Faded Face

Faded Face

It was a dreary and light-hearted rainy night. The melancholy man stood below the awning of the newly refurbished Tom's Diner, breathing quietly as he awaited a taxi. The dim lighting advertised 50% off in sandwiches and chips.

He could faintly remember an artist who once sang about Tom's Diner. There were many "do's" in that song. Unsurprisingly, as he remembered, it was titled Tom's Diner. 

A car sped past by, almost-but-not-quite splashing his lower half. He breathed a deep sigh.

Perhaps, one day, he would become like the quiet rain too.

I Saw Him Once, in a Dream

 

I Saw Him Once, in a Dream

I always did sympathize with the bad guys in fairy tales when I was young. The troubles they experienced to destroy the hero, to make their own dreams come true. What I never did understand was why the villains did what they had to do. Did there always have to be an antagonist?

I doubt it. I'm sure the Evil Queen had to give the apple for some other reason than jealously.

My favorite antagonist is the Big Bad Wolf from Little Red Riding Hood. A simple wolf, waiting for prey, hoping to feed his family that was never mentioned in the story. They say that he never did devour the grandma or Little Red Riding Hood. He was simply after her desserts, since his pups wanted cake and cookies.

But they misunderstood his intentions...

I saw him once, in a dream. It was there that I was able to give him sweets of all kinds.

I hope to see him again. 

For She...Explores the Sunset Desert

For She...Explores the Sunset Desert

There are no people. There are no buildings. She is far from civilization...if there are any left. In the lonely desert she is alone, no miraculous oasis or fanciful mirages.

Her patterned jacket flutters in the desert breeze, her footsteps leaving shadowed marks in the sand. Endlessly, the desert expands toward the northern sun, which continues to shine half-heartedly. She follows, but expects no sort of reward, just the journey itself.

She breathes a deep sigh.

"I should be able to find the lost ruins soon." She could sense it. Strange disturbances in the air that shifted toward the end of the desert.

She questioned if anything truly was at the edge of the horizon. Perhaps.

"Perhaps."

She breathes a deep sigh.

The Man With Cat-Paw Gloves

The Man With Cat-Paw Gloves

He is a very strange man who can pull off a cat-like appearance very well on Tuesdays. On Thursday he is British, and longs to visit a clam buffet. He's very eccentric, and not that well-known except for the residents in his head.

Some say he's mental, others say he's colorful, but he doesn't really care because he does and doesn't exist, so the comments do and don't affect him. Sometimes when he fully exists, he gets sad, but he finds it all dandy since that sadness is alleviated later when he half-exists.

So far, only a few handle consider him wonderful. But that is because they too, are wonderful people.

The life of a 1/4 cat-man is quite difficult (his paws are gloves and the only thing cattish about him are his ears).

For She Hides in the Light

For She Hides in the Light

The mysterious woman surrounded by white aura did nothing to conceal the strange light emanating from her, and because of this, the denizens of Hell avoided her purity. They would hiss and shout strange curses in their demonic tongue, and some even had the gall to attack her outright with tendrils of dark shadows. Yet, all the demons could do nothing but watch in ambivalence as she simply ignored their assaults and strange insults.

"Through Cerberus Street and wait at Souls Plaza below the lantern tree." The man's voice, so softly spoken and devoid of emotion echoed in her mind. She repeated the simple phrase multiple times in her head, fearful that somehow, the demons of Hell would warp the phrase into something else. 

She wasn't afraid of them, of course. She was a neutral being simply borrowing Angel's Light for the time being. Neutral beings were frowned upon in both Heaven and Hell, since to the Angels and Demons, it was either good or evil.

She discarded her musings as she reached the open plaza cloaked in a heavy green fog, the lantern tree in the middle dimly illuminating the area with eerie orange lights. The buildings seemed suspiciously devoid of life, but as she squinted she could make faint shadows watching her from behind counter tops and demonic shoe stores. Could this really be counted as a plaza though? Instead of normal cobblestone, the entire surface fresh dirt with scattered gravestones.

A man half-naked with scars and something oozing out of his body approached the unnamed woman quietly waiting under the lantern tree, mumbling a continuous phrase of "no place like home, no place like home, no place like home..." he passed her harmlessly, but one of his eyes watched her for a second.

"The creatures of this place...certainly are odd." The woman mused. "He better be here soon..."

She would wait until her damned lover would appear, regardless.

Pretending to Sleep

Pretending to Sleep

She never sleeps, from what they are told. Never a nap in the afternoon nor forty wink of shut-eye for five minutes. Nobody knows how she does it, but there are rumors that the Sleep Fairy took away her ability to slumber. These days, she only pretends to sleep, so that her friends and family will not worry. What she really does, when everyone else in the house is unconscious, is play video games and study nonsensical things.

She has all the time in the world now, 24-hours, really.

Whenever she pretends to sleep, she always keeps the right eye open and the left eye closed. She blinks slowly as she pretends-sleep, secretly listening in on conversations about her and her eternal insomnia. But she never complains about the lack of sleep. In fact, she says she is ecstatic. She has infinite energy, can run around at night (she could never do that, she'd be asleep), and can late-cram study for a test the following days. 

Her all-nighters are amazing.  

There is one thing she regrets though. Something she misses terribly. She can never dream.

(But on the bright side, she can daydream, but it's not really the same.)

Near the Lake, Is a Muse.

Painting by AK

Near the Lake, Is a Muse

There is a muse near the unnamed lake. Nobody knows for certain, however. They just assume so because of the creative ideas they obtain just by being there. Regardless, most have named her Mimsy, even though her true name is something indistinguishable to mortals.

There is one particular mortal who she likes, always making sure that he receives his daily dose of muses. But only because that he depicts her the way she is, and not the way that others do, overly changing her structure, drawing her in a conflict between a dragon and an ogre.

Ironically, she is friends with a dragon and ogre.