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[pillowa]

ʙᴜᴍᴘ!
"ʏᴏᴜ ᴏɴʟʏ ꜰᴀɪʟ ɪꜰ ʏᴏᴜ ꜱᴛᴏᴘ ᴡʀɪᴛɪɴɢ."
-ʀᴀʏ ʙʀᴀᴅꜱʙᴜʀʏ

[Forbidden Gifts!]

Joining!!

[pillowa]

ʙᴜᴍᴘ!
"ꜱᴏᴍᴇᴛɪᴍᴇꜱ, ᴏɴʟʏ ᴘᴀᴘᴇʀ ᴡɪʟʟ ʟɪꜱᴛᴇɴ ᴛᴏ ʏᴏᴜ."
- ᴀɴᴏɴʏᴍᴏᴜꜱ

[rfeb]

Yay, I'm done! Ehh, I know I went a bit too off topic than what I was planning, but haha mistakes happen ;-;

Username: rfeb
Prompt: #3
Word Count: 890

Everyone wears a mask--I'm no different. We all have parts of ourselves we want to hide, we all try to be what everyone wants us to be. There is no "freedom" in our individuality. Individuality is a risk. We have to hide our face behind gems and ribbons and everything pretty, just to look good in front of others. If not, then who would we be in this world?

While others hide because they want to, I've accepted my mask because I had to. I depend on it like one depends on the air. I need it more than my own heart. No one has to wear their mask, but once I took mine off, I'd lose everything I worked hard to get.

And I would only have what I shouldn't have. Something no one wants.

As my teacher drones on with his lesson during a cool summer day, a girl appears in my mind. My thoughts always run back to her. She faced the world all alone all because she took off her mask. I've never seen anyone take off their mask before. It's such a normal part of society that no one criticises it anymore. Actually, did she ever have a mask to begin with?

I can't say everyone liked her, in fact, it was the opposite. The whole school knew of her and avoided her. What did she do exactly? She flaunted her quirks. She laughed at her own jokes. She said what she needed to say. She liked what she liked. She never forced herself to fit in. She stood up for herself and everyone else. But, no one stood up for her.

I personally envied her. Her heart was pure and strong. It was unbreakable. Mine, well, it was weak and full of thorns. It grasped for perfection because it doesn't know perfection itself. I knew back then that perfection didn't exist, but what else was my deformed supposed to yearn for?

The first time I met her face-to-face was when I had to help a teacher with taking down posters in the hallways. Of course, I had to do it, since my image had to be good in his eyes. Just because everyone likes me doesn't mean I can slack off. I soon found myself conflicted beside her holding the posters she took down.

"Hm, are you gonna talk or what?"

Her question surprised me. I was sure she knew well that people didn't like her. Or was she just an idiot the whole time?

I asked her, "Why don't you try to fit in with people?"

We locked eyes. "Why should I? All these fake selves are just tiring. Isn't it much better to be yourself? I'm sure life would be better for everyone."

I looked down at the outdated posters of the school's masquerade ball. I muttered, "I wouldn't ever take off my mask."

She heard. "Then be like me, I'm my own mask. You'll never have to worry if you're your own mask."

She smiled wholeheartedly at me, and for the first time in my life, I lost my confidence and self-esteem, everything I worked hard for. Doesn't she realise I hide behind lies and deceit? I can't just be like her. She doesn't understand.

"I hate you."

She lost her smile for a moment, but a second later, I swear, she grinned again at me. "I knew people felt the same way as you, but you're the first who actually said it to me. Thanks for confirming that I'm not just making up everyone's feelings."

I stared. Was that sarcasm, or was she genuinely saying that? Unexpectedly, it was the latter. I felt no bad intentions from her. Suddenly, I realised my childishness and blushed.

"Haha, how cute! But like I said, don't hide behind your mask, okay? No one would know how honest you are! You're a fantastic person without your mask, you just don't see it."

"Oh, okay."

We kept quiet for the rest of the time. I worried that she would reveal my outburst, but I reassured myself that she's not that kind of person. She doesn't lie, but she doesn't speak bad of others either. I knew that from the moment I met her. Everything I needed to know about her was on her mask, the mask that brags every detail about her. Her mask is her.

I passed by her several times, and without fail, she smiles at me. She gives the "me" who's behind the mask his own confidence, one who doesn't hide behind his mask. One day, I stopped seeing her. Perhaps she left. No one spoke of her again.

I apologise every day to her in my mind. I won't be taking off my mask like she asked me to do. I know I won't ever be like her. I want my mask to be as beautiful as her smile, and when I finally solve the mystery of her perfect heart, perhaps then I'll tell her how I feel. But I still wouldn't take off my mask yet, not because I can't let anyone else see the monster I am, but because my mask is who I'm not, who I want to be, and who was reflected in her eyes when she smiled.

Stash

[pillowa]

ʙᴜᴍᴘ!
"ᴛʜᴇʀᴇ ɪꜱ ɴᴏ ɢʀᴇᴀᴛᴇʀ ᴀɢᴏɴʏ ᴛʜᴀɴ ʙᴇᴀʀɪɴɢ ᴀɴ ᴜɴᴛᴏʟᴅ ꜱᴛᴏʀʏ ɪɴꜱɪᴅᴇ ʏᴏᴜ."
-ᴍᴀʏᴀ ᴀɴɢᴇʟᴏᴜ

[rogan]

writing

"writing is something
you do alone. its a profession for introverts
who want to tell you a story
but don't want to
make eye contact while doing it."
- john green

[xThetricksterx]

This isn't going to be a story but rather a poem...

She runs to her bedroom
And slams the door
She can't stop crying
She falls to the floor
Tons of adrenaline
Pumped through her veins
Her ribs are breaking
With tremendous pain
One hand on her chest
The other on her arm
Her face is cold
Her tears are warm
She lays for awhile
On the cold floor
There in the dark
Behind the slammed door
With nobody knowing
She's all alone
But it's okay it happens a lot
She's quite aware
That she's all who she's got
(please do not steal my poem. It's very dear and personal to me. I worked hard on this poem and it's really the first time I've shared it with anyone. So please do not steal it. The poem means a lot to me)

[pillowa]

ʙᴜᴍᴘ!
"ᴛʜᴇʀᴇ ᴀʀᴇ ᴛᴡᴏ ꜱɪᴅᴇꜱ ᴛᴏ ᴇᴠᴇʀʏ ꜱᴛᴏʀʏ,"
-ᴀɴᴏɴʏᴍᴏᴜꜱ

[BigWolf643]

username: bigwolf643
prompt: 3
word count: 2669
notes: heavily inspired by the song 'lady stardust' by lisa minkovsky. i recommend listening to the song while you read, as i listened it for the hourish it took to write this!

Stardust is everything and nothing at the same time. She plays the part of a lost griffin, spending her days at Broken Tree until she can find her flock. The creatures that live with her don’t bother her. She isn’t close to any of them, so none of them are there when she can barely hold her disguise together, when the feathers fall and blood spills and it takes all of her strength to keep the vague shape of something with four legs.

But then comes Creek, and it’s like Stardust is reborn again. It’s the first time she’s ever doubted her role in the forest, thought she might be something more than a creature of twig and rot. It the first time she’s ever wanted to be something more than what she is, wanted to leave behind her disguise of old feathers and old blood and be something better. Something beautiful.

Creek stays longer than she has to, and Stardust wonders if it’s because of her. Creek is friendly, but seems to spend most of her time with Stardust, asking questions about flight and griffin culture. Stardust knows nothing other than the bare minimum about griffins. She’s aware that her name isn’t a griffin name, so she makes something up on the spot—Crow-call.

“Crow-call,” Creek says. She says it like it doesn’t feel right on her tongue, like it doesn’t fit the creature before her, and Stardust hopes she doesn’t question it. She isn’t sure if cats can tell when the name you give isn’t a true one, but she hopes that even if Creek knows, she doesn’t bring it up.

But Creek goes along with it. Stardust is Crow-call, and it feels wrong, so wrong when Creek calls her that. She wants to yell to the world that she is Stardust, that she is made of twig and rot and no better than a Forest-walker, but she doesn’t. She hides whenever a griffin visits, and hopes none of them pay too much attention to her scent.

It’s many, many full-moons later when Creek finally leaves. Stardust had gotten used to the molly’s presence. Had gotten used to the way her pale fur seemed to glow under the sun, and change from white to the colors of dawn. If she’s being honest with herself, Stardust thinks Creek is being no more honest about her name than Stardust herself is being. Nobody would look at a cat with fur that glowed and changed, and name her after something muddy and brown.

Stardust is preparing to say goodbye, but like she always does, Creek surprises her. Tonight, the surprise is an invitation.

“This isn’t where you’re supposed to be, is it?” Creek asks. Moonlight falls from between branches, and Stardust flinches from its light. Light isn’t good for a creature of the forest, she’s told.

If Creek notices, she says nothing. “I’m going to leave this forest,” she says, “I’m going to rip the beating heart out long enough for me to escape, and then I’m going to see the world. I was hoping you’d come with me…?”

The molly trails off and looks down at her paws, scuffing them in the dirt and dead leaves. Stardust feels her heart (made of bone and blood from sacrificed prey) thump faster, and she almost forgets how to form words. Then, she realizes she was so startled the vocal cords in her throat faded away, so Stardust tries to put on a convincing performance of talking with vocal cords.

“I’d…I’d love to!” Stardust finally gets out, and she feels herself flicker. Creek, who is still looking at her paws, doesn’t seem to notice.

“You would?” Creek asks, slowly lifting her head to meet Stardust’s violet eyes. Stardust nods, and grins, and Creek says, “I’m so glad, I mean, of course you would! We’re friends, right?”

“Friends,” Stardust repeats as she follows Creek out of Broken Tree and to the heart of the forest, “Yeah.”

If there’s a wish for something more in her words, Creek doesn’t pick up on it.

The trip to the heart seems to take forever, but if Stardust is being honest, it was probably only a few moon-cycles. They meet the light-deer, and surprisingly, their light doesn't burn Stardust where she stands. They don't even cast her suspicious glances, just pitying looks and knowing nods at the others. She doesn’t like the light-deer, much.

They meet two Forest-walkers on their way to the heart. Even without fire, Stardust manages to tear them apart long enough for Creek to escape, before she leaps into the air and follows her deeper. After, Stardust makes sure to send out signals through the roots, the vines, the leaf-rot, every bit of forest she can still use, and tell the Forest-walkers to back off. They don’t show up after that.

The deeper they get, the heavier her body feels. The forest breathes here, the leaf-rot shifts and tastes their sweat and paws, and Stardust finds herself craving the moonlight. Even though she is a forest-creature, made of twig and rot, the forest doesn’t make her feel better. The deeper they go, the harder it is for Stardust to hold onto her disguise, and she isn’t sure how to tell the molly she loves that oops, sorry, turns out the griffin you were friends with was nothing more than a convincing mask of feather and blood!

So instead, Stardust says nothing. She and Creek cuddle when they sleep and Stardust pretends the lies don’t exist. She pretends they aren’t cuddling for warmth, but because they love each other in the way Stardust wishes for.

They make it to the heart, and it’s huge, a massive, twitching mass of tangled roots surrounding a tree that seems to climb higher than any Stardust has ever seen before. There is no sky, here, only a thick canopy of leaves. Forest-walkers are perched in the trees, and birds of leaf-rot circle the air above them.

“The heart,” Creek breathes. They’re so close Stardust can feel her breath, can hear her chest rise and fall. Stardust’s chest also rises and falls, but it’s just to mimic the illusion of life.

“It’s…not what I was expecting,” Stardust says. She doesn’t know what she was expecting. Maybe something of flesh, like the hearts of living creatures. Maybe something big and bad they’d have to slay. Stardust isn’t sure how to destroy a heart of wood without fire, and they don’t have any of that right now.

“We should leave and think of how to destroy it,” Creek says, eyeing the birds above them. One of the birds glares back, with eyes black and empty, and Creek flinches. “Yeah. Let’s retreat for now.”

Stardust clicks her beak in agreement, but she doesn’t move. Creek is already backing away, back into the dense brush that hid the heart from view, back to where they’ve been hiding, but Stardust can’t get her limbs to cooperate.

“Crow-call,” Creek says, but it’s like Stardust is drowning, and Creek is calling to her from above. Leaf-rot is sticking to her talons, and in her mind, a voice speaks: creature of wood and leaves, return.

No, Stardust says. She means to say it aloud, but she can’t open her mouth. She tries to roar and shriek and cry, but her beak refuses to open. She tries to fly, to rip herself out of the grasp of leaf-rot, but it’s like her wings are stuck to her sides with sap.

“Crow-call, come on!” Creek yowls from behind her. Stardust can’t even turn her head to make sure Creek is okay. The fake-name stabs through her like a thorn, but Stardust still can’t move.

The voice in her mind speaks again. Stardust thinks it might be the heart. Interesting. The one of blood cares about you.

Stardust still can’t speak, so she snarls her words in her mind: don’t you dare touch her, or I’ll burn you down myself.

The forest laughs, and it’s like there was never warmth. Cold air blows through the branches, though her fur, through her mask of feather and bone, and Stardust struggles to hold onto herself. If the forest wants her back, Stardust isn’t going to go easy. She likes being herself. She likes the idea of leaving.

Return, the voice says, and it’s loud, so loud it feels like Stardust’s soul is going to shatter. But she holds on. She squeezes her eyes shut, thinks about Creek, and hopes the molly is okay.

Forest-walker, the heart thrums, forest-walker made of wood and leaves, return to the forest. Protect your forest.

Stardust doesn’t know much about herself, but she knows one thing. She is no Forest-walker. She wrenches her beak open, and breathes a harsh, shuddering breath. She opens her eyes, and stares at the heart. It’s twitching, writhing, like a pile of snakes. The roots thrash and dig deep gouges in the earth.

Moving feels like she’s ripping out her bones, but then again, they were never her bones to begin with. She puts all her focus into moving, dragging her paws through the leaf-rot and to the heart. Forest-walkers watch, but don’t move. The birds above them stop flying circles and just hover. The air they beat at her is cold, so she breaths out heat.

“Crow-call…” comes a quiet voice from behind her. Stardust jumps and spins around to see Creek, on the other side of the clearing, where they started. There is blue fire reflected in her eyes, and the pale molly looks terrified.

“I’m getting us out of her,” Stardust says.

“You’re…” Creek swallows and shakes herself, “You’re no griffin, are you?”

Stardust looks down at herself. She can no longer see feather or talons, only a burning blue fire. Stardust jumps, and the fire follows her. The leaf-rot below her screams in pain. The fire continues to burn, only it doesn’t hurt. She reaches out with magic she didn’t know she had, and in front of her eyes, is a burning ball of blue flame.

Stardust turns back to the heart, spreads wings of fire, and leaps at it. She hears the cries of birds and Forest-walkers alike, but they never reach her. She crashes into the heart, and breathes hard. Her vision is flickering and black, the fire that is now her burning and hot.

The forest howls its pain. Stardust keeps burning, letting her flames scorch the roots and wood until they begin to drop as ash and soot. As the heart burns, and the forest dies, she can feel something. The heavy feeling is lifting. The air smells clear and fresh. If she narrows her eyes, she can see rolling hills and lakes.

“It’s dying!” Creek yells, “Crow-call, keep burning it!”

Stardust does. She finds the magic inside her and channels it into her paws, her wings, the air around her. It’s hot and burning and she keeps it like that until she can no longer hear the forest, and the last of the roots crumble into ash.

Once it is dead, Stardust stumbles and falls. The fire dies, just like that, and she is once again trapped in the body of a griffin. She coughs soot.

Creek trips over a twitching section of root as she makes her way over to Stardust. Everything is smoke and ash, but the forest is slowly rebuilding. The remaining leaf-rot swallows the bones of the Forest-walkers, and new roots push their way out of the ground.

“We have to hurry,” Stardust hacks, and Creek purrs. The sound is warm and comforting and sends strength through the bones that aren’t Stardust’s own.

Creek and Stardust lean into each other as they run for the hills. Behind them, the forest is starting to howl, again, anger and hatred. But the two of them are faster than the growing roots, and before the heart is rebuilt and puts up the barrier between reality and forest, the two are out.

Creek falls into the grass and laughs, rolling and breathing the air. Stardust just stands, panting, coughing, talons stained black with ash. The moonlight seeps into her wounds, and it’s like Stardust is born again.

She collapses beside Creek in the grass. It’s warm and tickles the her back as she looks up at the stars. She’s never seen so many, before, like eyes watching over them.

Creek sighs. Her jaws are parted in a grin, but she is panting. She turns to look at Stardust, and somehow, her eyes hold both happiness and a hint of anger.

“I don’t know what you are,” Creek starts, “But you aren’t a griffin. No griffin can turn into a creature made of fire. That was…that was terrifying, Crow-call. You were gone, and it was just fire in the vague shape of something with four legs. What are you?”

Stardust answers honestly. “I don’t know,” she says, “I thought I was a forest-creature, made of twig and leaves. I’m not…I’m not a griffin. But,” and Stardust makes sure to look Creek in the eye, “You aren’t named Creek, are you?”

Creek startles, and her fur puffs up, but it soon lies flat. “I’m not,” she says, “I’m…my name is Dawn.”

“I’m Stardust,” Stardust says, and she grins her relief. She feels herself flicker, again, and she can’t bring herself to care. She’s out of the forest. She doesn’t have to be a griffin anymore.

Wait.

She doesn’t have to be a griffin anymore.

Stardust leaps to her paws just as Cree—Dawn, is testing her name. The moonlight beckons to her.

“What are you doing?” Dawn asks. She rolls from her back to her belly, “You might’ve lied to me, but…I don’t want you to leave me. You’re like…the only thing I have.”

Stardust doesn’t answer. She looks to the moon, closes her eyes, and says: i want to be myself.

She flickers. She feels the feathers fading away, skin and bone made of stolen things all fade away. They weren’t hers to begin with. Stardust lets her disguise, her mask, her lies fade away, until she is nothing but herself, whatever that might be.

Dawn is the first to react. “I’m…oh my god. You’re…” the molly trails off. Stardust opens her eyes, and she feels weightless. The grass around her reflects silver light.

Stardust walks to the nearest lake, and it’s like her paws don’t even touch the ground. Dawn trails behind, and she doesn’t speak. Stardust isn’t sure she remembers how.

Her reflection is made of stars. Stardust stares at herself. Her body is the color of the night sky, a deep, black-blue, and silver scales glow, scattered around her body. She is a bit larger, now, and her eyes are the color of the moon. Her chest is white, her underbelly is white, and she has horns on her head that sparkle with the light of stars. Her tail twitches behind her, and there is a barb at the end of it that looks like a captured star.

She still has wings. Stardust unfurls them, and they change before her eyes. They fade from red to yellow to purple to pink, and a mix of all colors between. It’s like a rainbow, with tiny pinpricks of starlight sprinkled throughout.

“I have no idea what you are,” Dawn breathes. Her reflection appears beside Stardust’s, soft white fur and wide green eyes. “But…” the molly isn’t much smaller than Stardust, and Stardust wonders if that’s how things are supposed to be.

“But what?” Stardust asks.

Dawn seems to think, before saying, “What are you?” Stardust doesn’t think that’s what she wanted to ask.

“Star-stuff, Dawn,” Stardust says, and she leaps into the air. Her wings catch starlight, and Dawn laughs from the ground.

“Star-stuff,” Dawn repeats, and the molly collapses back in the grass, “I can work with that.”

Stardust grins, wide and full, and Dawn smiles back. It makes Stardust’s heart twist and fly, and this time, Stardust’s sure it’s her own.

[cedilla]

mark!