My Random Writings

'Summer'

Written July 2019

Out of all the seasons, summer used to be my favourite.

The time where I could take off my thick woollen jumpers and replace them for thin shirts and short pants. Where my long, blonde hair could be tied up and not leave my neck exposed to the harsh winter winds.

Watching my family dance happily around a roaring fire, their laughter echoing through the night. In summer, everything seemed to dance with my family, I would watch the flowers sway and the tree branches swing with a small smile on my face.

Not anymore.

That memory seemed to plague my mind, filling me with a burning rage each time it popped into my head. No longer was the grass green and the sky blue, but coloured in pale whites and grey. Almost as if to taunt me.

Summer used to be my favourite.

Before it's harsh rays and unforgiving heat waves took over, burning each leaf, shrivelling each plant, causing any human to choke on the dryness of their own throat as their skin blistered and peeled from the rays of the sun. Turning each and every living thing into a pile of dust.

Everything except me.

But then the winter came. I used to hate winter. My younger self would curse each time I saw the first drops of snow for the year. Winter covered the cracked, brown earth in glistening snow, erasing any sign of the death and chaos that had happened.

In a way, I thanked it, in another I didn't.

I still wasn't sure why I hadn't burned like the rest of them. Why I had remained intact while everything I had ever known fell apart into thousands of small pieces. I have spent years, years, trying to find someone who may have a sliver of an idea. And after eon's of searching, I may have found someone who does. A woman named Janiya, the embodiment of summer herself. I had been trailing the woman for a while. Her pristine, red hair was cut short at her shoulders. Her face was sharp and her eyes were cut-throat. She travelled alone, simply wandering through the snow and winter's endless forests. Her long coats covered her feet. She had been travelling north for a while now, maybe a week, and I still hadn't figured out where she was going. We were in a thick patch of trees. Finally, she stood into a clearing, and my heart began to sink. The clearing was too familiar. She stood directly in the middle, as I gazed, cursed images returned to my mind. The fact that she had come here...

She knew I was trailing her.

"Come out of the bushes would you Ellowyn. I won't bite," She laughed at the last comment. Her voice was soft, like the breeze that would flow through the trees while we danced.

I hesitated, should I? She turned around to face me, Her gold and orange eyes beginning to shine brighter, "If you don't come out, then I will have to take extreme measures."

I stepped out from behind where I was hiding and into her direct line of view, I kept walking towards her until I was about five metres away. She looked me over before beginning to talk once more,

"I would guess that you want to ask me something?"

I took a deep breath, "Did you know how it happened? Why the world began to burn and why I was the one who survived?"

She chuckled deeply, raising a hand towards her face, "And what would you give me if I told you?"

My words seemed to become stuck in my throat, "At this point? I would give you anything. I have nothing left to lose." My voice cracked.

She sighed, "What happened was.... unfortunate. Never in my years here have I seen something quite like it. The way that everything died, and just how quickly it happened, I don't think that it could have been stopped, even if it were foreseen."

"Did you see it coming?" I spat out, her words were beginning to bubble in the pit of my stomach.

She didn't answer, watching my anger boil behind my eyes.

"Did you?" I demanded,

She sighed, "I had a suspicion, but nothing was confirmed until I watched everyone and everything in my domain shrivel into nothingness,"

"That's not an excuse."

"I know."

Her previous voice had been sharp and cold, but now it was soft, full of regret.

"Why didn't I burn Janiya? Why was I subjected to watching that?" I asked, pouring as much emotion and heartbreak into my words as I could muster,

She watched me, "Summer is different from any other seasons of the year. My sisters and I, we represent each season. Not make sure that everything runs smoothly, but simply be the embodiment. I'm not entirely sure what caused it, but I do know that every single living thing on this planet died. They either burned or shrivelled or turned into dust-"

"You're not answering my question, Janiya." I interrupted, my voice hard. My face began to turn red, my breathing laboured and harsh.

"Maybe, the reason that you didn't die during that summer is that you're not alive. You have a body and a brain and a heart but you don't have a soul. Something in you is either missing, or it was never there in the first place."

My fingertips began to burn, small wisps of smoke flowing off the tips of my blonde hair.

"What you're saying is impossible," I shouted, my anger and disbelief increasing.

Janiya smiled softly, "I think you know what I'm saying is true. That this entire time you have been trying to find someone that could provide you with a different answer, and answer that you wanted to accept."

I snapped. My smoky hair lit alight at the ends, they began to turn black, surrounded by large red flames. The flame began to move out of my hands, firing towards random targets. The bright red colour blurred my vision, yet the outline of Janiya still remained in my sight. I felt myself drop down to my knees, shoving my burning hands underneath the snow. The flame subsided, the area was quiet until the noise of my sharp, loud breaths filled my ears.

I heard a small laugh as the fire and smoke around me cleared,

"Just like summer," Janiya said, "Wild, unpredictable and uncontrolled."

A warm wind rushed by me and swept Janiya up and into the air, disappearing before my very eyes. Leaving me alone in an empty circle, surrounded by the thick, white snow.

I pulled myself off the floor, as I stood up I stared at the still lingering ashes and flames on the trees. My hand rested on my chest, feeling the thump-thump of my heartbeat, a small reassuring feeling that maybe what she said was a lie, yet her words were still ringing in my head.

I started walking away, if something like this happened next summer then I needed to be prepared, and maybe find someone that had survived and evaded my searches. Regardless, I knew something had to be done. And deep down inside me, I had always known but simply not wanted to admit it. I walked away, ready to fix the problems that someone had caused, for both me and Earth.

And ready to destroy the person who caused this with my bare hands.

I hated Summer.

And a soulless, evil, disgusting human was about to pay.