MABEL
She’d never seen proper throwing knives. Her life had been dedicated to chores around the farm, listening to a fanfare of worship she didn’t believe in, and striving to cultivate an obstinate land that refused to produce the same amount of effort as her family. So Mabel listened, an astute pupil, pondering over flatter convections and unwrapped hilts, proper balances. It made no sense to her – something she’d have to see to truly understand nuances and motions.
The youth took the compliment, but didn’t let it reside or rest too firmly between her shoulders. She could always do better. Maybe quicker. Maybe deeper. A dream of a single swipe, embedded in between layers of hearts and lungs. Of a dissipated, withered, decayed man, taking one last look at her before succumbing to his wounds. A feral, wild kill for a twin.
She would’ve applied his next set of complexities, but he’d taken the knife first – showing, demonstrating, holding my fingertips and not a grasping, holding, clenching manifestation, her release too late. Then Aamu took his own shot, and her gaze snapped to its placed, rooted section. She followed its movements, pacing in willow contributions towards the tree, hand grasping its threshold and pulling it out, backing away, away, away to stand where she’d been before.
Thereafter, she strived to follow through on the same movements, make them inherent things, her fingertips the only material grasping – flinging it away from her palm. It sung and snipped through the air, landing below where his mark had been. “Better?” She reflected back, a curl of a smile beginning to form on her lips.
The youth took the compliment, but didn’t let it reside or rest too firmly between her shoulders. She could always do better. Maybe quicker. Maybe deeper. A dream of a single swipe, embedded in between layers of hearts and lungs. Of a dissipated, withered, decayed man, taking one last look at her before succumbing to his wounds. A feral, wild kill for a twin.
She would’ve applied his next set of complexities, but he’d taken the knife first – showing, demonstrating, holding my fingertips and not a grasping, holding, clenching manifestation, her release too late. Then Aamu took his own shot, and her gaze snapped to its placed, rooted section. She followed its movements, pacing in willow contributions towards the tree, hand grasping its threshold and pulling it out, backing away, away, away to stand where she’d been before.
Thereafter, she strived to follow through on the same movements, make them inherent things, her fingertips the only material grasping – flinging it away from her palm. It sung and snipped through the air, landing below where his mark had been. “Better?” She reflected back, a curl of a smile beginning to form on her lips.
If you dig under my feet
You will find things that you don't want to see
You will find things that you don't want to see
