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Nameless Story
Upon her back, she carried the burdens of her previous life; faded letters from a secret admirer, a pair of bullets without a gun, crumpled clippings of outdated newspaper articles, and the remnants of an old map. She trudged through the bushes that concealed the forest floor as mud stuck to her boots and dozens of mosquitoes followed her every step of the way. Long ago, she had given up on even trying to swat away the pesky bloodsuckers. They'd always evade her aimless swings toward them anyway.
The sound of the splattering mix of earth and water suddenly came to a stop. She paused for a moment to catch her breath and ease her shoulders of the burden of her cumbersome knapsack. Unfastening a latch on the tattered and torn backpack, she pulled out a rusted water filled canteen. She lifted its cap-less top to her pale parched lips and out form the canister came a single drop of water. In disbelief she shook the metallic water bottle to ensure it was completely empty, which it most certainly was.
With a sigh, she plopped herself down on a neighboring colossal rock after brushing aside a thick layer of moss. She then brought her knees to her chest and cradled the scratched up limbs with her itchy mosquito bite swollen arms. Perhaps, this was it, she'd have to turn back. With another sigh she recollected her belongings in her knapsack and slung it over her sore and aching back as Kendall arrived at a dreaded location.
She turned around, caught a glimpse of the dilapidated and abandoned house of her childhood, and cringed. The house had horrible memories that failed to die with the fire that had once consumed its whitewashed walls, it failed to crumble when neighboring oak tree fell upon its roof, it failed to collapse and completely cave in when the mudslide occurred. The house was determined to live, despite Kendall’s hopes of its demise.
She stood alone before the aging house, blankly staring in the general direction of its decaying garden. Kendall closed her eyes and remembered the time her mother stood there, watering the various vegetables, which she’d somehow turn into a hearty meal of soup. She remembered sitting at the dinner table and slurping down the warm vitamin rich fluid as her mother smiled with pride for she had finally made something to satisfy the pickiness of her youngest daughter. With her eyes still closed, Kendall recalled the bright summer sun blazing in the cloudless sky overhead as she and her older sister Becky ran under the laundry line their mother had left out to dry. At the turn of their mother’s back they played tag and knocked the clothing into the muddied forest floor, soiling almost everything on the line. These were two of the few fond moments she actually had at that house. Now with her eyes wide open, Kendall sighed. Oh, how she longed for the days of childhood’s simplicity.
She gave the house another look as she began to recall the night that the lighting struck. Thunder boomed loud enough to disrupt even the deepest of thoughts. Rain poured down from the huge dark clouds that loomed overhead. In the mind of a much younger Kendall, this was it, supposedly the end of the world. Rationally was simply flooded out by the rain and each clap of thunder. Kendall and Becky exchanged concerned glances, as they peered out a nearby window as the whole house trembled with fear of the storm. A flash of light blinded their eyes followed by a deafening blow to the ears by lighting’s accomplice, thunder. With concerned eyes the two sisters glanced at their mother, who assured them that they were safe. About five minutes later, the smell of burnt wood could be smelled. Alarmed by the unexpected scent, their mother went outside to investigate.
The roof had caught fire. Urgently, she ran back inside and demanded the girls to get out as the fire spread despite the slight rain that soaked the roof. Within mere seconds the fire doubled in size as it devoured the shingled exterior of the house. She pushed both Kendall and Becky right out the front door and as she stood in the doorway, the roof gave way and with it the whole house. As their mother’s screams echoed throughout the wooded area, the girls stood there before the flames stunned by the hidden cruelty of nature. Becky fell to her knees and sobbed uncontrollably as Kendall’s hands reached out into the flames and struggled to move the torching wood from her mother’s brunt corpse. Not only did those flames scar her hands, they scared her life. With tears in her eyes, Kendall recalled that horrible night as she stood before the remnants of the house she grew up in. She then looked down at her hands that still ached from their burns.
Time was nothing but the salt poured on an open wound, it did nothing to heal the pain of Kendall’s past. She was now eighteen and though she had lost her mother a little less than a decade ago, burn blisters upon her hand still stung and twinge both literally with a sense of pain and metaphorically with the memory ingrained within her mind. She turned her back on the pile of burnt wood and ashes. But there was no point living in the past for Kendall knew that holding onto these unfortunate moments would do nothing to promote her future. Her heart pounding with the adrenaline running through her veins at the thoughts of those vivid moments of her past, she walked away without looking back. That house could hold her heart no more. Kendall left the remnants of a house and left nothing but her muddied footprints behind.
Any ideas for a title? :( Corrections, suggestions, and comments accepted.
nice and sad story cahoots.. ;o;
one thing i noticed was that you mention 'rusted water filled canteen' but then instantly say it is empty. :O should it be water canteen instead? that threw me off xD
are you completed with this story? i felt bit lost why she walked through the mud to look at her old home and then walk away. did she visit her childhood home to pay respects to her mother?