jessesprague Presents: Sleeping Gods

Author's Note: Hello all you lovely Wattpaders! This is my third Block Party and I can't express how much it means to me to be included. And my sincere thanks go out to KellyAnneBlount for her continuing effort to put on this party. Wattpad is an amazing community and I'm proud to be part of it with all of you.

I don't have anything really organized to say this go-round. It's been a rough year and I'd like to share a story with you...but first...a peak at why. For a lot of us, writing is an escape from the world. I know it always has been for me. I think that's why when I started writing it was all fantasy (and for those of you who know me, this may seem odd, but really I haven't strayed as far as you might think...everything I write is still fantastical!) This year has been a really hard one for me.

So many awful things happened out in the world this year. So many people are in pain. I wish I could reach out and help all of them but the only tool I've ever had is my words. Writing is what I have...it's what I'm good at. So it made this year that much harder when I realized I couldn't find the stories inside me.

Where do the stories even come from? I started really thinking about that and looking at what I've written to see. What sort of inspiration is enough to draw a story out? These are honest questions. I can sort of answer for myself but I realize I have no idea what really drives the other writers on here. What makes anyone write? Dreams set to paper, inspiration from music or pictures? Real life experiences that burn for further expression?

Regardless, this year all the stories I meant to write dried up on my keyboard. None of it seemed to matter anymore. So I did something unthinkable.

I wrote a story just for me.

I didn't stop to think about audience, or plot anything, I didn't even know the character names until I started writing. I poured out all of the hurt that had gathered inside me and made it into something solid.

I've been unsure what to do with this piece of work. I can't imagine selling it in any traditional fashion but I wasn't really sure there was any sort of audience for it here. Oddly, being invited to join the Block Party sort of brought me full circle. I realized that when I post here, when I visit Wattpad, it has never been entirely about an "audience" that way. I'm here because I want to share with this wonderful community. I'm here because it's one of the few places I feel truly at home.

So I've decided to share, here, with all of you. Obviously not the whole story will be on the BlockParty, but the rest will be posted to my profile. I adore you all. I adore this community...and I know that none of this has really said much...but that's why I write fiction. I'd be a horrid motivational speaker!

LET SLEEPING GOD'S LIE

Danny's breathe fogs on the window and I watch that instead of him—instead of meeting his eyes. The white pool of condensations spreads, a plague across the glass melding at the edges with the haze of grey fog outside. The low hanging mist darkens as night approaches and hides the macabre scene outside our rented cabin.

Apparently being hidden is not enough. Danny might not see what is out there but the memory of it sharpens his words—focuses him into a single pinpoint of focus. I wish he'd be quiet.

I'm tired. So tired.

Why won't he stop talking? The black rims of his glasses make a shadow on the glass and his reflected mop of brown hair move as he gesticulates along with his fervent speech.

The words are like the fog. They hang there, cluttering the air.

Everything he says is a variation of the same. "We need to leave." "Pack your things." "Get up." "Let's go."

I don't even care anymore if he leaves me here. Will I tomorrow? I can't make myself care. We've been here sixteen days. It feels longer and those first few days of romance seem to belong to another life. Every day I have less and less fight in me.

Danny wants to get away.

I want to sink under the mist. To stop trying and just let the whispers carry me off.

"Are you even listening?" Danny says. His hand touches my arm, a smear of black paint remains dried on one of his knuckles. The fact he's still painting at night tells me all I need to know. He's as lost here as I am.

I focus on the window and the distant shapes moving in the fog. Yellow eyes glow for a moment then blink out.

Danny's fingers dig into my arm.

I almost tell him that it hurts, but what does it matter?

"We can't stay here—we won't survive," Danny says. I used to love his voice. It's deep, slow, sonorous. But now a hectic speed clutters the usually soothing tone.

I sigh.

"We'll die here, Vi," he says.

We'll die out in the fog, too. But I don't say this. At least in this cabin it's warm and we have running water. There's nothing here to rip out my beating heart or shred my flesh under its obsidian claws.

And if Danny leaves, I can eat the food that he leaves me every day. It arrives at moonrise and at sunrise, the woodsy odor of my caretaker lingering in the air splices with the scent of raw meat. Danny tosses the offering out before I can eat it. But the cabin's supply of canned food in the pantry is running low. Danny only packed for us to be here two weeks.

A romantic getaway during my school break. Time to work on my Master's Thesis. Time for him to finish his pieces for his coming art show. It had been such a great idea, coming here. Until it wasn't.

"Vie!" Danny yells.

I shrug.

"Get your coat on, we're getting the hell out of this death trap."

I don't answer. I turn and walk with my head lowered to my room. The wood floors are clean and shiny, except for a few brown cracked smears. This no longer looks like a handprint. My foot flakes a bit of the crust away as I pass by the brown leather sofa in the center of the cabin's main room. I head past the kitchenette and into the second bedroom—my room, now.

I shut the door behind me.

The room is packed with luggage, and my laptop lays shattered against the wall. The crack in the screen distorts my reflection, making my mouth appear wide and monstrous.

I lock the door.

"Vi!" he yells.

I step onto the top of Danny's suitcase—it's empty and caves in—and then hop onto the bed. A furry rug that used to be out in the main room lays over the top of the starched coverlet. I rub my face into the fur. It's almost like hugging my dog, though the rug is probably synthetic.

Danny would take care of my dog, Hurly, if Danny made it home and I didn't. Is there still a home to make it back to? Maybe, all the world is just like this. Whatever those things outside are, who is to stay they are confined to this strip of Arizona desert?

Or perhaps those nightmare creatures are stuck here with Danny and I (and the corpses outside...like a garden spread in front of our romantic getaway.)

Maybe that's why they left us alive...maybe, they can't leave here until they are released.

The hairs of the rug tickle the inside of my nose.

"I will go without you," Danny yells. The door handle jiggles, then jerks. "We can't just wait here to die."

That's a stupid statement. Of course we can.

"Vi!" Something thuds against the door.

The rug is starting to smell like me. I wish it didn't. It should have an animal scent. Maybe if I toss it outside tonight he will shred it, leaving his mark on the remnants. That would be nicer to cuddle.

If only Hurly were here instead. My big goofy pup. I could lay my head on his warm side and hear his heart patter and the occasional airy sigh as he twitched in his sleep. But Hurly isn't here.

"I'm not kidding, I'll leave you!" Danny pounds on the door.

I close my eyes and snuggle deeper and curl a hand over my stomach.

Something crashes into the outside of the door than a few moments later a door slams. I can tell by where the sound comes from it's the other bedroom—not the front door.

He didn't leave me.

Am I sorry? Glad?

I can't find a part of me that cares.

Thank you so much for checking out my post and for being the wonderful loving community that you are!

★ ★ ★

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