Chapter 6 – Wait til I tell you

 

Written by: Donna McT

Her routine is the same every day. At 9am she sits by the window watching for the birds that flit jubilantly in the Frangipani tree that she’d planted so many years before, a fresh pad of paper, her favourite pen, and a mug of coffee arranged on the desk in front of her. Each item in its allotted position; she liked the simplicity of the routine, found comfort in it and enjoyed its liberating effect on her writing. She had become used to, but never took for granted, the words that flowed freely onto the page when she sat in the same chair, her things arranged around her. But since Yogi had arrived, something fundamental had changed. She could feel it but didn’t fully understand it. His stories had crept silently through her armour and warmed the bitter hole that had been her heart since Max and Lara had gone. And now it was sadness that flooded out of her, not words, and it would not stop.

Since Yogi had given her the stone, she had taken to holding it in her left hand as she let her pen hover over the blank page. She rolled it absently with her fingers until the cool white surface was suffused with the heat of her blood. Sometimes she just held it tightly, willing it to save her.

She hadn’t been able to tell Yogi why she had been crying. The words choked in her throat, burned her mouth. She looked forward to Friday and his next story with a frightened pleasure.

“Once upon a time there was a farm where chickens lived very happily,” he begins. “One day an evil crow arrived and disrupted their peaceful life. The crow wanted to be their leader but he spoke cruelly and was mean to the chickens. The chickens became very unhappy and they asked the strongest of them, a big black rooster, to make the crow go away but the crow was clever and outwitted the rooster then became even crueler.

During this time of unhappiness, one of the chickens laid some eggs and soon there were tiny yellow chicks running all around the farm. One day, when the mother chicken was not looking, the evil crow swooped down and grabbed one of the chicks. Before the crow could fly away with the chick, the mother chicken cried out and rushed to attack the crow. She was fearless even although the crow was much bigger and stronger that she was. The crow was so surprised that he let the tiny chick go. Then he stumbled on the ground and the rooster and the other chickens crowded around him and chased him away from the farm. When the chickens asked the mother chicken why she had been so brave, she replied that a mother’s love can conquer anything.

 

Yogi finished his story quietly and looked up. Charlotte eyes were wet and fixed on him. “I have a story for you,” she said and began.

Comments

My goodness what a challenge. This is a new turn for me so I’m walking in the dark again for the next chapter. This chapter is so well crafted. When something as excellent as this has a couple of editorial irks they stand out. (than instead of that and close dialog at end of story) That apart the last three sentences of the first paragraph are so superb I was drawn into Charlotte’s state of mind and inner feelings. You have to totally give yourself up to the character you are creating in order to take the reader’s away from the reality of their mundane lives and for a short magical moment transport them into another believable world. This is a great example of succeeding in just that. Always a pleasure to read you, Donna. I hope you will be thinking of writing a whole serial of your own very soon. Thank you for ten minutes of great pleasure as I rested from writing with a cup of tea today.

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