Within bright green hills, with houses stationed on them as sure as there are words on this page, lay a clear, tranquil lake. The sun shined on it just so, giving it an almost unearthly glow. The serenity of the lake was so dense, that many stressed people who stared into it's waters soon found themselves dizzy or merely dazed. The water promised things that no human could, and the odd part was that nobody even knew what they were, only that the promises existed.
Tons of people had stopped, maybe for a mere moment or so, and stared at the lilypad on which two drops of water lay. But after a short stare, they'd move on. They'd always know there was something a little off about those two droplets, but who honestly would stand around and pursue a fleeting thought about some water on a leaf?
I would.
It wasn't hard to find, the story of the two droplets on the lilypad. They entire story was captured in the droplets, captivating me, calling me to come to a mere day or so before, when it had all taken place. At first I sunk into the water droplet, mentally at least, if not physically, and I felt what it would. I could feel the sun beating down on me, grabbing at me as if to suck me up into the clouds were I would eventually rain down again. I could feel the serenity of the lake engulf me so that my vision nearly blurred, could feel me slowly fading away, so that I was no longer myself, but apart of the story, or so it seemed . . .
I could feel the night it happened. As my blurriness faded, I saw the dark sky, the moon making a spotlight on the quivering water, as dark as ink. I could hear a few frogs croaking, see the cat tails bending down as if they wished to dive in the water, but they were kept firmly rooted in the ground. I could feel the prick of the cold air at my skin, smell a curious smell that made me feel warm. I felt like I was there, in the scene.
Barely noticeable to someone who wasn't waiting for something exciting to happen, a small dragonfly flew with difficulty. Slowly, and painfully, it landed on one of the cat tails. Under the weight of the small creature, the entire plant bent down until it's tip touched the water, making the icy lake ripple. It was then that I realized it wasn't just a dragonfly.
Upon her back sat a tiny person. The first thing I noticed about her was her eyes. They were astonishingly green, and were so beautiful that it was almost hard for one not to get lost in them. Her gorgeous orange hair waved around her triangular face, and was pushed out of her eyes by a fragment of a vine.
Her skin was so pale that she seemed to glow--or was she glowing for another reason entirely? I couldn't be quite sure, for I didn't know who, or really what, she was.
As she slowly shifted her weight off the dragonfly's body, I noticed there was a second person. She had long, golden, straight hair that she probably could have easily sat on. She looked much like the woman holding her with care, and I realized they probably were mother and daughter.
There was something different about her. Was it the hair, or the way it shaped her face? Was it how she wore a white lily dress and her mother a pink one? I couldn't identify exactly what was it, and didn't until I saw their reflection on the lake--or rather, her mother's reflection.
She wasn't glowing.
Her mother walked towards the edge of the cat's tail and slowly stepped onto the lilypad. The entire thing wavered dangerously until she gave it her complete trust and put her other foot on, at which point it stilled.
The mother walked across the lilypad and laid her daughter down in the moonlight's glow, next to the pink lily. She sat down and stared at her pale, impassive face.
"You're so young." The words shocked me deeply. It sounded like the croak of a cricket, caught in a person's throat as naturally as if it were their own. I think it was then I realized she wasn't speaking in my language, and it surprised me how I knew what she was saying.
"You have so much to learn," she continued. "So much to do. You're the last one with magical powers. You're the last hope." She paused, biting her slim lip with a perfectly white tooth to keep it from quivering. "Hope," she repeated. "Hope."
I wasn't sure if 'hope' was her name, or merely what she had and needed to give others. The entire conversation and mystique of this all filled me, though, so I stayed there, listening intently as if my life depended on it, even though something was calling me back to reality.
It was about then that the dragonfly slowly flew from her position on the cat's tail to touch the water and drink. As her slender feet touched the water, it made a small sound: Pitter. It meant nothing to the untrained ear, but everything to a trained one.
The sound of something slipping into the water and then, the moment of silence. Not a frog croaked, not a leaf rustled. It was always silent for the moment before devastation happened.
A huge frog rose out of the water and right behind the dragonfly. Shocked, it skittered up into the air, forgetting it's master and her daughter behind.
The frog threw his tongue up at the sky were the dragonfly was disappearing, but soon she was engulfed safely in the dark night. Anger brewing inside of him, he turned to the two small people sitting on the lilypad and licked his lips.
The woman screamed, but it sounded more like a mere cricket. The frog put a large, webbed foot on the lilypad. The entire side dipped into the water, and the woman grabbed on to the lilypad to avoid sliding off. The fat, ugly creature hoisted it's weight onto the floating leaf. It shook back and forth violently for a few moments, and the woman fought to hold herself and her daughter on.
The creature licked it's lips again, giving it's maliciously croak. "Please!" the woman screamed. "I'm not your enemy! Let me go!"
But all the frog heard was, Cricket, cricket, cricket. And that sounded like food.
Tears poured into the woman's eyes at the desperation of this situation. She held on to her daughter close as the tears fell out of her eyes and onto her flawless face. Her whole body shook as the creature opened it's mouth, and stuck it's big, pink tongue out. It was quick and skilled, yet somehow the woman was still able to dodge it.
It looked like the frog was frowning as he tried again. This time his tongue stuck right near the woman's feet. He quickly retracted it and tried once more, this time aiming at her side.
He hooked her in with his long, slimy pink tongue and pulled it back towards his mouth. I knew it was happening much too fast for the woman, but for me, it seemed to be going in slow motion. As she flew through the air, towards the ugly beast's open mouth, she clawed desperately at the air, as if she could somehow reach her daughter, laying abandoned on the pad. She opened her mouth to scream, no doubt, but not a sound came out.
Her face suddenly lit up as she got an idea. She straightened her body so that when she reached the frog's mouth, she was too tall to get in. Furious, the frog tried to close his mouth and suck her in, but she was too strong for him.
She closed her eyes and took a few deep breaths. I could see from her face that she was trying to achieve being completely calm, and even though she was in a serene lake, how could one calm down when their life, and their daughter's life, hinged on the mere fact that she kept the beast's mouth open?
As she kept the concentrated look on her face, she nodded slowly. The lake obeyed, and the waters slowly moved back and forth, shaking the lilypad. The toad stopped his attempts to swallow her, shocked at what she was doing.
The woman nodded her head up and held it there for a long time. When nothing happened, she tried again, and then slowly, a stream of water pulled out of the lake and carefully over to her. She nodded it over to her side with the toad's tongue still stick to it. Once the water was resting on it, she bit her tongue pointedly, and it froze.
She slowly, and cautiously, took one of her hands and rested it on the frozen frog's tongue. He didn't notice, so she broke the ice, freeing her from the frog. Immediately she jumped out of his mouth and ran across the lilypad.
The frog shook his head angrily, trying to break the ice inside his mouth. The woman took her hands to her side, then pulled them above her head. Threads of water flowed out of the lake from both side, and when she lowered her hands it followed her, eventually making a small globe of water inside her two hands. She looked at him, her eyes narrowed as she prepared herself for the battle.
The green beast gave her a long, blank look. He had learned the hard way: she was not a cricket.
The woman waited for a long time for the frog to charge, but when he didn't, she figured she had the right of way. In one quick movement, she lifted her hand up, closed her fist, and punched it back out at the frog.
The water followed her command. It lifted from the rest of the water, froze, and then shot out at him.
The ice ball went and smacked him across the face. He slid back into the river, defeated and grumbling, noting how he liked food that didn't fight with him. The woman bent back over her daughter, pretending nothing had happened.
"This world is so dangerous," she continued her speech. "We need someone like you now. All of us."
She lowered her eyes. Something told me she knew what she had to do. Tears fell out of her eyes once again as she sat there, staring into her daughter's face.
She looked down at the globe of water in her hand. It shined and sparkled in her glow. Taking a deep breath, she closed her eyes and focused all her energy on it. Quite suddenly, her glow began to disappear throughout her body. As it disappeared on her body, her water globe got brighter. Finally she was dark, like her daughter. She sat her daughter up with one hand. The child's mouth fell open, and she pushed the globe of glowing water in.
She waited for a few moments, watching her face. Finally, the girl began to glow. It started out as a small nettle sized glow from deep within her heart, and then it spread to her entire body.
The woman smiled and pulled her daughter's face to hers, tears of joy running off her face and falling onto the lilypad, creating a visible droplet. She nearly jumped at the heat of her child's fair face. She was in a fever, she knew, but it mattered not. She was still alive.
It was then that the woman had to pay the price for her sacrifice. She put a hand to her head an unexplainable wave of dizziness washed over her, telling her that the end of her time was near. She didn't know how or when it happened, but she fell heavy and hard, like a sack of potatoes, on the lilypad. And she was gone.
The world was in fast motion, skipping to the next scene, when the morning sunlight broke. The daughter woke up, moaning and groaning in her fevered state, and sat up. She turned for her mother, and was terrified (as well as I) to find that she was not there.
I hadn't seen the mother disappear. Along with the daughter, I looked for her frantically, and my heart started beating quicker. Where in the world had she gone?
"M... Mom?" She looked around. In her state, she believed that she was insane. Believing you were insane, though, made it no better. Tears fell out of her eyes quickly as panic set in.
"Mom? MOM?" She shook like a leaf, her tears falling out of her crystal clear blue eyes and hitting the leaf with an audible, Thump.
"Mother? Hello?"
It was about then that I got a strange buzzing in my ear. The scene in front of me slowly began to fade, and I fought to stay in it. It angered me that I was leaving now--I wanted to see what happened to the girl, where the mother was, and if the girl got home safely or didn't survive past the lake, even after the devastating sacrifice her mother had made...
The scene disappeared into darkness, and then the real world fell around me. I stood there, right where I had before I had disappeared into the story. I stared at the droplets as if they would take me in again, but they refused, like closed doors.
"Aushy!" my little sister's voice chimed, making me jump. I turned to see her, with her brown eyes and bushy brown hair, trotting over to me.
I was quite angry I had been cut off from the story, so I snapped, "What?"
She looked at me with big, sad eyes. "I've been calling you for ten minutes. What were you doing?"
I didn't say anything for a moment, while I gave the droplets a long, hard look. Finally, I took a deep breath and sighed. "Daydreaming. I know, it sounds stupid, and silly, but sometimes, it may be one of the most important things you've ever done, for it can tell you a story that no books have."
My sister gave me a long, blank look. Eventually she said, "Let's go inside, okay?"
I nodded and followed her inside, giving one last glance at the two droplets sitting on the lilypad.
