Young Writers Society

By late evening Carris needed to get up and move. She had fallen asleep after Laura’s departure and never heard Alec come or apparently go because he was nowhere to be found. The fire had died down and a chill hung in the air. By the skylight Carris could see that it was well past sunset. While she still felt sleep-deprived and achy, she noticed that it was considerably easier to sit up on the side of the bed than it had been earlier that day. She stood, using the wooden bedpost to balance herself, unsure of how steady she would be on her feet. Thankfully she realized that other than a slight head-rush at first standing her head felt fine, it not groggy.

She wiped her eyes and worked her way to the dying embers of the fire and grabbed some kindling stacked beside the door. She tossed it on and was relieved to find it catch fire without having to coddle it. Alec had a good amount of timber ready for burning, dried and stacked along the wall to the left of the door, a luxury that Carris was not able to afford back at Potter’s Creek between doing her laundry and making dinner and whatnot.

She shivered in the still-cool air and took a quick survey of the cabin. Her clothes must be air-drying outside, but she noticed her boots were tucked against the bedpost. A quick check of the inside found them dry. Carris tugged them on with a grunt, something she found herself doing with just about every action.

“Got to just push through. Who knows what’s happened to Gwyn with Malcolm and Devlin,” she said with a wrinkled nose. She didn’t like the idea of por Gwyn being stuck with them.

Carris felt a heavy weight in her side. Doubt they have an outhouse here. Carris pulled open the cabin door and was greeted with a frigid gust of wind. She buried her head in her neck and stepped out, slamming the door shut. The view that greeted her was surprisingly pretty. A cobblestone road wiggled from left to right with a fence the only barrier between the road and a steep bank into the dark growling waters of the river. A light post to Carris’ right glowed a warm orange, the lamp guarded by a glass enclosure. The light illuminated enough to show Carris a small dock farther down the road, and a clump of trees along the side of cabin. To Carris’s joy she spotted a small wooden structure tucked a few feet back.

Carris spotted her clothes draped over the fence. tied with some string to keep them from blowing away. Carris looked both ways down the abandoned street and cross, hobbling over. She may feel better, but her joints still felt like blocks of ice. She gathered her garments in a bundle, but not before throwing on the coat acquired fro m the Sadorian.

What a week it had been. Going from the attack to stealing the coat to being thrust in the river. Carris shook her head.

“What a mess!” she sighed.

“What is?” a voice from become inquired.

Carris nearly jumped the fence in fright. She put a hand to her chest as she turned. From the glow of the light post she recognized Laura, wrapped in a furry coat and a scarf tucking her hair in and revealing only her eyes. But that voice. It was just too authoritarian. Like a teacher. Or parent.

Carris took a deep breath to settle her heartbeat. “Nothing.”

Laura huffed. “Come on girl, I’m not a fool. You’re hiding something.” She spread her hands wide. “I just want to help if I can.”

“Then you can hold my stuff while I relieve my bladder,” Carris said with a glare as she jammed her clothes into Laura’s arms and traipsed to the outhouse.

It was pitch-black save for two slivers of light sneaking in via a pair of cracks in the wall. Carris rolled her eyes.

“Cozy.”

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Laura was waiting inside the cabin when Carris entered. She noted that her clothes were laying on her now-made bed, and the fire was now back to its crackling self. Laura looked a bit heated as well with cheeks that were rosy, perhaps not because of the fire so much as Carris’s outburst. She stood over the fire and gave Carris a raised eyebrow as she entered. Carris noted parchment in Laura’s hand. Laura opened her mouth as if to say something.

“What’s the paper?” Carris asked. Anything to change the subject from her destination.

Laura paused and looked back at the picture. “It’s a painting. A portrait actually.”

Carris stepped over, sticking a hand out. “Mind if I look?”

“Sure.” Laura surrendered the photo to Carris who knelt by the fire to get a brightened look at the portrait. It was a portrait of a family. A younger man, although his hair was disheveled mess of brown and graying hairs stood with a giant smile beside a younger woman, perhaps thirty-five, with blond hair spilling down to her waist in two thick braids. There was a girl on a stool in front of them. She couldn’t have been more than five years old. She had that same thick blond hair as the woman, presumably her mother. They looked happy. A happy family. A complete family.

“Alec’s kin?” Carris guessed, returning the portrait to Laura and pulling a nearby chair next to the fire.

Laura nodded. She returned the portrait to the counter near the cabinet on the opposite side of the cabin. She pulled two glasses from a cabinet and lugged a bucket to the fire. She procured a ladle that had slipped into it and portioned a cup of water for both herself and Carris.

“Alec was a younger man back then. More adventurous. That’s what Mable loved about him. He was never complacent with what he was doing. He was already ready to try something new.”

Carris looked around at the cottage. “Looks like he settled down.”

“When he met Mable that built this cottage, but Alec never stopped exploring. He was a great hunter, an alchemist, even tried his hand as a cook.” Laura looked into the fire with eyes that looked as if they were somewhere else.

Carris took a swig of water, realized how thirsty she was, and took another. “Was? What happened? Did Mable die?”

Laura shook her head. “No. She still lives right here in the village.” Laura jammed a thumb backwards. “South side near the bakery.”

Carris scrunched her forehead. “I’m confused. Alec said it had been years since he had a lady around. He even mentioned Mable, like she was gone.”

“Not gone. Lost. Alec is a great man, inventive, creative, passionate. But those great qualities don’t always make a great husband. He became engrossed in his work. Spent so much time in his alchemist shed. Their daughter, Marly, became sick. No one knew how to cure it.”

“And Alec thought he could make a cure?” Carris presumed.

“Very astute. Mable felt as if he cared more about finding a non-existent cure than spending the remaining time they had as a family. Alec became a very different man. Intense, angry, violent even. He slept little, ate less.”

“Did Marly die?”

“No!” Laura smiled, and yet despite joy in the smile her eyes told a tale of sadness. They didn’t sparkle. They clouded. “Alec found a cure. But it was too late. Mable had left him, taken Marly across town to live with her mother. Told alec to never come again. Nothing was ever proved, and Mable was too loyal to betray him, but many believed that Alec had...” Laura’s voiced trailed off and she looked away.

Carris nodded, knowingly. “Grief can change people. Believe me, I know.” Carris blocked the memories of her younger life that threatened to surface. “So if Marly, Alec, and Mable are all alive in town, what happened?”

“Marly has some side effects from being sick for an extended period of time, but she’s full of life and creativity just like her father. She still lives with her mother and grandmother. And Alec lives here, alone. But the village don’t care for him much.”

“Why’s that?”

Laura shrugged. “People loved Mable. She had lived here her whole life. Alec hurt her deeply and that offended people. Not to mention how Alec changed. Yelled at kids, became a villain in the yes of the villagers. And in time he became the grumpy old man that everyone said he was.”

“But you care for him?”

Laura stood and crossed the room to grab more wood for the fire. “Yes. Alec is a good man. He was dealt an impossible situation and tried his best to provide for his family. Sometimes he didn’t make the right choice, but Alec is a good man.”

Carris cocked her head to one side. “But he abused his wife, and became a mad old man. How can you defend that?” She scoffed.

“Watch your tongue, girl!” Laura jabbed a finger at Carris. “Alec is a good man who made mistakes. You can’t determine the character of a man by one stage in his life. Through it all his goal was to save his daughter from what everyone else said was certain death. It’s probably the only reason your alive,” she said, thrusting the log into the fire with a shower of sparks that caused Carris to lean back in her chair and nearly fall out of it.

“Excuse me?” she said, feeling color rush to her cheeks. “I’m sorry, but ruining one’s life to save someone else’s doesn’t sound heroic to me. Sounds selfish and cruel. And what do you mean it’s the reason I’m alive?”

Larua pointed to the portrait on the counter. “Did you not see the resemblance? you look just like her. Like Marly! The person who cared for more than anyone else. So you can judge the man you don’t even know or actions he may have done in the past, but you better be a grateful wench that he pulled your ungrateful self out of the water.”

Carris sat in silence, caught off guard by the intensity of Laura who was standing over her at this point, looking down with a creased forehead and squinted eyes.

“I just hope that one day you realize that forgiveness gets you a lot farther than hatred. Alec made mistakes and people cast him aside. How did that make them better, huh? If you call someone a monster long enough, that’s just what they’ll become. If you take nothing else away from here, take this: what makes you deserve a second chance anymore than a man who risked everything to give second chance to someone else?”

“Second chances belong to people who deserve them.” Carris shot back, folding her arms. Why did she care so much about this? “Some people have just done too much to be given another chance.”

The past is the past; we’ve all made mistakes, but it don’t mean we have to be defined by it! I only hope that the people in your life give you more chances than the people in Alec’s life gave him.”

With that Laura stormed out of the cabin, slamming the door behind. Carris huffed. She’d had enough of this place. She was leaving in the morning period. She didn’t have time for ridiculous parental speeches.