Sep 21, 2015 Fairy tale

Metamorphosis — A Short Magical Tale

©By Vijaya Sundaram

Written on Feb. 26 into past midnight on Feb. 27th, 2013

(Dragged in, kicking and screaming, from my other blog from 2013)

The mists descended, and the shadows prowled across my back yard.   I had been looking out the window.  It was, as usual, 3:00 a.m., and my head was buzzing with unceasing chatter.  I had worked all day, and had been unable to get a certain image out of my head, or should I say, a certain imago out of my head.

I had wandered into my yard that morning, before heading off to work, and attended to sundry matters — pruning a bush here, watering some rose bushes there, ruthlessly yanking up some weeds, smoothing over the soil, looking admiringly at my butterfly bush that bloomed exquisite and purple, like smoky twilight, while butterflies obligingly admired it.

As if impelled by a magical impulse, I drew near the bush, almost swooning with delight from the delicately overpowering scent of the blossoms. That was the moment when things froze into a tableau in my head.  I saw a thing that did not seem to be real.

I can still picture the scene: The sun’s rays pouring down on the bush, the splash of color of the butterflies and the flowers, and … a certain large thing that hung from a leaf.  Larva? Pupa?  Imago!

Fascinated, and slightly repulsed (no entomologist, I), I stared at the thing, and it bulged.  I made out the faint shape of something completely perplexing.  It didn’t look like an insect to me.  The butterflies were making much of it, though, and they seemed to think it needed their loving attention.  They fluttered around the beautiful blossoms, drank nectar to their heart’s content, and then hovered over this object.  A ray of light caught it, and I drew in my breath in amazement.  A long, thin, straw glowed liquidly, and something was coursing down it, into the imago!

I must be losing my mind, or I really am ignorant about how things work in nature, I thought, and mentally shrugging my shoulders, and detaching my gaze from the strange, pulsing, bulging thing, I turned away.

All day, the thing haunted me.

Working at my desk at the Daily Trumpet, scanning my email, trying to marshal my thoughts into coherent words to produce for my column, I found my mind returning to that, that, well, imago hanging from under that butterfly-bush leaf.  My back ached abominably.

“What the hell are you doing, just staring at that screen?” asked my editor crossly.  He was definitely not one to be crossed.  Deadlines were to be met, and if they weren’t, we had to deal with his unleashed wrath, which had the force of a hurricane.

“Sorry!” I muttered.  “I was just reviewing my facts.  I’ll get to it.  I mean, I’m on it, okay?”

“If you aren’t, I’ll be on you like a ton of bricks, so hustle!” he said, rudely and stalked off.

Pam, on my left, smiled sympathetically.  “One would think we were a major newspaper, instead of a dinky little town rag!  He has delusions of grandeur, that one!  Don’t worry!  He needs us as much as we need him!”

I smiled uneasily at her, and reached over my shoulder to rub my back.  Pam had a way of sounding sympathetic, but I never knew where I stood with her.  She might just as easily go and tell him what I said, if I said anything.  So, I kept my mouth shut.  One cannot overstate such a thing enough: When you have nothing to say, don’t say it!  When you have something to say, say it with enough witnesses around.  Better still, don’t say anything.  Just put it into your first novel.

I turned back to my work.  Somehow, I managed to write my column.  I have no memory of what it was, or whether I was even remotely interested in it.  The day seemed to have been covered in a sort of thin shell, or a mist.  I felt nascent.  My back really hurt.

Later, I had a sandwich with Pam and Jake at the local deli a block away.  They talked of this and that, mostly complaining about Jason, our editor.  I nodded, said a number of “ums,” and found my head throbbing, as if a band of silver had been tightened across it.  The light hurt my eyes.  I put my hands to my forehead, and a few beads of sweat dropped into my plate.

Pam looked worried, and I knew this was real concern.  “You okay?” she asked.  “You look ill.  Do you want me to tell Jason you’re ill and had to leave?  You really need to go home, you know.”

I felt grateful and strangely disconnected.  I pulled out a few bucks, put it down on the table for my sandwich and coffee and said, “Yes, I think I really must.  Would you tell him?  Thanks so much!”

Jake offered to drive me home, but I said I’d get a taxi.

And so, I came home, and bathed my temples in cool water.  Felt better, marginally so.  I took an aspirin, and went up to bed.

The image wouldn’t leave me.  My back was throbbing unceasingly.  I stirred restlessly, got up, turned on the idiot box, watched some mindless soap, turned it off, slept uneasily for a couple of hours, ate a microwaved dinner, drank a glass of wine, prowled around my house, called my sister in Seattle, my mother in Florida, my father in Toronto and my ex-husband in Washington, D.C.  (but he was busy with a brief and brushed me off).

The sun had just dropped out of sight, but its glow was still there, blending into the purple of  twilight when I decided to go back out into my garden.

I didn’t want to stare at the butterfly bush.  I didn’t.  I wouldn’t.  Would I?

No.  So, I watered the plants, pulled up more weeds, lingered on the tulip patch, where the lobbed off stalks stood forlornly, tended to my basil. thyme and mint, inhaling their heady fragrance, which seemed to dissipate my strange feeling of malaise.  Then, seeming to do it almost by accident, not by design, I went to my butterfly bush.

The butterflies were still busy (Strange!  They should have gone by now).  The imago was still bulging and pulsing.  I was very unsettled by that.  It made me faintly queasy.  A dim light seemed to glow from within it.  An unearthly hum seemed to envelop it.

I turned away, went back in.  I couldn’t bear it now.  It worried me.  The rest of the night passed in a blur.  I had some soup, showered, read a book, went to bed … and didn’t sleep.  My back hurt too much, and my sides ached as well.

Thus it came to be that I was standing at the window at 3:00 a.m., staring down into my backyard at the butterfly bush.  The mist was swaddling the dark, and I felt wrapped up in my own blanket of strangeness and weirdness.  Suddenly the moon came out from behind a cloud, and flooded the place in a pale wash of purple-white.  Something seemed to be moving around the imago.  The butterflies!  They were STILL there!

That’s it! I thought.  No more of this nonsense!  I am going to get rid of that thing.

I turned on the backyard lights, donned my dressing gown, slipped into my slippers, and armed with, of all things, an umbrella, headed out into the backyard, striding determinedly towards my imago.

The night seemed to press in on me like a shell, and I thought I’d burst from the pressure of it.  I needed to break this strange spell.  It was not pleasant.  I made me fearful and wretched.  I would break the spell.  I pulled up short in front of the imago — and stared.

The shell was cracking. A leg came out, then two, then two hands parted the sticky, slimy thing, and a small face peered out.  The butterflies fluttered onto leaves, and became quite still, as if completely frozen in sleep.

The thing that was inside, emerged sinuously from its shell, and two beautiful, iridescent wings unfolded.  There was a sudden, imperceptible sound of a body dropping to the ground, and the being was now on the soil, looking up at me.  She (or he, or it) was absolutely beautiful.  A glow seemed to light it from within.  Deep golden eyes looked at me.  I fancied I saw the sunlight playing in them.  A halo of hair curled about its head, and it had beautifully formed human features.  Only its wings were like those of a butterfly.

It looked up at me, and smiled.  A beautiful voice, softer than a sigh spoke in my mind.

Its words bloomed and formed within my head:  Mother?  Is that you? 

The night loosened its hold on me.  My silver band of headache broke.  The mist that had been blanketing me, released itself into tendrils that floated away. The moon shone down, bright and relentless.  I felt my back bursting with something that resembled pain.  I bent over, and straightened up.  Nothing surprised me anymore.

My wings unfurled.  They had always been there, tight under my skin on my back.  I had never known.  And I wasn’t afraid.

I smiled back at the being.

Yes, my darling.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~The End~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Tags: #Original Short Story by Vijaya Sundaram, magic realist short story, metamorphosis

Jul 22, 2015 Fairy tale, Friday Fictioneers

Genre: Fairy Tale

Word Count:  100 words of text exactly (sans title, author, etc.)

The Kick

©July 22nd, 2015

By Vijaya Sundaram

The abandoned child emerged from the monstrous woods, and saw a building made of frosting and graham crackers.  People carried spun-sugar balloons.  Golden light from honey-lamps spilled onto sugar-frosted ground.

Feet numb, teeth chattering, she walked rapidly towards this vision.

A voice said, “Not so fast, dearie!”

An old man with sharp teeth, white beard, and black cloak stopped her, and held out his hand.  “Price of admission.”

“I’ve no coin.”

“We don’t need money — just a teensy bit of you.”

She hesitated, then spun on her heels, and kicked.

Everything vanished.   She was alone, again.

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Thanks to Rochelle Wisoff-Fields, our Fairy Blog-Mother, for hosting Friday Fictioneers, and taking the time to read what we write every week in response to these photo-prompts.  We love you, Rochelle!  And thanks, also, to Dee Lovering for the photograph-prompt!

Tags: child in woods, fairy tale