Skeletons in the Closet (or maybe just a month's worth of laundry)

From my experience, author's are not the cleanest people. 

Maybe there's one or two authors out there that stay organized in their daily lives, but for the most part most authors are not organized in anything other then their writing. And even then, not always. 

Teenagers are also not very well known for their... cleanliness.

The combination of these two factors cause a buildup of a lot of mess.

Sometimes said mess gets so bad you can't even see the floor, literally. Or, for another example, your bathroom sink.

I got to that point a few weeks ago. If not months.

Another thing about me is that sometimes, completely randomly and out of the blue, I'll just start cleaning. Obsessively. 

I think that's enough background for now...

Yes. That's right. It was background info to the illustrious POINT. Which always seems to disappear from these things...

Anyways. One of the things I was cleaning up as I worked was my bedside table which is full of a bunch of old papers. Some are old pictures I tried (and failed) to draw, old pamphlets that I thought were important, and more importantly, old pieces of writing. I also have the habit of writing on the backs of scraps of paper, typing them up, and throwing them in a draw to gather dust until something like this happens.

Guys, I beg of you, on my hands and knees, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE save all of your writing. It's so important I'm going to say it again bolded and underlined.PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE save all of your writing. I'm serious. I know that the story you wrote in the fifth grade makes you bow your head in shame. Trust me, I know. What's worse is remembering how proud you used to feel about it.

But when you go back and read it?

It is just an experience to itself. It's a trip back in time. Call me a pack-rat, but I'm serious. I was reading a story I tried to write when I was eight that was an obvious and blatant rip-off of Guerdo  thieves from Zelda: Ocarina of Time and I couldn't stop laughing. It was so adorable! Oh my goodness. And my old fan fiction from Yugioh of all things? Oh my gosh. 

You just can't replicate that feeling.

If you don't have old things saved, start saving them now. It will cause you no end of pleasure later. And think about when you're a big name and all the little Middle-School children are talking about your book for their English book reports and you let loose one of these pieces on the internet to prove just how much you've improved. Cause there's going to be a difference. There'd better be. If I hadn't improved from my seventh's grade stories? I think I would go and die in shame...

Anyways, I would really really like to see what types of things you used to write when you were younger. Please send them vinshire.sisters@gmail.com if you're brave enough. Yup. That's a CHALLENGE.

And just to give me the right to issue said challenge, I'll participate myself.

This is a story I've tried to rewrite... a lot. I don't even want to try to go back and count how many times I've come up with something new for it. Maybe I'll try again sometime... Without further ado...

Prologue

          At the time of midnight, in the Terian woods, a woman wearing a long cloak that covered her face and carrying a small bundle ran through the forest.  She was careful to avoid any rocks or roots as to not jostle the little bundle in her arms.  Over a thin stream, around a boulder, and off a ledge.  After a few more yards her pointed ears picked up faint traces of pursuit.  She guessed that they were humans, ten to fifteen of them, coming in her direction, about 100 yards behind.

          Hurrying her pace, she ran through the slowly thinning trees.  Coming to a clearing she stopped, and looked around.  As she was searching, a dark shape watched her, not daring to approach yet.

          Finding what she was looking for, a marking in the rock in the shape of an eye, she laid the small bundle of blankets on the ground beneath the rocks.  She knelt down and whispered a few quiet words. 

          Hearing the sounds of pursuit again she got up and turned.  The dark shape tensed, but the mother turned around again.

          “Good bye Areena, I’m sorry, sleep well,” and without another word she was gone.

          A quite fell on the clearing and the only sound was of the dark shape steeping into the dim light from the full moon.  It walked around sniffing and searching for any hints that the mother might come back.  Apparently finding none, it walked over to the child that had the most piercing green eyes and started inspecting her.              

          Through out all of this the child slept, thinking not of danger, or fear, only sweet dreams of a castle on the horizon.

                                                Hunter

          A deer ran through the woods at noon, watching for any hints of danger.  It bent it’s head down low to drink from the shallow pond beside it.                 What it didn’t notice was a hunter, pulling back an arrow with a inhumanly grace.  The arrow flew hitting the mark exactly, the deer was deed in seconds. 

          Many times had this huntress shot a dear, but never had she killed any thing this large.  Arenaa was the name of the huntress, with the lightest brown hair found bouncing slightly as she walked over to the body of the now dead deer, sharp green eyes searching for threats.

          Pulling the arrow out of the carcass and beginning to clean it, Arenaa yelled,    

          “Rinca!”

          Almost immediately a blue and purple fairy was hovering by her side. It had gossamer transparent purple wings and blue skin that looked good with her sharp pointy face. She was about six inches tall.

          “Wow” the colorful dot remarked rather quickly “That’s a big one Arenaa, how big would you say?”

          “Two to three days worth for all of us, two maybe three years old, four and a half feet long.” Areena replied dully as she eyed the beast.

          “Like I said, Wow!  You know what this means? Paco owes me 3 coins.”  Arenaa gave her a Oh-come-on-I-told-you-to-stop look.

          “What?” Rinca asked in a false innocent voice “Ok, I know you don’t like me betting on you, but it was necessary. Paco said that you couldn’t get anything bigger than an fawn.”  Arenaa frowned but inside she was happy that Rinca had stood up for her like that, but than of course she should have expected it. Rinca had supported her in everything she had done since before she could remember.

          “And she can’t” a stuck up sounding voice said from the trees. Rinca rolled her eyes and whispered,

          “Wait till you see the look on his face when he sees this.” And she was right.  As the small red, green fairy flew out of the trees and caught sight of the beast on the ground, the look on it’s face was hilarious. They both had to hold back tears of laughter.

          “Um … how much do I owe you Rinca?” he asked hesitantly. Rinca smirked.

          “Three coins”

          “What!” he looked outraged “There is no way I would have agreed to that!”

          “Maybe, but you still did!” She was holding back on her laughter “Pay  up” Grumpily he pulled out three gold coins the size of a baby’s fist out of the leather pouch he wore on his shoulder.

          “Rinca, come on lets go. All our admirers will be waiting” by that Areena meant all the people waiting to laugh at her small catch, which didn’t often. Areena was actually despised by a lot of the kids that grew up around her. To them she was too perfect and Blake liked her too much, so they were always trying to find ways to somehow “get back at her”.

          “OK, I’m coming. Yeshh don’t be such a bossy,” was the only reply she got. As she turned away she heard a quiet whisper that sounded a lot like

          “Yeah, like she really shot it.”

          A smile played on her lips as she started imagining what Rinca was doing to Paco right know. Carried on by this thought, she walked away slowly so Rinca could get back and tell her a cover up story to tell everyone else.

          “So what’s the story for Paco getting beat up this time?” she asked as Rinca flew into sight.

          “Oh I was thinking about flying into a tree.”

           “And you think Mariesh will buy it?” there was a pause.

          “No.” they said in synchronized voices.

          Every person on the land of Mari had a partner, fairy, nymph, or sprit, except the mysterious thieves to the north west. Rinca was Areena’s and Paco was Mariesh’s. Partners are free to leave if they wish, but most would rather stay with each other for life.

          Out of all the people who hated her, Mariesh hated her the most, no, she loathed her. No one knew why and some people even felt sorry for Areena because she loathed her so much. Mariesh would do just about anything to hurt her, insult her, or embarrass her on a daily basis. It didn’t help that Mariesh is what some would call “a gang leader”. Of course Areena was always to fast to catch, to good to get in trouble, and to strong to be embarrassed.

          “Well I guess it is time to find out” Said Areena as she walked out from the thick, green underbrush that was a hidden entrance to her “home”, otherwise known as Blake’s clearing.

          There was already someone waiting for her. Mariesh was standing there tall as ever, with her shoulder length jet back black hair hanging over her shoulder her blue eyes looking as if to kill. Areena had to admit that she looked intimidating with her “gang” standing there backing her up.

          “What did you do to him?” she close to yelled at her.

          “What do you mean, Mariesh?” Areena said putting on her innocent voice.

          “I know you did something to him, you monster!” she, again, yelled at her. Already almost every one was staring now except for a group of four and five year-olds playing skip rope (jump rope).

          “WHAT DID YOU DO TO HIM!” even the group of skip ropers were staring now. The looks on their faces are so cute, Areena randomly thought.

          “I did absolutely NOTHING to your little monster of a partner.”

          “Don’t even try to lie to me I know he got hurt!”

          “Did you ever think that maybe we didn’t hurt him, just because he’s hurt doesn’t mean we did it.”

          Rinca piped in “Beside he flew into a tree”

          Mariesh‘s stare could kill “You already tried that on me don’t think of me as a fool!” almost every one went back to what they were doing, same old fight.

          “Look Mariesh, I’m tired, I’ve just caught about the biggest catch of my life and I would just like to go about my day without any fights.”

          “Oh really” Mariesh said her voice dipped in sarcasm and handed to Areena on a plate “How big is it? A fawn.” They were staring again, listening carefully, some to hear her admit it, in small hopes, the others to hear Mariesh’s reaction to what ever Areena was going to say. It was different every time.

          “No actually that was your catch last week.” This remark was greeted by a bunch of you-got-served ohs “My catch happens to be dinner for all of us for a good three days.” She could hear a good few cheers in the back of the crowd.

          “What’s going on around here?” a deep throated, but gentle voice called out of the crowd.

          Every one went back to what they were doing the second this happened. This was Blake.

So yeah.... 

I've posted my shame. Send me yours. Please and thank you and thanks for reading,

~Amanda Vinshire

P.S. If you also live a similar lifestyle to mine (messy) now's as good a time as any as trying to clean up a little. Going back to the bathroom sink theme at the beginning, I discovered that they're actually white! It's that so cool?