Snippets and Stories: (WtI) Dog Day Shorts - Soft and Fluffy

Shyloris had been many things, and she remembered all of them. An alchemist who studied at the Malarkurious Parline Academy, a prestigious and wonderful school it had been. The daughter of a wealthy entrepreneur, an office worker, an instructor at a daycare, a soldier and guard who toiled at the Great Walls, a runaway from the Salem Witch Trials, a salvager of old wreckage as had been common across the veil, the list was endless.

Happy times!

All of the lives she lived, she treasured in memory. And in every one, she would bring back a memory-piece, that held, in whatever life she lived, of dearest sentimental value.

At least once per lifetime she made a point of visiting that one place. Buried in the hollow trunk of an ancient gnarled oak tree, it's roots twisted and rough, but an amazing hiding spot nonetheless.

And so it had been that day that she, for she had been female that previous life, took to the tree, bag in hand and a cozy maroon scarf around his neck. 

Shyloris could not have anticipated what came next. Not in the experience of a thousand lifetimes.

The timelocked child had made it to the grove, past the unnaturally large dandelions that signaled his passage into the veil.

It was there that she met him.

Snippets and Stories: (WtI) Dog Day Shorts - Matcha Latte

Shyloris sat in the alcove, legs drawn up to his chest to cradle the sketchbook as he watched the streams of sunlight flittering through the brisk morning and dewy grass.

A few yards away there strung a blown glass bird feeder, from which several crepuscular birds were finishing, and the diurnals just arriving.

"Life is the art of drawing without an eraser." -John W. Garder

Shyloris lifted a dusky green mug from it's coaster and smiled as he caught whiff of the still steaming creamy green fluid.

"I’m bad, and that’s good."

It had the soft bittersweet flavor typical to matcha, and the botanist relished in its nostalgic taste.

"I will never be good, and that’s not bad."

He worried his lip and stared beyond the cloud of steam. Life is like a game, he mused.

"You have to learn the rules of the game."

Snippets and Stories: (WtI) Dog Day Shorts - The Typewriter

The Typewriter: Snippets and Stories

The Typewriter is a short story that falls a touch on the serious side. It reflects the maturation and loss of the absolute faith that only children can so blindly follow as one grows and goes through the "up"s and "down"s of life. Just a snippet and look into how I'm spinning the yarn for this story.

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Synopsis: A story short of a boy who sneaks into his father's study to admire the antique typewriter. He reminisces upon an old fable of its seemingly indestructible nature, having survived several misfortunes and catastrophes that the family had undergone. Yet just as it had miraculously survived many a disaster, it was deemed likewise useless as anything more than a decoration, for it could function to type as well as it could fly. There were other aspects such that it differed from the typical typewriter, like the parchment roll that lacked an insert for fresh paper, looped on a perpetual roll.

Staring at the typewriter, the youth notices a small keyhole, and holds up the metal key hung on a looped string of leather. A family heirloom. On a whim, as if beckoned by more than a child's curiosity, he inserts the key into the slot -a perfect fit-, and turns the key without resistance. The machine whirs and clicks, and to his amazement, begins typing a singular message:

Greetings, Master Curse. It is a pleasure to serve you.