Hybrid Fairy
Author's Note: This is one my sister wrote. It's her birthday, and she really wanted to do the Nina chapter. So I let her. Be kind, y'aal. (I know you will, right?) I did help her with some parts, so you can be a LEETLE mean.
He really didn't like the situation, but who could? The days were becoming more and more tedious as he waited for what would eventually come. It was a sad fate, sure, and very disappointing. But it wasn't his fault he wasn't cut for the job.
Jack sighed. He gazed blearily at his fields: a mass of twisted weeds and dry dust. None of his crops seemed to succeed; partially out of bad luck and partially out of sheer forgetfulness to water them. His two calves were sickly and gaunt, and his sheep was bad-tempered.
"How did Grandpa manage to do this?" Jack wondered aloud that morning. There was stillness in the air, and emptiness in him he wanted to fill.
He knew where the empty feeling came from. It was from Her.
Not only was he leaving behind a failed farm, he was leaving behind the first girl he'd ever loved. The sheer notion of it sounded like a tragic story, or even those ballads the carpenter liked to hum while working. It made him cry, or want to, at least.
But the boat was coming tomorrow, and he was leaving forever.
With a sigh, Jack grasped his pen, and put words to the paper before him.
She couldn't believe the city boy was leaving.
She sat there, numb, when the Mayor told her the news. She felt the feeling flood from her face, her eyes become wide. She knew he hadn't been into working, but… well, she thought he'd manage a way. And now he was leaving, breaking her in such a way she felt … empty.
The flowers in her hands seemed trivial. Pretty petals crumpling beneath her pale fingertips, her eyes crushing the delicate things with an inborn hate. No, why? Her lips parted, she gave a hiccup, and fell to the ground on her knees.
She buried her face in the flowers.
She'd always treasured flowers. They were beautiful and delicate and gracious things full of something she couldn't quite pin down. They taught her lessons, so to speak, though it wasn't in the same way you might think. They tangled her up in word vines and letter roots, the secret of the soil.
"Why is he going?" she sighed into their budding blossoms, tears falling from her eyes, the softened pink of her hair reflecting into the watery droplets. But there was no answer to her question.
She remembered giving him the first bag of seeds she could find: she tried so hard to please this boy, to give him what he needed. He'd given her a crooked smile – he was so awkward that way! – and taken the bag with little more than the brush of a finger. But she'd swooned, and felt her hand burning the rest of the day.
She hated it when the people she loved left her.
At this thought, her heart broke open even more, like a ripe fruit falling onto the ground, and she openly sobbed for the first time since her father died.
"Well, my boat's here," he said, biting his lip.
The crowd of people was small. The carpenter, the bartender, Ann's dad, the fortune-teller's granddaughter, and Her, of course. His heart broke when he saw her face cave in like a collapsed mine, but he tried to tuck away his grief into a wrinkle on his forehead, a souvenir from his time spent here.
The boat horn squalled again, and he winced. She wimpered.
She hadn't opened the paper yet.
With a sigh, Jack left the town without knowing if the girl he loved actually loved him back.
"Dear Nina,
It's hard to write this, even now. I was never much good at writing letters, you see. Found it pointless. But I feel compelled to write you a letter… not one of those pointless ones, but one you might keep forever.
That's what I hope at least.
You know I didn't like farming. I think we were all prepared for this in the end. I wasn't made to be a farmer boy—I've always been more of an athlete, you remember? I told you when we went swimming in the summer. Farming isn't my thing, and apparently, neither are small towns.
I'm sorry I have to leave. There are so many things I want to say. That was cliché, I know, and I've always hated those. But I know exactly what it means now, and I want to tell you how your hair always bunches around your face when you giggle. You wrinkle your nose when you lie—"
She self-consciously patted her nose.
"— When you smile, one eyebrow is higher than the other. You have six sour faces. You always seemed to glow when I give you a flower. When you dance, your hands always seemed to float at your sides. And I love you."
She gave a smile.
"I hope you can forgive me. I'm just not cut out for this time. But I promise I won't forget you… Really! You're… special to me, Nina. God, look how sappy I'm sounding. I'd make Shakespeare ashamed.
I don't know any other way to say it, Nina. I love you.
Sincerely,
Jack."
She balled the paper up, and threw it in the fire. Then she sighed, and gazed into the embers with the emptiness aching inside of her like a gnawing dog, much like the one Jack had left behind. She dabbed away her tears, and put the envelope in her pocket.
Sometimes, ten years in the future, she'll wonder if her big-city boy ever thinks about the small-town girl who wasn't strong enough to hold onto him.
Author's Note: I really liked that last line. Hahahahhaa. Anyways, leave a kind review for my struggling sister.