Story-a-Week #4
Memories
At first it was all sand. No people, walls, or structures. No roads to follow and no towering spires. Just sand. And despite the profoundly humbling thought of being born of that sand, and the sheer awe of human creation, she wanted nothing but to destroy. Every precarious and wonderful citadel she craved would crumble. Every wide and spanning archway inflamed her urge to crush. Even as she marveled at everything around her, she would inevitably conjure terrible and devastating ruination in her mind.
She was ashamed of how quickly the violent images surfaced, often reciting her lessons out loud to clear her mind. But the power tickled at her fingertips and begged her to exercise her desires.
Sometimes the feelings fought with cunning logic. Questions and rationalizations coursed through her in a disjointed array: This was a land of freedom, wasn’t it? She could do as she pleased. It was not as if someone could stop her. The people around her never seemed to appreciate the splendor of the fortress, they deserved to lose it. And in any case, what would the destruction mean in terms of the life of the earth? These massive structures were insignificant in the full scope of the cosmos… At any moment, her resolve could falter and nothing would be spared.
A man looked up from his newspaper, “Didn’t she just finish building all that?”
“Yeah, hold on I’m getting it,” a woman was holding up her camera phone, “maybe another one for youtube- crap I’m getting a glare off the sea…”
The man watched his daughter stomp around, “maybe try from the shade,” he shifted in his seat.
“Huh?” the woman was squinting at the phone, “hey Anna, look at Mommy!”
The man was suddenly annoyed, “let her play,” he grumbled and returned to his paper, “it’s just sand.”