A/N: :3 I came up with this when I was washing my hair...weird, I know! Wrote it up in about 15 mins, so it's just something kind of little. xD also, it's MUCH sadder/angstier than anything I've really written before, so I'm sort of diving in headfirst here! Anyway, I hope it's okay, haha.
Disclaimer: I don't own anything Harvest Moon related!
He'd seen this before.
She came to the island with a lily-of-the-valley slipping out of her chestnut hair, wearing pink satin ballet slippers with ribbons criss-crossed halfway up her shin. Her carpet bag—sparingly packed—was emblazoned with a ragged van Gogh print and patched over with vividly clashing Renoit. A free spirit, she laughed like the sea and smiled like the sun; the townsfolk knew she was different.
And with her came change and chance. The missing winds returned as if only to twirl with her and ruffle her hair; the fire burning her heart spread and returned to lend its aid to the island once more. They didn't know how she did it. They only knew she was something else.
But like any newcomer, invincible as she seemed, she did not escape gossip. Who was she? Where did she come from? Why was she so…outlandish?
And whenwould she find a nice boy and settle down?
She seemed to do no wrong. Fairly dancing everywhere she went, she made friends and distributed gifts—some big, some small—everywhere she went. She was like an angel, they said, with her boundless energy and childlike wisdom, with her wide doe-eyes and rosebud smile.
Many seasons passed on the island. The conditions seemed to improve with each one; couples, under her discreet direction, came to be. More weddings at once than had ever occurred before on the island crammed together as the couples clamoured to wed. Life bloomed. Love bloomed.
For all but one.
She stood, shaking, outside the reclusive ashen-haired man's door, clutching her fuzzy lime-green scarf tightly around her neck more for comfort than for warmth. Her heart had plummeted for the first time in its soaring career and crashed—hard. "Can you…can you tell me why?"
"…Molly." His voice caught, and he averted his dichromatic eyes from her searching, pleading ones while shifting his weight on the threshold of his door. She watched his Adam's apple bob uncertainly as he swallowed. "I'm…not like you, Molly….I could never be….like you…"
"But we could try," she persisted, stubbornly blinking away the hot tears she could feel welling in her eyes. "Don't you think we could try? I know…I know I—"
"Molly…please." The wizard finally managed to look her in the eyes and found that the pain behind them nearly matched his own—but not quite the same. Never the same. "It's…better for us both….trust me…"
"Trust you?" the farmer spat, a stray tear running down her cheek as she fiercely blinked. "I didtrust you. With all that I am!"
The wizard didn't reply, only listened to the ragged breath that escaped her as she tried desperately to quell her sob. Never before in all her life had she felt so broken, so emptied. She could hardly tell if any of herself was left. Where was that bright laugher, the carefree dancer?
The shimmering feather fluttered gracefully to the frosted ground as her grip finally loosened in defeat. He stood before her and watched, heart breaking once again, as she dragged a sleeve across her eyes, and fought against reaching out to her. That would never do; he'd loved and lost her before, and it wasn't happening again.
After all these years, he'd finally learned his lesson: the vicious cycle of immortality never ended, and Molly—or Angela, or Akari, or Hikari; whatever her name would happen to be—never failed to find him. The life of a recluse suited him best, he finally accepted that; and the undying, unbridled spirit inside of her deserved far better than he could hope to offer. It was best for the both of them to part ways.
Until the cycle repeated itself, of course. After she passed—as he well knew she someday would, like all the other fickle mortal souls—the island would forget. About hope, and faith; about the Mother Goddess herself. It needed her like air to breathe, and it would only take a few generations for the people to lose everything she'd worked so hard to achieve. Again.
And so, she would be called back. The wizard hardly thought the people were worthy of the constant forgiveness for their own flaws, thought it unfair that only Molly should have to carry the burden, but knew he was not the one to judge. Apparently, his superiors knew what was best.
His eyes closed as he knelt to pick the feather up off the ground. Brushing the flecks of ice crystals away, he pressed it into her clenched fist and curled his own hand around hers. Her large, mahogany-brown eyes snapped open and a faint hope that made his heart ache shimmered beneath. He hated to crush it.
"Molly…it is best…and I am sure…you can find someone…much better." A small, sad smile played shyly at his lips, but Molly didn't return it. Her throat tightened and several moments of heavily-charged silence passed.
"I don't know if I can stay here," she finally whispered. She took a step away from him, smiling almost apologetically. He let his eyes fall back down to bore into his boots while giving a small incline of the head. As he listened to her soft footsteps pattering away, he still couldn't force himself to raise his head and look at her retreating form.
"You know," she added suddenly, startling him. He glanced up to see her standing a few feet away, perched at the top of the small staircase. "When I left, my mother told me I could do anything I could dream of, but not to do anything too stupid."
"Like fall…in love," he murmured, lowering his eyes once again. She'd said those words to him once before. It didn't lessen the sting one bit, as it was something his Master once told himself and Vivi.
But oh, he was too stupid to listen then.
When he glanced back over at the staircase, she was gone; only snowflakes in the cold winter breeze remained. He would later learn that she had left on the ferry the following day, her mismatched carpet bag considerably more full and missing a flower in her hair, after selling her flourishing farm to an eager upstart by the name of Kasey. He resettled back into his old pattern of poring over ancient, dusty, thumb-paged tomes and staring into the night sky—the one thing that never changed—and watched as the children's children of Molly's generation slowly destroyed the island. He could almost sense the last gust of wind draw away as the island sighed deeply, sadly.
And then one day in mid-summer, a young woman with a calla lily in her springy brown hair tossed open the door, letting golden sunlight spill inside and frame her form while effectively disturbing the peace inside the darkened house. A Sprite—the newest, if Wizard recalled correctly—bobbed around happily at her shoulder, leaving a glittering golden trail in his wake. "Um…excuse, me? Is there a…a Wizard here?"
And the cycle began again.
A/N: So um, thanks for reading this little thing. I'd really appreciate some feedback/concrit if you'd like to offer some! I hope you enjoyed it. C: Have a great day!