Somewhere Far Away
by Latriva Pierce
An ocean of glittering jewels expanded beyond the horizon, rolled out long and luxuriously in front of Mira. She crossed her arms and rested them on the boat’s railing, leaning forward into the breeze, letting it take her away for a moment. It felt nice against her bare arms, the bumps of iridescent greens, blues, and reds on her skin exposed, finally free from their prison of sleeves. This was good. She was happy.
A gentle tear slipped from her eyes and embraced the water before her.
“I’m not picking up any big signals!” Cypress shouted as they lazily swung out of the helm, one arm holding onto the wall. Their button-up was casually open and blew out behind them, revealing the spikes of bark protruding from their collarbone, up their neck, down their arms.
“Nothing? Really?” Pirian, in her too-big floppy sunhat, bounced over from the other side of the boat to peer at the radar. The vibrant orange blossoms on her shoulder caught the sun in just the right way to be set ablaze. Kaleid glanced over at Mira, covering his eyes from the sun, determined not to wear sunglasses.
Mira was smiling. Seeing her friends free, open, and bubbly made her heart feel full. But she couldn’t help it as another tear fell.
She felt Kaleid rest against the railing next to her. He let them sit in quiet for a moment, then nudged his elbow against Mira’s.
“Think we’ll find them here?”
Mira chuckled. “It’d be too easy if we found them on the first go, wouldn’t it? I mean, we’re working off practically nothing.”
Kaleid laughed too, a nice low rumble, shaking his head. “You’re right, you’re right. Hey.” He nudged her again, his eyes of swimming rainbows searching hers. “You doing ok?”
Mira sighed deeply, heaving something cold and brittle out from her soul, something left over from their old world that was already beginning to fester in only the first few weeks of departure. “I don’t know, I just… sometimes I just miss it. And I feel like I shouldn’t.”
Kaleid put a knowing, warm hand on her back, letting her lean into him. “I think… Mira, I think we all feel that. In different ways, you know? I mean, it was our childhood.”
“I don’t know what to do with myself.”
“Do what you do best.” He gave her a squeeze that managed to be both soft and fiercely, lovingly tight. “Write about it.”
---
May 18. Off the coast of Jewleside
Trying something new today. A little writing exercise, to get the thoughts out of my head.
Fluff is a speck of a town situated snugly next to a deep blue lake. For most of the year, it is blanketed in layers upon layers of shimmering white snow wrapping the town in cold comfort. It is soft to the touch, and freezes your fingers in a nice, tingling kind of way. The children love the snow, setting out to build igloos and snowball ravaged battlefields, running and twirling and falling in heaps on the ground.
As the children romp around in the plush, white world, snow sprites shyly peek their crystal heads from a tree branch, a bush, the old wooden playset in the park, and approach the children with guarded curiosity. They’re frosty creatures, the snow sprites of Fluff, and they tend to spook easily, running away to their hidden safe havens when adults get too close. But the children, the sprites seem drawn to them. Maybe it’s the warmth of their smiles, the ease at which laughter floats from their tiny bodies, or the weightlessness in how they jump over snowy barricades and dive behind cover. Whatever the reason may be, the snow sprites always drift towards playing children, and after a couple minutes of observing, they break from their cluster and choose a little child’s neon jacket to cling to and gleefully yell as they join the battle, their sing-song voices lighting up the frigid air.
---
“MiMi, c’mon, c’mon!” Cypress tugged insistently on Mira’s arm as she laid, eyes closed, in the snow. Half hidden behind a woolen scarf, their round, frosty red face was pleading. “We’re going to have a snowball fight!”
“Shhhhhh. I’m waiting for a sprite. See, they’re in that tree. Here, lie down with me.”
“Wha? They always come out when we’re playing, that’s the best way to get a sprite!”
“Nuh-uh. I think the quiet ones are better. And they don’t get to play as much cause they’re too shy to ask. Just lie down.”
Cypress’ face was scrunched in skepticism, but they laid down next to Mira, letting the snow hold them softly. After a couple minutes of fighting the fidgets and nearly losing, one, then two, tiny, crystal white critters slowly drifted down from the tree branches. Cypress almost burst into a giggle fit when it landed on their nose, but Mira grasped their arm as a warning. The snow sprite danced its way across their face, then found its place in the nook between neck and loud green-jacketed shoulder. Mira’s sprite settled in the rosy puff of her hat. Cypress looked at their sprite, then over to Mira, grinning from ear to ear.
“Woooow”
---
~ “Maybe your adults are right, and they do end up in the ocean. But, oh no, there are no caves. See, all bodies of water are bottomless, not just our lake. And if they will it, the creatures can flit from place to place, blinking in and out of existence.” ~
---
May 27. Jewleside cottage
Play can’t last forever, not even in Fluff. Eventually, the children and sprites tire. Then, ignoring the warnings of their parents, they venture out to the middle of the frozen lake. They lay down, back to the ice, arms and legs splayed as far apart as possible. The cool numbness sinks into their body first, then they feel the rumbles of the giant lake creatures bellowing below the surface. Dark shadows slowly float under the ice, the size of airplanes and cruise ships. No one knows how deep the lake really goes, or how it holds creatures of such astounding size, or where they go when the ice melts and they’re suddenly silent. A witch on the outskirts of town likes to say the lake is bottomless, and the creatures disappear into that nothing realm. Adults say they migrate through a hidden, gigantic system of watery caves to the ocean. But, in the winter, everybody knows they rule the lake, and the children worship them as gentle giants.
---
~ “Or maybe, the creatures amble silently through the dark to a forest, one bigger than you can imagine. Only such a forest could house creatures of such magnificent size. ~
---
Trees taller than the sky loomed over the four friends, giant roots sprawling out of the ground, housing families of woodland fairies or gnomes or scritters in their entangled mass. Oddly, Mira, instead of feeling intimidated, felt comforted, protected under the watchful eyes of the trees. Pirian was atop a root, scanning the endless world of sage, dark, olive green through binoculars, one hand resting on a mighty trunk. Kaleid kept glancing up from a yellowed map, until finally, with a frustrated huff, rolled it up and returned it to his backpack. Cypress walked, hand-in-hand with Mira, rough, woody palm against soft skin. They had a relaxed grin on their face, but there were also the tell-tale signs of uncertainty weaving its way in.
“Remind me again why we’re looking for lake creatures in a forest?”
Mira playfully pushed them. “Because we know literally nothing about them and where they go.”
“Yeah, but we’re working off stories, and most of the stories have something to do with water because they’re lake creatures.” They punctuated the last words with tickling jabs to Mira’s side, who fended them off with a giggle.
“Not all of them, remember? Besides, the ocean spots we visited were a bust, so why not come here?” Pirian leaped from the root, binoculars swinging around her neck, matte black brushing against sunset orange. “I haven’t heard of a lake like ours anywhere else, so if you have, speak up now, or forever hold your peace.”
Kaleid piped up as he finished zipping up his pack. “And we better hope that they live somewhere we can actually get to.”
Cypress deflated a little against Mira. “Yeah, yeah, I know.” Pirian walked past on her tiptoes to boop them on the nose.
“Hey, what better place to look for giant ass creatures than in a giant ass forest?”
---
June 20. Evertree
When summer finally rolls in, the ground soaks up all the snow and a lush sea of emerald springs forth. The snow sprites, reaching the end of their lives, turn into dandelion puffs to be scattered by a child’s wish. Even without the snow, everything in Fluff is silky and tender and inviting to lay down on and get lost in an endless slumber. Firefoxes light up the warm nights, their glowing tails whisking through the sky, more brilliant than the stars. Children build forts in the park out of broken tent poles and tattered bed sheets to stay up all night watching the firefoxes, dreaming that one day they too will fly away into the sky.
---
Packed tightly together and wrapped in lavender blankets, four small friends laid together under midnight blue bed sheets. Out of the flap, they watched brilliant flames of ruby, sapphire, and jade dance in the sky. They were quiet. For all their chattering energy, they were entranced by the firefoxes and silent, just like they were every summer.
Mira’s arms were bare. Kaleid had taken off his sunglasses. Cypress had unbuttoned their button-up and removed their scarf. Pirian wore a tank top.
Alone with the firefoxes, they felt like they were flying.
But they stayed out too late this time. Their parents came looking for them. Pirian was whisked away by her mom back to her grey little house. A padded jacket was shoved into her hands in the car.
“Put this on and keep it on. You know better.”
---
~ “They cry for us, those gentle creatures. They shed a river of tears in the valley, leaving behind their damp sorrows for those too big for this world as they climb the tallest mountain, waiting until winter comes again.” ~
---
July 31. Valley of Tears
It doesn’t happen often, but children in Fluff can stay wild, unique, beautiful, they can fly –
In Fluff, childish fantasies are foolish. The wild, unique, beautiful children all end up in the same place, molded into identical, colorless people that fade away into the grey of life. They become the adults that the snow sprites fear, all lifeless and drained of rainbow, with ashen clothes and lifeless slate skin. If they don’t shed their beauty before 18, they walk through the flames of pewter to burn away all that gives them life. No one ever leaves Fluff, no one except those that are pushed out because they are too spiky, too kaleidoscope, too mantis shrimp, too bird of paradise.
---
Even with his eyes hidden behind shades, it was obvious Kaleid was nervous. His fingers tapped nonsense rhythms onto his legs, and his lips were stretched into a tight line on his face. He watched as his parents shuffled around his big sister with grave faces as they fixed her ceremonial gown.
It would be the only time they would willingly let her wear a dress that almost lovingly framed the moss and vines sprawling from her shoulders down her back. They would be gone soon anyway.
The car ride was tense and silent. Kaleid retreated from his family as soon as they arrived, running to meet his friends huddled together, shivering in the dark as their parents discussed the ritual.
“I kind of hoped you guys wouldn’t come.”
Pirian glanced over at her mother. “I didn’t want to, honestly. But my parents said it’d be… a good learning experience for me.” Mira and Cypress nodded, too scared to voice their similar experience with words.
The small crowd quieted, and gathered in a clump as Kaleid’s parents lit the flames. They erupted upwards, a column of swirling storms. Looking through them, Kaleid caught a glimpse of the colorless world that awaited on the other side. He didn’t hear the words his parents spoke to send his sister through; he just watched as she stepped inside the ravenous black and white fire, her head tilted up in a scream until all the moss was burned away and she passed through the other side.
At that moment, Mira, Pirian, Cypress, and Kaleid locked eyes, and silently swore they would never walk through those flames.
---
The fire crackled, sparks fizzling in the wet mist of the valley. The four sat comfortably in a circle, trading warm conversation until it slowly guided them back to Fluff. They knew it wasn’t possible to live the rest of their lives flitting around the topic like butterflies, but it lulled them into a heavy silence, until, after many round minutes, Mira spoke.
“Do you… do you ever think about the people who can’t leave like we did?”
“Well… yeah, of course.” Kaleid nodded, shifting on his blanket. “There’s not really a lot of choices if you stay and The Burning doesn’t work.”
“I think they’re a lot stronger than us. For staying, I mean.” Pirian brought her knees to her chest, hugging them tightly.
Cypress sat up from laying languidly on their back and nodded. “Yeah, we’re super lucky to be out here just wandering around, not sure where we’re going because we can make anywhere our home now. But they’re forced to make it work, living at the edges of town and never being safe from the stares.”
The silence returned and laid its mountainous weight atop them as they all imagined the people of Fluff who stood out against the grey masses, hurriedly walking past on sidewalks or store aisles, but always stopping to wave and give a sad smile to the children in the park. The ones who cultivated the land but never received recognition, the ones who turned to silently making art for those who still had wonder left in their lives, the ones who wove stories in magical wooden huts -
Kaleid’s prismatic eyes flashed in the fire with memory. “You remember Eugenia?” Everyone let smiles overtake their serious faces in place of an answer. “We’d sneak off to her house just outside town, to listen to her stories. She’d always say –”
“Gather round, gather round.” Eugenia swept her rigid, shaky, sun-scaled hand in a circle around her. Obediently, they sat on her rug of stories, backs straight and eyes wide in anticipation.
“Let’s see. Oh, I know, you love this one. A real mystery.” She clapped her hands together and leaned forward, a sparkle still alighting in her misty eyes.
“Wait!” Kaleid bounced on the ground. “Are you going to tell us about the lake creatures? Cause you always tell us about them and I want to hear something else.”
Eugenia crossed her arms pockmarked with scars, years of painful memories locked within them. See, the fire was not powerful enough to burn away all her color; it was only able to hungrily peel a number of scales from her arm. So, she drifted to her quiet life in the woods at the very edge of Fluff, selling teas and remedies and sending them off in neatly packed parcels so the adults would never have to lay their eyes on her to receive the goods they desired. It was a lonely life.
But, when the children came, eager to hear her tales, mischief still managed to creep onto her face.
“Well, I was going to tell you the truth about them this time, but I guess if you don’t want to hear it –” she was cut off by a choir of squeals.
“That’s what I thought.” She leaned back in her chair, a real, genuine smile blooming on her lips.
“I’ve told you about the glittering ocean and the giant forest and the tallest mountain, but the truth is, they could be anywhere. I only saw them leave. Yes, I saw it with my own eyes. I think… they let me see it….” She quieted, staring out the window at something, or maybe somewhere, far, far away.
~ “Their flight into the sky.” ~
---
They heard them first. That low, rumbling bellow that vibrates through the bones. At the mouth of a gigantic cavern atop Startouch Peak, staring into the darkness ahead of them, a creature of unfathomable size slowly formed from shadow. Legs as thick as Evertree trunks. A layer of translucent grey skin with more colors than there were names for flashing underneath it. It bent its pointed head down to Mira’s level, and when she met those round, onyx gemstone eyes, she felt a waterfall rush of understanding crash over her. She knew why it was here.
“It wants us to get on.”
Its great, inviting wing of ice tilted to the ground. The four, clasping hands tightly, heeded the call.
A rush of air smacked their faces as the creature launched from the cave’s maw. For one dizzying moment, gravity held its breath. Then, they were above the clouds, melting into a world of endless blue.
---
August 11. Our new home, Somewhere Far Away
There is nothing beautiful about Fluff, it is an ugly, inhabitable, awful, hateful place where everything withers away and nothing –
Fluff is a beautiful place. But that beauty is a deceptive curtain hiding a town full of dull adults who value conformity above all else.
The ones of us who don’t conform?
We are like the lake creatures, disappearing from Fluff and leaving no trace we were ever there.