Tick tock.
There goes time. There goes the chance to call her mine, the wizard sings. Only this wizard doesn’t believe in time. There he goes, swooping down, wishing away her songs so only he can rhyme. They say he eats hearts, swallows them whole. But instead of eating hearts, he chews through songbird’s notes, twisting them from whole notes into halves. He’s nothing like the Welsh wizard from the story on my shelf, but instead a starling. He plucks eggs from nests that aren’t his own, until one day, a young boy cried out, “Please, no!”
The wizard stared back, puzzled and incomplete, with half his body human, and the other half with avian feet. He’d never heard a little boy speak. He’d only been smashing the songs of others, without any knowing of what he’d been killing.
“Please don’t hurt them, they’re my brothers and sisters,” the little boy wept.
And it wasn’t until the clock ticked and tocked again, the wizard’s eyes slept with sorrow. The boy had two feet, two wings and a beak.They were two of a feather, birds of a kind.
But it was too late. His starling friends already hated and reeked.

A foreseen event of thoughts, words, and execution.

That was all it took.

At first, it's a silent conversation of ominous tunes echoing through the perturbed room.

Whispers travel left and right like a tin can telephone as an imaginary game of tug of war occurs. Pick a side.

Eyes nervously shift, flickering like faulty lightbulbs when other pairs of eyes catch sight.

The clock's hands spin hastily as compliments sweeter than honey swirl around the room.

But sometimes, sweet compliments mask the bitter truth.

Mistrust or perhaps–hatred, planted on their faces. A seed bound to grow into a garden conquered by an assembly of Belladonnas.

One side serene with peace, triggered solely when the clouds weep with crocodile tears.

The other side brews a recipe of organized chaos into a cauldron.

A spell that amuses the vagabond wind. It's faint whistling chants mocking incantations against the window:

Mirror, mirror, on the wall, who's the deceiver of them all?

But the truth eventually ascends like the sun, gradually rising above the horizon; unraveling the night's attempt to conceal its secrets.

At last, thoughts pile up gunpowder, and tongues ignite fuse.

Then, Fire.

The blustering winds send icy chills down my numbing fingers. I — stupidly — forgot gloves. Snow pools about me, littering the exterior of my car.
I fumble with the scraper, leaning across my windshield, scrape, scrape, scraping off its icy finish — careful not to touch the glass with my frostbitten forearms. Being the genius I am, I forgot a coat too.
Filing out of the school gymnasium, adults, bundled in coats with warm, remote-started cars — unlike me — hustle like businesspeople with places to be, eyeing me pitifully. I avoid their gazes.
Hands burning, fingers screaming, I scrape quicker, my shame accumulating alongside the snow. An elderly man strolls by, cigarette lighter in hand, chuckling when he sees me shivering. I cut my losses, unable to brave the cold any longer, and yank the car door, icicles flying off in a dramatic spectacle.
I slam my head against the wheel and sigh, defeated.
I can drive, but I forget to pick up my sisters. I have a credit card, but I don’t know how to pay the bill. I give my full effort, but it’s still not enough.
How am I supposed to grow up — I can’t even scrape away frost.

A seed lay inside a ripe tomato, growing inside a garden. One day, a bird ate the tomato, and the seed began a new journey inside the bird. Eventually, the bird dropped the seed, and it landed in a crack on a paved parking lot. Its quest for survival had begun.

There was no water or soil for the seed. Time after time, people went by this weak seed, oblivious to the struggles of the seed. The seed could do nothing but live its life in despair, soon to perish.

On its last strand of hope, the seed sprouted, pushing tiny, feeble roots into the pebbles that lay below. Somehow, underneath, lay a small patch of soil, signifying the glimmer of hope it had left. Yet this barren earth still lacked water and nutrients. But then miraculously, rain fell. Daily, showers soaked the dirt, providing the seedling with water. It grew stronger, absorbing every trickle of water possible.

As time went on, the seed grew into a healthy tomato plant and bore fruit. Against all odds, it had fought for survival, showing that through despair and hardship, one can still survive and thrive.

You always swore you’d leave this town.

Ever since you were a kid, you’d trace the highway on maps, following it past fields and forests, past rivers and state lines, past anything that reminded you of this sickening place. The roads were a promise, and you were going to keep it.

But the trees don’t forget.

Neither does the river.

And when you drive past the old willow tree at the bend—the one by the water, the one you crashed into last year—you can’t forget either.

The dented guardrail. The split bark. The wilting flowers someone had left at its base.

You grip the wheel tighter. You don’t quite remember the impact, just the feeling of falling. Of being weightless for a moment before the waters swallowed you whole.

Pfft, whatever. It doesn’t bother you, right?

Turn up the radio louder. Keep driving.

The street lights flicker. The road stretches endlessly ahead, but something isn’t right. No landmarks. No signs. Just pavement and sky and a hush of wind through the trees.

Then you see it again.

The willow tree.

The guardrail.

The flowers.

The truth is–

You never left.

You never will.

Outside, the sky was turning a rather unforgettable shade of maroon, though soon there would be no one to remember it. The earthy red reminded Shira of her violin. If the world was doomed, as the news claimed, maybe she’d play one last time. There were so many songs about the apocalypse, she may as well accompany it.

Shira opened the case, relishing the satisfying click, realising she might never hear it again. She closed and opened it twice more. It was a nice sound, one she’d never paid much notice.

Her fingers brushed the velvet cover. A red deeper than the burning skies. She wedged the shoulder rest onto the instrument and tightened the bow. Before applying the rosin, she gave it a curious lick. It tasted like sap.

The scales and arpeggios came easy, she’d been playing them for years. Fingers gliding across the fingerboard, she savored the simple ups and downs that had once bored her.

Shira played every piece she could and improvised when there was nothing left. And when it all came crashing down, Shira drowned everything out with the sweet timbre of the violin, sweeter than she’d ever thought before.

I slam my hand on the steering wheel, smashing the horn over and over again, adding
to the cacophony of blaring beeps blanketing the jammed up intersection. What on earth was going on? I was late to work, I had a big meeting, my boss was going to kill me, and I still had to drop Jamie. I sucked in a breath and poked the upper half of my body out the window, craning around in an attempt to see what was the cause. My brow furrowed as I tracked the cars tangled like spaghetti and tried to put my finger on the reason for this veritable mess. I squinted. Oh! The traffic lights had gone off. I heard a strangled gasp from my son. Heart in my throat, I whipped back into the car, trying to see why my kid had made a sound like that. He was hunched over his phone and my adrenaline slowly ebbed away as I realized it, not him, was dead. His breathing was growing rapid though, as he stared at his phone in obvious panic. I sat back and contemplated if I should tell him it was not worth getting upset over.
 

I was once told that the best way to counter a kick was to get closer to whoever had thrown it. That way, there wouldn’t be enough room left for it to be effective. Run into the fire, my dad had told her, because the forest is not burning on the other side.

I asked him in return, “Why not just avoid the fire?”

He had smiled then, the kind of smile that was both warm and distant. “Because you’ll never see what’s beyond the fire if you don’t run through it. And if you keep avoiding it, you’ll never know what you were meant to be on the other side.”

I had gone silent, but hadn’t understood — until now. I’d lost my job. Ended things with a man whose name I refused to recall, in fear of bringing the memories back. I’d spent months hiding, replaying my failures in my head, letting the shame of it burn through me.

I’d spent so long avoiding the fire — the risks, the awkward conversations, the truth.

But now, standing at the edge of my own unraveling life, I knew: I had to plunge headfirst into it. The only way out was through.

The tiles are cracked and brown. Dirt and curls of hair are strewn across them. My stomach spasms, toilet water reflecting my pale face. Something slides up my throat, I gag. It dribbles then splashes into the toilet as bile streaks down my neck. It’s black and slimy, floating like a dead fish. I back away, retching, but it pours out now, hot and steaming. It pools on the floor with the clumps of hair and grime. It spreads under the stalls, coating tiles in its shining black mucus. The thing is spilling from me, like slugs in my mouth as it rises, the taste of vomit coating it, coming from it. My head is spinning from the smell, standing in the steam with it running from my innards.
The bathroom door opens. In an instant it is gone from floor and dirt and hair, compressed to a heavy stone deep in my stomach. The clear water holds nothing. The students are leaving, slamming the door. I wash my hands until they’re red. Looking into the mirror I see a black drip on my chin. I wipe it away, assured that my secret will stay inside me for another day.

The last thing I remember was crashing on the freeway, only to wake up one morning and find myself in a light green hospital room. Out of the corner of my eye, I see a calendar reading March 2, 2075. I ask the doctor when my crash happened, and she tells me that it was 50 years ago. I look in a mirror across the room. My hair is still dark brown, and there isn’t a wrinkle on my face – just like the last time I looked in my rearview mirror.
Suddenly, I see a fellow patient getting rolled into the room on a gurney.
“This hospital is really a prison.” he whispers as he rolls by, grabbing my hand and pulling me, so that I roll the gurney into the doctor and trip the other nurse. No time to think! I push the gurney down the hall as fast as I can toward the hospital doors. We burst into daylight and find ourselves where the hospital should be, but it isn’t there. Instead, we are in a vacant lot, with a single sign that reads: COMING SOON IN 2027! NEW METROPOLITAN HOSPITAL!