Along the Sandy Banks

Quinn stabbed the heavy iron handle of the ornate scythe into the pond’s muddy embankment She let out a long, haughty sigh, letting the wide brim of the black hat on her head fall in front of her face as she closed her eyes with a pensive wince. Without hesitation she let her bloody muddy ankles enter water.

The acrid smell of pond water, algae, blood and sweat permeated the humid summer air as she hung her legs over the old wooden dock. She watched her dirty bare feet as she kicked, taking note of how each kick produced larger or smaller waves depending on how hard she kicked. As the day wore on the mud on her feet began to dry in layered muddy brown and reddish patches.

Each time she wet her feet a new layer edged it’s way closer to her dirt-coated ankles. . The knotted end of her friendship bracelet floated along the surface of the dirty water, it’s frayed ends spreading out as the waves flowed. The bracelet’s braided pattern had once been bright orange and yellow, now it was brown, faded, blood soaked and frayed. As the thick cotton strings sank deeper into the water, a deep dark red pigment flowed into the pond. She began to feel the sorrow wash into the pond.

As the sun set, the rising and falling of the tiny waves bounced along the moonlit surface like a vainglorious heartbeat in motion, deliberate.. Fixed. It’s steady rhythm beat perfectly and pulsated as the blood eagerly circulated across the surface of the pond.

Like many nights before she fell asleep on the sandy banks as nature’s gentle lullaby eased her troubled soul. The orchestra of crickets and the consonant rhythm of the cicadas were made whole by the chorus of coyotes as they howled in the distance. As she slept, the hackneyed little black book sat nestled under her arm.

Eve looked down into her mirror brushing her thin, ashy, hair knotted, and tangled from the neglect of forgetfulness and sloth behavior as she carelessly threw on a t-shirt and sweatpants. As she clumsily rushed downstairs she could smell the buttery aroma of pancakes flowing up the stairwell as she began her descent.

She sat down, greeted by a stack of buttermilk pancakes dripping with thick golden syrup. The syrup trickled down the side of the stack like slow moving magma, warm, and unadulterated. As she picked up her fork and began to eat her mother began her morning barrage of questioning.

“Are you ready for the big announcement?” Her mother asked as she sat down at the table hugging her coffee mug.

Trying to ease her waves of anxiety as she used the side of her fork to cut up a piece of sweet pancake. Eve replied, “I don’t want to get my hopes up too much…” She said with a sigh that also echoed a bit of arrogance tinted with humility. Deep down her heart thumped with loud pounds of fright coursing through her body.

As Eve took another bite she recalled in her mind regretfully

Six months earlier her English teacher had approached her after class one day after reading a short story she had written. “Eve, this is exceptional,” he had commended her while pushing the nose of his wire rimmed glasses back up closer to his furrowing gray eyebrows. He fumbled the handwritten pages in his hands, rereading the passages, getting lost in the words while he was speaking to her, "I would like to enter this into an upcoming contest. It would be an excellent opportunity for college applications.”

With unfettered hesitancy Eve replied “ I don’t-”

She paused for a moment looking off into her mind. The warnings from the little black book leaped out at her confronting her thoughts. She knew this felt wrong, twisted, an invasion, and dangerous.

“Eve?” the teacher questioned bringing her snapping back into reality

“Oh! Sorry, uh maybe... I'll have to think a little.”

After all, the book was Quinn’s, the story was Eve’s writing, but she had used the book.

Perhaps it was greed or maybe simply her ever present ignorance surrounding it, but after learning the prize was $20,000 she reluctantly entered her story into the contest.

After all, it was just a dumb note on the inside of a dumb little black notebook.

Eve had almost forgotten about the entry when two months later she had received a notice on ivory parchment with raised gold lettering, that she had been selected as one of the top five entrants. Eve had read this notice, imagining it as some absurd story plotline or something out of a fiction book written for children

Nostalgia filled the air as Quinn continued to read through her sisters writing in the little black book.

____

Eve thought back to that cold autumn evening several years earlier.

“Evie!!!!” Come quick!” She remembered her sister, eight years old, innocent and excitable hollering her name from downstairs. Eve entered the living room and found Quinn with a look of frantic anxiety perched in the oversized recliner .

“What is it? She asked, filling with excitement.

“Look Evie!” She exclaimed as she pulled out a little black book from the antique bookcase that sat adjacent to the recliner. As Quinn opened the book the pages were blank, but as Quinn traced her fingers on the pages words began to slowly appear.

Eve shook her head in disbelief. “Give it! “She unsuccessfully tried to snatch the book from Quinn’s hands.

“No!!’ It’s mine! I found it! Look there’s words on the inside too! “ Both girls sat in awe as they read the ominous warning.

“Evie!!!” Quinn screamed, pulling and clinging to her older sister pointing to a dark shadow towering over head casting bleakness and an endless traumatizing fear across the room. The fear resonating like a dense and heavy fog engulfing the children whole like a snake swallowing its prey.

Eve jerked her head in the direction of Quinn’s quavering finger. The man was wearing a wide-brimmed black hat. The shadow of his hat called attention to his modest black suit. As Eve followed his horrifying outline she was then drawn to his icy blue eyes. He saw her, all of her, frozen in an infinite loop. She saw herself here, in front of this bookcase, helpless, forever.

As the girls watched he turned and dissipated into the wall dragging his heavy walking cane at his side, it’s pointed blade making sharp scraping noises dragged along the floor.

For month’s Quinn had been too scared to even go near the bookcase. Eve was determined to give her sister some peace and assuage her fears. As Quinn sat watching television one evening, Eve brought her the yellow and orange bracelet, “I made you this bracelet. Whenever you feel scared run your fingers across the braids and know I am always with you to protect you.”

Eve had nearly forgotten about the little book until Late one night when Quinn was presumably sleeping at the pond she had snuck in and found the book tucked under the mattress and carefully tore out three pages from the book.

Late one night when Quinn was presumably sleeping at the pond she had snuck in and found the book tucked under the mattress and carefully tore out three pages from the book. Without any other than curiosity.

Quinn awakened, perplexed with sand in hair, the smell of pond water, and her puppy rambunctiously licking her face.. “Really Max? Now?” The relentless puppy continued his plight until she finally sat up “Finnnne..ok.” Max was a ten week old brown and white spotted cocker spaniel. He was, to say the least… annoying. No matter how Quinn tried he would not house train. He would not sit. He would simply destroy everything.

She had convinced her mom she would do all of his training and care- he was an early birthday present in March for her 14th birthday. She had been overjoyed when her mother brought in Max after school one day letting him run towards her, wagging his tiny docked tail. “I will love you forever!” A promise she still kept, but did sometimes question.

She stood up, surveyed the bank and finally spotted the little black book, she dusted off it’s jacket, slid it into her pack and with Max at her side she approached the house. She could smell pancakes and hear her mother and Eve talking at the table.

Eve was staring at the screen. Her mother was screaming, hugging her, exalted, reading the screen loudly as Quinn and Max entered the kitchen. “1st prize- National Young Author of the Year- Eve Ball. Grand Prize- $20,000. “

Quinn stared at Eve. Waiting. Waiting for her to look up. When she raised her head it was as if Eve could read her mind “Dear God, what did you do?”. Quinn ran upstairs, threw her pack on her pale pink comforter and quickly pulled out the little black book.

Her breath fell to the floor like a large boulder being flung to the ground, large and heavy, a thud so loud it was almost audible. As she looked down at the pages she saw what she had failed to see the thousands of times she had opened this book. About three-fourths of the way through she ran her fingers along the jagged edge. She turned back to the inscription in the front cover and traced along the worn letters. The words seemed to lift and swirl as she reread them:

May this book find thou joy 'i it’s stories. May thou find tranquility 'i it’s cantons. As to whomever this book belongs, they are the owner of it’s tales. These tales are not for gain, and the transgressors of such shall find their fate met with tragedy and woe.

Quinn, showered, trying to wash the fear from her soul. Watching the soap swirl into the drain, much like her fear, swimming and over -taking her thoughts, the soap on the top in a white frothy layer gave way to the water undulating below as it made its way into the pit of the drain.

The commotion of Eve’s success had grown eerily quiet as Quinn walked into the kitchen. Max rushed past her chasing a tennis ball and causing a commotion. She could hear her mother comforting a crying Eve in the next room over. “I don’t understand why you are crying, honey, please.. This is great news…” her voice trailed off and all that was left was the echoing of sobs and sniffles throughout the house.

Eve’s hands drooped down to her knees now embedded on the hard wooden floor, “Quinn,” Eve blurted out startled from not noticing her presence before.

“What's happening?” Quinn inquisitively responded both sympathetic and completely confused in the current happenings.

Eve tried to say something for a moment before pausing, she lifted herself from the tear-speckled floor after noticing her embarrassing and childish reactions.

“I'm sorry...I just kind of got overwhelmed,” Eve tried to calmly and passively say whilst wiping away her tears.

Quinn with queried eyes stared at Eve and then to her mother who was also least to say puzzled with Eve’s sudden outburst and recollection.

“Honey, are you feeling alright?” Their mother began to say while examining Eve’s face checking for some sign of illness to explain away Eve’s despair.

“I'm fine mom, I just was reminded of something” Eve sheepishly looked at Quinn and her little bracelet wrapped onto her thin pale ankle.

“Quinn, could we spend tonight at the pond like when we were kids?” Eve asked, smiling slightly with clearly watering eyes reflecting the icy blue color in her irises.

“Sure…” Eve replied slightly curious but mostly concerned.