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The Enchanted Tin pot
A Short Story - Inspired by Young Woman Bent Over the River A painting by the artist MendyZ
Kate Woodley looked at the enchanted tin pot in her hands and felt stressed. This was unusual for her. She generally had no qualms, and was calm in her isolated environment. She calmed, then tensed again. Her soft body locking up scared her. Kate whirled around searching for the source. she noticed the cracked window, her potbellied stove, her drying hosiery, and the meager supplies stacked neatly in a corner of her wooden home. A home tucked beneath the mountains shadow.
She sat on the rolled up mat that served as her bed, and felt the bamboo mat reeds beneath her thin gauzy dress. she sighed as the feeling dissipated mildly from her bones. She reached for the simple end table, which only held a candle perched on a volcano of melted wax, and a tin pot. Clinked the spoon as it scraped the bottom and used her whole fist to grip the spoon and bring the now cold soup to her lips.
Where had the time gone, she had just finished heating up the can of soup. She mused a little on that, and then let it slip gently from her mind. This was how she survived the past few years. Just forgetting. Or at least working hard at forgetting. Her misgivings, her sweetness, her past lives, all of them.
She walked over to the cracked window and reflected on her damp surroundings. She had always loved the depths of the creepy Santa Cruz Mountains with its fair, weathered and fat trees. It was a place that encouraged her tendency to feel less stressed. But, she knew she was not safe. She never would be.
Then she saw something in the distance, or rather someone. It was the figure of Ashley Teller. Ashley was an admirable but creepy woman with thick collarbones and sweet skin. She marched onward piercing Kate's memories until they shattered and fled on their own accord.
Kate gulped. She glanced at her own reflection. She was a stable, now instantly cowardly, with frumpy collarbone and shaky sternum as her ragged breath began to quicken. Her ancient friends saw her as a depressed, dripping deity. Once, she had even spent a generation helping a frail old lady recover from a flying accident. But now all she could do was arch her back as she dropped to the ground in a convulsion. Not even a stable, strong person was prepared for what Ashley had in store today.
The clouds danced like throwing demons, as the Santa Cruz Fire ripped through the serene mountains, making Kate blubber and bounce. She saw stars as she hit her head on the tin pot pouring forth a spray of dark red blood across the cracked window pane.
As Kate crawled outside over the weathered treads and Ashley came closer, she could see the heavy glint in her eye. She could see the smoke outline her body, and felt the energy drain from her body.
"I am here because I want peace," Ashley bellowed, in a deranged mocking tone. She slammed her fist against Kate's chest, with such force that it rattled her senses. "I frigging hate you, Kate Woodley."
Kate looked back, even more shocked and still fingering the enchanted tin pot. "Ashley, your evilness is draining me," she replied. "We used to have something together". "Something special", she pleaded.
They looked at each other with concerned feelings, like two screeching, selfish spirits loving at a very scheming accident, which had soft bells music playing in the background and two gentle spirits crying to the beat.
Kate studied Ashley's thick collarbone and sweet skin. Eventually, she took a deep breath. "I'm sorry, but I can't give you peace," she explained, in pitying tones. She rubbed the tin pot. A screeching sound poured forth from her body and enraged the roiling air around the two of them. A crack splintered the air, and then the gully was silent.
Ashley looked sleepy, her body raw like a wet washing station. "Anybody up there", Kate whispered in mocking joy.
Kate could actually hear Ashley's body shatter into pieces. Then the admirable coward hurried away into the distance to seek wash her battered dripping skull, and off into another gully to hide from enemies of centuries past.
Not even a drink of hot soup would calm Kate's nerves tonight.
THE END
You can get the print that this short story was Inspired by From here. Young Woman Bent Over the River by the artist MendyZ. You can even get this painting on a phone case, makeup bag, or backup battery!
