised her face and arms up to the heavens and screamed out for Tergián’s aid. Alas, the god did not answer. Iraha begged and bribed and prayed, but gradually, Daimhín faded away.

She cradled his cold body in her arms for seven days and seven nights, her gift still clutched in Daimhín’s hands. Preserved inside, nestled among the veins of yew, was his voice. When she noticed a piece of her love was still alive, she cried aloud in joy, and raced back to the home of the gods.

Once there, the voice of Daimhín was easily freed from its crystalline prison, and Iraha cradled it gently in her hands. She looked out over the whole of the earth from her modest throne, seeking out the very best men from all over the world, men that had prayed to the most lesser goddess and had never forgotten about her. There were not many, but there were enough.

She rode on the backs of the winds while the world slept, opening the mouths of the men she found worthy and placing part of the voice of her beloved on their tongues. They swallowed in their sleep, and were blessed with the singing voice of the satyr overnight. They praised Iraha, burning sacrifices and erecting temples in her name and, without knowing it, sang all their songs as a tribute to Daimhín.

#writing #author #genie #mythology #myths #pantheon #satyr #air #earth #fire #elements #iraha #daimhin #gaelic #singing #music #lyre #creation #love #love story #nature

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