The Fox and the Vole

There was once a very shy fox who lived alone in a heap of tyres by the riverbank. He wasn't an unhappy fox, not at all, but he was very reserved around the other animals that he didn't know. And so some thought he was very lazy because he seemingly did so little on his time.

One day when the shy fox was walking his favourite walk around the birches of Ms. Rabbit, he met a vole. She was a happy and fat and round vole who lived by the orchard in an old oak. The vole completely ignored his shyness and bubbled and talked a hole in his head. Even though the fox usually would be uneasy at this approach, the fat vole simply gave him no room to be. And like probably no animal could've predicted, they clicked like a jigsaw puzzle.

And many thought it was such a shame they became friends because the vole had so much more to offer than to a quiet fox they said. But in truth the fox was way better than the vole, and took such good care of the her, that she could never imagine a life without him. Because the vole wasn't all that bubbly happiness that was on the outside, for some time she had been quite depressed and cried a lot on her own, underneath the ferns. And despite her being a stubborn vole that didn't want anyone's help - the shy fox ignored her stubborness and fought with her and kept her warm in the night even though she hadn't admitted to be cold.

The shy fox was such a delight underneath his shell, he noticed everything around him, every branch in the trees, the flowers, the leaves caught in the sizzling river and the whirring insects in the low sun. He could talk endlessly, like a waterfall, with so many thoughts and ideas, because he had an eye for things that other foxes could never see.

The vole thought about him constantly when he was not around, because even though they seldom did much, they could just lie in the grass and look at the birds and the clouds - they still felt as complete as the sky.

Draft for Soneera

The golden fruit knife was both short – and after many years of eager use – also getting blunt. But in the moonlight it glistened in all its dangerous beauty as she clenched it in her hand and soundlessly made her way through the corridors. See-through drapes in light, cool colours floated up from the cold stone floor as she rushed past. The moonlight was muted and frail, coming through small windows high up by the massive domes that made up the palace’s ceiling. It glittered on mosaic of rushing rivers and fruitful groves lined with intricate patterns around the floor and the doors. A sound swished through the empty, windless passageway. She quickly took shelter in a beautifully decorated mihrab and tried to hold her breath. Her eyes sparkled with unshaped tears, her heart hammered so loud it almost exceeded every other sound. Her chest was heaving and sinking fast, she tried to brush her black hair out of her eyes with ringed, painted hands. She had removed the other expensive jewellery she usually wore – so that her mission could be carried out soundlessly. It was not a good night to commit murder, she thought. The stars were out – only veiled by a few vague brushstrokes of clouds, the Gods would see everything.

She pressed her muscular back into the golden mosaic and waited for a very long time. A weak breath of wind touched the drops of sweat and covered every patch of her bare skin with goose bumps. Everything was at stake. Her hand quavered uncontrollably, all these months now - she had only had this night on her mind, but now that it was here – now, she didn’t know if she could go through with it. She swallowed. I have to. After all these years of suffering, everything would end exactly as it had started. It was beautiful and ironic at the same time.

It had begun indeed the same cool spring night 17 years earlier. A beautiful dancer of the royal harem, though considerably thinner and weaker – had made her way through the darkness of the usually stunning palace hallways. At night everything seemed different, everything except the love in her heart. While day and night and the will of the Gods may change by the rising of the sun, the love and lust in the heart stay constant. She remembered those words. He had whispered them in her ear as he gripped her skinny arms hard. He had let his strong nails scrape her back open as tears twinkled down her cheeks. The young girl drove the prince mad with desire, and her mind was poisoned with blind, numbing love. She did whatever he told her to. Not only because it was her duty to do so, but because she loved him. She loved him so much she could not eat or drink. Just the mere thought that the prince was to marry soon almost made her split open. And all this naïve affection had made it very easy for the prince to persuade her young hands to be ones to dissect the queens heart. If she dies, Muwta. If the queen dies-- then I am the heir of the throne, and my engagement to my cousin will cease to be appropriate in the queen’s absence. I can marry you, Muwta. You can give birth to my children. She could hear his voice in her head so clearly. She no longer had to murder the unborn infants and bury them in the shade of the lime coppice.

The hairpin sunk into the queen’s eye without much effort. Muwta had made sure to mute the woman’s agonized scream with an embroidered silk pillow. Another layer of tissue behind the punctured eye gave in to the sharp pin, and the queen made a final twitch before eventually dying. The quiet felt intoxicating, the skinny girl struggled to make her way back to the harem lodgings, stumbling past the many colourful curtains and doorways as if drunk. The happiness was unexplainable. The prince was hers now.

An old house

The house was the home of a big, dead family. The garden was a thin patch of unkept lawn that evolved into a high hedge that almost disguised all the windows in the first floor from the streets. Through the wrought iron gates the pathway was overgrown and ultimately empty, only beetles tread there. The front door was made of dark wood and was featureless and heavy, the hallway plastered in crumbling tapestry, the drawing room a mouldy, mushy pink, sun-bleached ghost of what it had once been. The kitchen was large with hollow cupboards and heavy cast iron pots and copper pans with burnt edges hanging from the ceiling. In the corners hung bouquets of dried herbs - only a few sad strands remained. Cracked porcelain cups filled with black dust lay strewn on the dining table, the curtains hung lopsided over the window, letting in a gash of dim light through the filthy windows. The sink was clogged and in it piled a heap of unwashed dishes that had never been cleaned. A jug was stuck to the counter, a spider had meticously woven a silky thin web that stretched all the way from the mug and to a pictureframe on the wall. The image within the frame was long since faded away from the sunlight.

Upstairs were three bedrooms. One was the master bedroom, with a big, heavy dresser - filled with the smell of age and mothballs. The doors to the dresser were carved like writhing branches stretching to the stained ceiling. In the middle of the room by the far end stood the bed. It was broad and too soft, the duvet was a dark, once noble green, but now rotten all the way through. A chandelier hung over the bed, mirrored in a black spotted floor mirror by the door. The wooden floorboards were broad and rough, and creaked alarmingly if stepped on. The other two bedrooms were quite similar. Containing a single bed, bedside tables, one small, fitted dresser with broken knobs on the drawers and dust-layered lamps that stood spindly on small end tables by the window.

The only difference was that in one of the rooms there was also a piano. The black and ebony was edged with discolour, it long since wrung out of tune by the force of time. Whenever he felt particularly lonely he liked to crawl in through the kitchen window and climb the steep stairs and sit by the piano and stare out the dirty window. He tried to play it, but it sounded terrible, and he didn't even know how to play one. But he liked to pretend like he could play it. He would sit on the moth-eaten stool and let his fingers float over the keys without touching them while pretending to be sitting in front of a giant audience, playing a heartfelt ballad. But in truth he was sitting in this empty, frightening house -without fully understanding why he came back, or why it just stood there, rotting away.

Girl sleeping

She lay twirled into some patchwork blankets in the back of the gallery. Her left leg was bent and lay in a thick ray of golden sunlight that made the particles and dust in the air glitter. She had her mouth partly open, revealing the edges of a few teeth and the darkness of her throat. Strands of sand coloured hair erupted from her head like a nest, wrapping itself around one wrist and covering bits of her face. Her lashes were dark and black mascara had been smudged all the way out to her temples. She had worn expensive earrings the night before, one was still attached to her right earlobe, the other one lay twinkling underneath her foot. Her left hand was clutching a patched red and blue blanket, the other one was folded underneath her head - some of the fingers sticking up through her hair. Her chest was peacefully, almost unnoticably heaving and sinking. She curled her toes and moved a fraction, her other leg now visible too in the sunlight. One of her breasts were uncovered by the blankets, her skin was blushing and covered in goosebumps. She moved again, and her feet retracted into the warmth of the blanket - she pulled the red and blue blanket subconciously up over the rest of her upper body and pressed her face harder into the cheap matress.

She was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.