Story 8: Solitude

It’s raining again. You blink, almost surprised, as a drop lands on your long lashes. A breath escapes your pale lips, chapped from the cold that nips at your exposed forearms, neck, face. The sky, dark hangs ominously above you, with night welcoming the shadows home.

You stand there, face unreadable, hands clenched so tightly that little half-moons will be imprinted in your skin. Again. Is it from the chill creeping up on you or from the barrage of thoughts pent up in your head? The patter of rain on the long blades of grass is relentless. Soothing. Your grey eyes flick upwards, searching for something in the distance. The lights behind you twinkle dimly, framing your damp hair with a faint halo under the angle most living things would never see. You’ve walked a long way to get here.

Darkness engulfs your form, as you hunch forward on reflex, as if used to fending of the darkness. You always were a stubborn one. Rain streams down your damp hair, arcing across the bridge of your nose and lightly descending down your cheeks, sometimes passing over your lips in a butterfly kiss. All softness but no permanency. When a faint caw reaches your ears, your mouth turns up in a smile and you slowly cup your hand in front of you.

Solitude.

Story 7: The Best You've Got

She clung to her bag as she dashed across the pavement, skidding ever so slightly as her converse managed to barely catch enough friction to prevent her from falling. She was late. Her boss wouldn't like this one bit. Hadn't he told her that any more tardiness would be punished by staying at the office. No way in hell was she going to let that happen. She was the best they've got and they knew that.

But then there was the fact that she was running astronomically late.

Literally almost knocking the door out of its frame, Cassy bounded the last few meters to come to a messy halt infront of her boss's door.

"Cassy, dude, late again!" someone laughed behind her and she turned around to find her partner stalking up behind her. " Boss man isn't gonna be happy. Promised he'd slit your throat for being late three times in the last twenty minutes and promised to slit my throat twice in the last five."

She groaned and buried her face into her hands. Drew could be so…evil. She had no doubt she had lost the biggest mission of the century already.

"We're done Jason. Might as well not show up at all," she mumbled and sighed again. "Drew is going to kill me."

Jason looked at her as if she had grown two heads, his hazel eyes wide with bewilderment.

"Just kidding," Cassy grinned and let out a laugh. "Oh come on Jas, he knows we're the best he's got."

Jason chuckled.

"For a second there, I thought you might be sick."

At that moment, the door before them opened and there stood Drew, eyes flashing, his aura practically livid. That was really an achievement considering he didn't come up any higher than Cassy's collarbone, let alone the other giants at the office.

"You are supposed to be half way to Lock Ness by now."

They blinked at him.

"WELL?"

"Love you Drew!" yelled Cassy as she ran to her desk and picked up the already placed plane tickets, moony and documentation.

Jason followed her, at a slightly slacker pace, enough to hear what Drew said after them.

"Watch her."

Jason nodded, worry clouding his brow, but it was almost instantaneously gone.

"Drew, we're the best you've got."

Drew nodded.

"I know Jason, but so do they."

Story 6: To Each Their Own Skin

They pass by, together yet all apart. Tied down by the same things and yet so vastly different. They all have their own stories, they all have something to hide behind the picturesque impressions that they might try to convey to the world with painstaking effort.

A boy who wears nothing but dark coloured clothing, silently slinks by every morning, his eyes glazed over, his mind evidently millions of miles away. His hair falls over his unblinking gaze and almost no emotion passes on his smooth face. One would never know about the amazing things his fingers could do when placed on the ivory keys of a piano, or clasped together around a paintbrush. One could never guess about the tiny crisscrossing scars on his wrists or the memories embedded upon his heart. His love for his brother, his cat, his family. The way he treats his friends. One could never guess understand why he never smiles and why his eyes always glow a brilliant grey.

A girl with short dirty blonde hair floats by every afternoon, her head in the clouds. She wears a uniform most times, for she evidently studies hard and spends most of her day in school. But could one tell just by looking at her what an marvelous writer hides behind the book back she lugs everyday? Or that her heart forever holds a flitting butterfly of aspirations that causes her to dance, to dream big and bright? Her folders would show that she is an organized soul and needs everything in proper order. No one could guess that her heart aches for her homeland every single day and that sometimes she is scared of where life might take her. One would never know why her eyes laugh one moment and shut inside the next.

Clad, more often than not, in a grey hoodie, a boy struts by every evening, chatting away to one of his friends. His mop of light hair, recently dyed, defies gravity and gay laughter comes from his form every few minutes. But if one knew what to look for, they would see the nibbled on nails. One could not possible know that his laughter hits a hysterical note every time he is nervous or that he is a great listener. One would never even consider that he comes up with the most outlandish ideas or that he is a bit of a daredevil. One would not guess that he has more than one secret he likes to keep from the public, forever smiling, joking, laughing.

They all pass by, never crossing each other, and yet somehow all irreversibly tied together to each other, never meeting, but always there. All having so many stories to tell, but all hiding them under the persons that they've chosen to build.

All hiding so much just underneath their skins.

Story 5: Pinkie Promises

When I was younger, a pinkie promise was unbreakable. You broke a pinkie promise and you could expect to be shunned by your toddling peers until snack time, being called the worst thing possible - 'a meanie'.

As I grew, pinkie promises grew far and few. Maybe that deal over the box of marbles with the girl in the rainbow hood in second grade... Or in sixth grade, when I told my friend Jason I still wet the bed. Yeah, I think I recall pinkie promising half my sandwich to my best friend in return for his chocolate cookie. I'm pretty there was that one time in middle school when I pinkie promised with my first girlfriend our 'engagement'.

Heh.

In high school, everything changed. Pinkie promises morphed into ghosted neck kisses and murmured sweet nothings. Or making out in the locker room. That too. Promises were so easily broken. No one sealed them with anything. It was so easy to just…promise.

Pinkie promises, to me, always meant something. The gesture itself, it was as if you were showing that yes, you took the split second you needed to think about it and were ready to commit. The gentle pressure you felt on your pinkie was so comforting.

So when I was sitting in my Business Law 101 class, second term, third year university student, I never expected what happened next.

"Alright everyone," my eccentric looking new professor addressed the auditorium. "I know you have a hell of a whole lot of work to do..."

A faint hum started as students woke up from their lethargic sleep deprived dazes and looked down with new found respect at their lecturer. Someone was saying something they liked to hear.

"And I accept that. So I'm going to give you the very basics that you need…"

A cheer rose.

"On one condition."

A collective groan quickly followed.

"Oh don't be so pessimistic," the professor laughed.

The auditorium turned quiet again.

"Just come here and pinkie promise me you're going to try your hardest during my class. But beware, if you break it…Let's just say you won't be seeing that diploma of yours in a long long while."

What?

"Oh don't just sit there! Hurry it up! I don't have all day."

"Who is this guy and who does he think he is?" someone muttered under their breath next to me as students began filing up to stand in front of the professor.

I grinned and got up to shuffle along with the rest of the mass up front.

"Beats me, but I'm pretty sure this class just became a whole lot more amazing."

Story 4: Purely Fictional

"So what's your story?" The forlorn eyes bore into mine and I felt a shiver crawl up my spine.

This seemed so final. Like I would be here forever.

"Oh, you will be," a small voice piped up. "They never want us back."

A small purple polka-dotted bunny seemed to materialize out of nowhere and hop next to the unicorn pony which had just spoken to me.

"We're stuck here for good it seems. Our owners don't want us anymore," the bunny squeaked in his thin, clear voice, his ears drooping dejectedly.

I felt a hole open up in my chest. I stood, rooted to the ground as if taking a step closer would deprive me of the little energy that I had left. Not want us anymore?

Not want me anymore?

"Don't look so surprised there, tiger. You knew this day was coming. Kids just don't want us to be there for them anymore."

Another voice.

This was too much. I didn't even turn around to see who the newcomer was.

I shook my head, trying to block out these absurdities that kept floating in my direction.

"No, you're wrong." I ground my teeth. "Something must have happened."

I felt movement behind me, - my whiskers twitched in automatic response and I saw a huge saddled reindeer walk into my field of vision. He stared at me with large, bright green eyes and I felt a wave of nausea crash over me.

"She can't have wanted me to leave, not yet," I managed to whisper. "She still hasn't found her way out."

The bunny looked at me with curiousity.

"Her way out?"

I turned around and got ready to leave into the open door, undaunted by what I might possibly find.

"I can't stay here. I need to help Ruby find her way out. She has been in her comma for over a year now. It's time she finally got out."

I bared my teeth and grinned.

I wasn't her imaginary friend for nothing.

I'm coming Ruby.

Story 3: The Cloud Who Wanted To Fall

There once was a cloud who desperately wanted to see what it was like to be on land. He floated every Single day, brushing with its soft underbelly the mountain peaks and sky scrapers, but it never was quite what it wanted. It grew sadder and sadder as time passed for it could only watch the interesting lives that the millions of creatures led down bellow.

One day, the Sky saw that the cloud once again noiselessly watched the world below it, small and sad. It seemed so lost. And so the Sky took pity on it.

"Cloud," the Sky asked,"Would you like to go down to earth?"

"Oh more than ever!" The cloud replied.

"What if you will never be allowed to be a cloud again? Will you still do it? How much do you want this?"

The cloud knew that an opportunity like this would not come again. And yet? To give up being so high and free with not a care in the world? Did it really want that?

"Yes, Sky. I want to go down to earth."

Wordlessly, the Sky began to darken and cloud felt himself grow heavy. He grew larger until all of a sudden, cloud found himself falling.

"Goodbye Sky!" he yelled, his voice thundering.

Sky flashed a wave in response.

"You don't know what the future holds and yet you still chose to take the risk, cloud. And because of that, no matter where you are, you will always be free."

Story 2: The Owl and The Cat

Owl had always lived in the run down barn of the Farmer. Since he was an owlet, he had hunted from the cool, shadowy rafters, swooping down and catching whatever small rodents that happened to be foolish enough to scamper out, no longer protected by the safety of the walls.

Owl lived a content life, albeit with one exception. That exception was none other than the Cat. Now, the Cat belonged to the Farmer since he had found her as a kitten abandoned by her mother, curled up, alone and trembling in the corner of the wheat fields. He had raised her to protect the grain from mice and she diligently fulfilled her purpose.

Be that as it may, it did not sit well with the Owl. She took his food, she made supper come by harder at times and what right did she have to intrude on his territory? Cat would also watch him with those lamp-like eyes of hers, waiting till he swooped down low enough so she could try and bat his tail feathers causing him to shriek and bear down on her with his talons.

They soon understood, despite their grudging acknowledgment of each other, that it was both their presences that caused the mice to appear every night. If Cat batted at the wall and scared the mice which ran in Owl's direction, it was his turn to feast. If Owl screeched and hopped on the bales of hay, Cat was the one to be victorious. And so their mutual respect grew and a friendship formed. Or at least a pact, of sorts.

One day, Cat did not come as usual for the evening hunt. Owl grew worried. She had never missed a day for as long as he remembered. He clicked his beak and waited for a while, watching the barely open door so that he wouldn't miss her ghostly presence. Yet he waited in vain. She did not come. Owl decided it was to go search for his friend. He spread his wings and soundlessly flapped into the twilight. He would hunt for her.

Owl found the cat in a bucket at the bottom of a well, next to a bubbling brook. The Cat had fallen ill earlier that day and the Farmer saw no further use for her. He placed her in a chipped, green bucket and lowered it down a no longer used well. When she tried to climb out, she would tip the bucket and drown.

The Owl watched his friend lie motionless for a few seconds before dropping down onto the handle of the pail. He grasped and pulled it up, higher and higher, screeching with effort as he pulled at dead-weight. The Farmer who was not far away, heard the commotion and watched in disbelief as the Owl lifted both the Cat and the bucket out from the well. Owl didn't have much strength left after the ordeal. Tired, he faltered once, twice, the beat of his wings heavy and lumbering and accidentally landed the bucker in the steam.

The brook gurgled as the torrent of water pushed the bucket downstream, Owl desperately clinging to the handle. The jolting woke the Cat and she turned her head to look up at him. She meowed. He stared at her and then gave a slow flap. The green bucket sped down the stream, soon out of sight.

That night, Farmer went home and told a story to his children, of The Owl and The Cat. It started something like this:

"The Owl and the Pussy-Cat went to sea,
in a beautiful pea-green boat…"