Daydream

A collection of short stories by the Onyx
Worked on randomly

## 1 - the lake

Completed 6/11/2023 sitting on a hotel bed eating pizza and Skittles and drinking cranberry grape juice house hunting hydra plant cowboy backyard woohoo

the road is cold and empty and blank and dark and gray like storm clouds and hopeless skies and hard plastic that stretches on and on and on and on and on

but at least we have the lake the lake with clumps of sky and weedy green rolling like ice floes or separated paint and the blinding white on every wave crest like the sun is crying itself into the water like it evaporated into clouds which rained pure burning light

and it all hurts but I am there I will be there I will sit by the window and sit and watch and let my eyes burn and let the trees falling past my window fade into green specks on a hill which are green then gray as they fade behind clouds and then nothing and then nothing

and it hurts but I will sit here and wait and wait and it hurts but I will sit here and wait and wait and it hurts but I will sit here and wait and wait and I will sit here as my eyes melt away like the sun.

the trees are scaly and the pine needles are green like the green of spearmints and they poke towards me as daggers do and it hurts but I will sit here and wait and wait and I will watch the sun crawl cowardly towards the horizon and dive under the ground as the moon rises and caresses the canopies with pearlescent light and shade the warm ground with cold like the road like the lake like the dying sky.

the sky is dying and turning blue and red and orange and pink and it will die into the darkness of space and stars and nothing

and nothing and nothing and it hurts but I will sit here and wait and wait

but I will sit here and wait and wait wait and wait and here sit will I but hurts it and

and the lake is gone and the road is gone and it hurts but I will sit here and wait and wait

"The cup, please?"

the cup? what cup?

"could you please hand me the cup?"

I hand her the cup.

She looks at me. She laughs a little bit. "You aren't looking good."

why would I You stole the lake the grass the road the sky the sun the moon the stars the car the window the waves the hills the clouds you stole me you stole my bed and my house and my lawn and my friends and my mother and my sister and my brother and my snake and my lamp and my desk and my letters and my books and my life and you stole me

"I asked you a question, Jasmine." She looks at me. She pokes at me. "Can you hear me or not?"

She looks at me. She pokes at me.

"I want the lake."

She looks at me. She looks at me for a while.

Jasmine laughs. She points at the cup, still looking at me wordlessly saying 'you have got to be kidding me'. With words she says "You have got to be kidding me! You're absolutely messed up. This is a c-u-p. Not a lake. Your flashlight doesn't make it a lake."

Jasmine dumps out the lake as she laughs. She laughs more.

The lake is gone.

"Your parents are going to pick up a brand new girl and they won't even know it!" Jasmine cackles. "And where will you be?"

You stole the lake the grass the road the sky the sun the moon the stars the car the window the waves the hills the clouds you stole me you stole my bed and my house and my lawn and my friends and my mother and my sister and my brother and my snake and my lamp and my desk and my letters and my books and my life and you stole me

a car pulls up in the dark in the night the pine trees with their gleeful daggers and the glorious night and the piercing orbs of shining light that gleam as spotlights would on a beautiful stage the grass is singing in the breeze and the car pulls up and they come out and they are happy and she is happy and he is happy and it is delighted

"How was camp?" she asks happily and he is happy and Jasmine is delighted.

She smiles. she hides me in the darkness. I can see the gleam of her red eyes. I can see the little stain on the back of her skirt.

"The lake was wonderful." Jasmine says.

They get in the car and they leave.

I stagger to my feet

I pick up

the cup and

go to the faucet and

fill it

up and

I lift

my flashlight with stains and stains on me

and it hold it to the

cup as I

sit by t

he hay a

nd I loo

k at i

t and I se

e the lake again

and it hurts but I will sit here and wait and wait and it hurts but I will sit here and wait and wait and it hurts but I will sit here and wait and wait and I will sit here as my eyes melt away like the sun.

## 2 - fear

"You must be strong." The queen said. "You must be harsh and confident and determined because they are just peasants. They are your citizens. You will show them who is the ruler here."

"But I don't want to!" said the daughter desperately. "I love them. I love them all."

No sympathy. No empathy. The queen was cold and unhesitating and her voice was icicles dangling from frosty overhangs. If you made a wrong step, if you defied them, the icicle jutted down from the roof and pierced your skull. If you were unlucky enough to be under it, the icicle did the same. It was better to avoid it all together. It was better not to defy the icy spear aimed wickedly for your head and to accept that there was no use in trying. And yet... "That is not acceptable. What if you are attacked? What if you are betrayed? It is better to not have cared in the first place than to die because you did not see it coming." The queen turned to the balcony, sweeping a paw over the bustling space. "Every one of these peasants, be them aged six or eighty, could be your demise. Are you going to let this happen? Are you going to let our legacy die because of your childish ignorance?"

The princess sighed. "Yes, mother."

The queen froze, her fur bristling. She gave her daughter a terrifying look. "You ARE?"

It was in that moment her breath caught and again she felt as if she would be impaled by the icicle. She cowered. "Yes, mother, I will show them that I am a confident, strong ruler like you are and I will not let them have the chance to kill me because I will not be surprised and I will have already been prepared for it, etc." She mumbled.

Her mother huffed. "That’s better." She turned away. "And speak more clearly next time. Only the worst of queens go around murmuring all of the time."

W I p

## 3 - what once was in your fridge

From a prompt the awesome Tilan gave me :D

This story begins with a 'Once upon a time'. Once upon a time when skyscrapers were mighty and tall and airplanes soared through skies every so often to look at the cars and people below as little ants easily squished by a wayward foot. Not a very distant time, it would seem. No fairies or elves or ghastly hogs winding menacingly around ruined castles here.

That was not the real 'once upon a time'. Here is the real one.

Once upon a time in a city by the sea, where tropical waters lap at blazing golden coasts, there was a crocodile.

Not a very fantastical sight, if you were assuming anything. There were a lot of crocodiles in this city.

The crocodile was in a car. It was surrounded by ice and it was being jerked around in the trunk as the driver honked and swerved and speeded and yelled and did not give any care to their passenger in the back.

The driver assumed the crocodile was dead. It has to be so. They were going to make some nice crocodile soup with it.

## 4 - bigotry

Anyone else browse Google Play Store game reviews for five hours straight in the middle of the night instead of doing anything productive? ':) totally not me<started 11/27/2023

"Brother?"

Brother was a gaunt, large figure in the corner of the gray room. His eyes were haunted. His shape was ataxic.

"Brother, what did they do to you?"

Handiwork of them. Reinforcing their own light. Blossoming by Brother's lamentation.

Outside, the lamps flickered on and off. They used to be off. They were supposed to be off.

"Oh dear. It must have been a lot."

Brother gave a nod, intoxicated by the floor tiles.

"I can get you home."

Fumes churned the air, fumes of chemicals and jubilees and unending euphoria. I held his paw tightly, but not for myself. Out the window overgrown with illness. Careful and soundless. Despite that they would find us. This being unforgettable now haunted and them.

"How long had you been trapped there?"

Enough to be them? Despite that they would find us, speared by intangible thorns.

Brother was quiet. He looked on instead.

"You usually talk more."

I pushed him on. He would not speak. His ghastly eyes scanned the ground. On we went.