A big willow tree once sat in this garden, on top of this small hill, capturing the hearts of hundreds. Even among the beautiful peonies and tulips that surrounded it, few would deny its unparalleled beauty. One fateful day, THE fateful day, when the bombs from the continent over flew their way down, the people were still laughing, smiling, living.
Only but a single moment later, the tree, alongside its onlookers, succumbed to its unfortunate fate: charred black, burnt to a million particles of ash. The smoke never did vanish, only collected into a thick fog that perpetually surrounded the premises. A faded sign peeked out of it, reading “Firefly Garden.”
A gaunt man emerged from that mist, eyes opening as the gray returned to his vision. The plethora of dried blood seemingly held his white dress shirt together. The black suit he wore had numerous holes, varying in size like moon craters, but never small enough to fend off the cold. Overtop hung, to well below ankles, a long trench coat, reminiscent of the forgotten western sheriff. The one rickety, chipped cane he held in his left stopped him from toppling over. He had the grim expression of a starving vulture, with eyes that saw in monochrome. Orange-hot ashes stained the dirt around him, but his leather-torn boots provided him with little protection.
He felt no heat.
Unintelligible groans forced their way out of his esophagus, alongside a harsh fit of coughs. Memories flickered in his mind like light bulbs in a pattern lost to time. His home, his family, his name, all whisked away. No, it’s more accurate to say he had no need for it, like a lost cave-dweller accepting their fate and whisking away their lantern’s light.
The man shambled through the night until stumbling into this place. Hungry and exhausted, he set up camp there, eating torn bark from the grand tree he sat in front of. He paid no heed to the charcoal bits. A rumbling could be heard from his stomach, yet the lack of sustenance proved to be an afterthought for him. Rat skeletons littered the lot surrounding him, skeletons he used his cane to kick away. He looked to the sky. Gray clouds had long since made their home up there. Weariness sat in the ridges of the man’s eyelids.
Droplets began to fall. He searched around: all the shelter had crumbled to scraps. He tried to form some sort of shelter, but the sawdust and pebbles proved too brittle for materials, trickling down into the ground as particles. The man stomped them in frustration. He resorted to using his coat as tarp, which he drew over the nearly-broken-off branches of the willow tree. He curled up and laid down on his side, with his coat a few centimeters from his body. His eyes saw what could’ve been a beautiful landscape, yet the rain turned it into a fractured, inky mess, like an old television with static. From the top down, the tarp formed a long hexagonal shape. From the heavens, it looked no different from a target, as the small droplets transformed into a furious torrent. He gazed at the sight one final time before shutting his eyes.
The man opened them back up. His eyes seared with intense pain, yet he did not care, as he stared at the lost sun flourishing above him. Wind, real wind, like the wind that whisks by your shoulders at your mother’s house, wind that excites the hair on your arms, sat snug around his neck. The sky shined a deep pearl blue, while the terrain had a blinding vibrance that caused a vibration in the man. A vibration that felt more like a shove with each passing moment.
The man awoke from his dream. Disoriented, he shot up, his head hitting his coat and bumping it off. Just before it covered his entire sight, he caught a glimpse of legs. His survival instincts almost kicked into gear, before realizing they were strangely hairy.
The coat dropped to the ground as the man stared at the dog in front of him. The man wore an expression of distaste and shuttered empathy. His eyes went up and down, as if he was some museum curator judging a product. Its yellow fur was reminiscent of a golden retriever, although much sicklier, with dirt and grime caked in. Dried bandages wrapped around its body, stained with blood. A silver dog tag hung crooked from its neck.
Suddenly, the dog leapt toward the man. He put his hands up, but the dog’s legs pinned his arms down. “You-” he yelled, his limbs clambering around, before spit and saliva trickled down his face. Sputtering in surprise, the man tried to scramble up on his feet, but his bad knee did not allow him to. “You dirty…filthy mutt!” He forcefully pushed him away, the dog landing on its hind legs before assuming a seated position.
The man felt exasperated, his chest tightening into unfamiliar knots. He turned around, swiped his cane from beside the tree, and turned back to find the dog strolling toward him. He raised his cane, poised to strike down as a judge would with a gavel. Just before nailing him, the man stopped.
The dog’s eyes were rigid, unwavering, not too unlike the raised stick above, but still soft, gleaming, like little marbles reflecting sunlight. They started to roll around in the man’s head: where has he seen those eyes before? Suddenly, a muddled flash of images rushed through him, like an overclocked film reel. Frames of the past left just the same as it came into view. He started to thrash about, protruding his cane further above him and cutting the air into haphazard bits, before a single word focused it all.
Here, on this patch of baked soil, in this vitriolic garden, the man remembered his name.
Some time passed. “Sol, huh?” he finally said, looking at the name on his tag. “Hope you like tree for lunch” he said monotonously, climbing onto his feet and down the hill, his chest unraveling a bit, his cane bearing the weight of this decision.
Sol was a strange dog, the man thought. His bandaged legs creaked with every step, yet he continued to jump at every stick the man threw, bringing back the ones he could. One time the man faked his throw, and he cackled at his confusion. He did it once more, and again, he had a fit of laughter that bellowed throughout the garden. Finally, he poked him with his cane. “Looking for this?” he said mischievously, holding up the stick he palmed in his hand. Sol, without missing a beat, hurled himself toward the man.
He ignored the stick, landing on the man’s chest and began to furiously lick him. “Oh, you-” he started, his hands raised up defensively, before grabbing Sol’s sides and flipping him onto his back. “Gotchu!”, he exclaimed, smirking in absolute confidence. His grin gradually blurred as he noticed the firm feeling in his hands.
Sol’s rib bones stuck outward, like boomerangs stuffed into a balloon.
The man grimaced. He turned sideways and flopped onto the ground. He gripped his cane. The sky overhead looked just the same as yesterday, and the day before that, and the year before that. Dead. Lifeless. Like the closed curtains of a shut-in, never to be opened again.
The film reel started up again, sputtering and spitting. The same images rolled by, one, of two children running past, with a cool breeze flourishing through an open window. And then it all burnt away.
It pained him to remember, the knots in his chest tightening into elaborate catacombs. His grip on his cane tightened and tightened, until, eventually, he let go.
Hesitantly, like approaching a terrified deer, he reached toward the sky. Time had swollen the skin on his hands, his knuckles had caved in long ago, and his fingernails were permanently filed from a lifetime of survival. Still, he kept reaching.
“Come back…” he quietly muttered, his eyes dimming and closing.
Then, the man felt a sharp sensation pulsate through his hand, shaking the knots. He opened his eyes. From his side, Sol had placed his paw on his palm. He had closed his eyes, silent and still. His claws were sharp and uneven, digging into his skin. Despite this, the man smiled.
“Where are we going, boy?” the man shouted. Sol had taken it upon himself to lead the man somewhere. He barked in response. A surplus of mud had collected and piled onto the ground. Both Sol and the man strolled through it. The constant gray skies have robbed any exact indicator of the time of day, only with the slight change in light could the man guess it was around evening time.
Sol stopped in front of a wall of fog. He turned back to the man, who was unsure of continuing. “Sol, it’s kind of scary in there,” he remarked, pointing at it. Sol kept his smiling expression, while turning around and shooting into that thick mist, disappearing.
The man felt the heat from his feet, as he propulsed into the fog. “Sol!” he shouted, blindly scrambling in. Desperation and anxiety perched on his shoulders, like two crows looking for a man that cheated death, whispering in his ears, a fantasy that could’ve been.
Then, the man emerged from the fog.
Those two crows flew off as he spotted Sol curled up in the center of a clearing. The “forest”, which stretched to lengths beyond sight, looked bare and exposed, like a furious hurricane had torn through the area. From a birds-eye view, it would look like a jigsaw puzzle where every piece was cracked and crumpled. Still, the man felt a tremor in his heart he had not felt in a long, long time.
“Sol, what the hell?” he shouted, although his frustration faded as his golden smile peered through. Sol laid on top of a small pile of dirt. He had a curious expression, as if beckoning the man to do something. The man laid down beside him.
He patted his fur down, trying to remove the twigs and twine. Sol closed his eyes. “You are one hell of a dog, you know that?” he said gently. “I’m glad you are here, right now, right with me.” The man continued to pet him. “I just want you to know that, okay?” Sol’s eyes stayed shut. “Sol?” Shut. The man heard squawking around him but ignored it. “Fell asleep, huh? I get it. It’s been a long, long day.”
The man reached out into the air and grabbed a falling, charred leaf. “Hey, you know, I wish I met you sooner. Before the bombs came. You and me, Sol and Dante, best friends for life!” Dante laughed, his fingers gently feeling the surface of the leaf. “That would’ve been the best, right buddy?” He tried to shake him awake, but Sol would not respond. Panic began to settle inside his chest, as the squawking grew in intensity. “Sol. Sol!” he cried, putting his ear to his chest, listening for any iota of sound.
He might as well have put his ear up to one of the hollow trees surrounding them.
Dante was quiet. He was quiet for a long time, his shoulders heaving up and down, his eyes widening and closing. In an act of rage, he grabbed a branch from the ground and hurled it into the trees. They did not budge, and neither did Sol. Tears welled up, yet no fluid drizzled out. His heart settled into a familiar dead calm. He looked to the sky, gazing longingly at the dull clouds, before laying down on his back, and closing his eyes, prepared to fall asleep forever.
…
…
…
Then, blobs of light appeared in front of his shut eyes, like an unfocused camera pointed at a busy intersection. Dante opened them back up.
Fireflies flew all around him like a lantern festival. Kaleidoscopic colors seeped into every pore of the atmosphere. They danced and frolicked around, like children playing in a garden. A low whirring could be heard echo throughout, but all sound faded for Dante as he took in the sight. The clearing looked animated, pure, alive. Even the broken trees regained their youth. Then, in Dante’s mind, a single image came into focus.
It was a family portrait, taken into a field of flowers. His two children sat in the center, beaming ear to ear, while his wife and him stood closely behind, their hands on their shoulders. It was sunny that day, he remembered. A tear began its descent down his face. The knots in his chest untangled into roots. He glanced at Sol.
Under all those tiny lights, Sol looked no different from the sun.
Dante chose not to bury him, opting to cover him with his coat instead, leaving his cane next to him. He took off his dog tag and gazed at it longingly. His heart trembled in syncopated rhythms, before he stashed it in his pocket. A cool breeze began to sway around his shoulders. He gathered his composure once more and walked toward the exit of the clearing, the film reel rolling in tandem.
Dante’s eyes were soft, gleaming, like little marbles reflecting sunlight.
Brandon Tu is from Philadelphia, a junior attending Franklin Towne Charter High School. He wrote this piece for his creative writing class.