The Dream Called Story

I Basket of Gifts

Wherein a girl is chosen by a dream, and given the gift to fulfill her Story

Once, there was a girl by the name of Quiet. She was like any other girl and boy who ever lived, except that one night, a peculiar yet wonderful thing happened to her: She was visited by a dream. But it was not like the usual dreams that filled our slumbers. This one was a living dream, and it had a name. It was called Story.

Story wanted to be written, and it chose her.

Quiet was given a Tome of empty pages. Two tasks she must fulfill for her dream:

To fill the pages with words, and

To make the Tome shine bright enough for others to see.

Quiet was beyond delight, that out of all the boys and girls, it was she who had been chosen. Having been favoured by Story, she was no longer just a girl but a Dreamer, and she was determined to do her best to be worthy of the dream that chose her.

And like all the other Dreamers, she would need all the help she could to fulfill her dream. This was what the Sanctum was for, and so she grabbed her basket, and off she went.

The Sanctum was the place all children go to upon awakening their dream. Inside was the Elder, the bestower of gifts. Quiet offered her basket to him, and he placed his hand over it. At once it became heavy. Quiet thanked the Elder and left.

On her way home, she thought of nothing but the gift inside her basket, of what it could be, what magical and precious thing she was then in possession of.

At last she looked into her basket upon arriving home. There was her gift, the gift that was meant for her Story, the gift that was destined for her and her only – a Heart.

Smiling, Quiet took the Heart and embraced it. She was going to cherish her gift. She placed it in her chest, and felt its warmth filling her body. Serenity overcame her, as though everything was as it should be, and that she was in tune with the world.

She was thrilled to begin chasing her dream, and she was indeed excited at first. However, it was never easy to pursue one's dream. It turned out that words were hard to come by for her. Quiet searched for words she could give Story, but the words fled from her. It never occurred to her how elusive they could be.

Quiet had a lot of heart, but she realized she was not very smart, and for this reason the words would not come, try as she might. She would beckon to the words, and the words would scurry away. Quiet would keep at it, though.

It was what she was meant to do, after all, and it was what made her truly happy. She was going to do all she could to catch as many words to put in her Tome until it shone.

And then she saw the words the other Dreamers collected. Such colourful words their Tomes contained, and with such ease they gathered them. Quiet wondered why the words came easier for them, while they would not for her.

What could they have had that she did not? If only she could see what was in their baskets, what gift they had that must be better than what she had been given. But to look into the basket of another Dreamer was forbidden; it always had been.

The temptation grew, as the mystery gnawed at her gut. To sneak a look was simple enough. No one would catch her. She must know what it was they had. For her dream, she reassured herself, she would do it for Story.

Quiet peeked into the basket of another Dreamer.

For this particular basket she saw two gifts, that of Wit and Abundance. And then, there was something else underneath those gifts. She reached down to take a closer look, and her brows furrowed at what she saw. It read 'Talent'.

At once she understood this as the answer to obtaining the words for Story. She went back to the Sanctum and asked the Elder for the same gift, the one of Talent. But the Elder shook his head. Talent was not a gift, and thus he could not give it to her or any other Dreamer.

As it was, only few were blessed with gifts that could nurture Talent, and sadly, Quiet was not among them.

And she was told that she should never have looked. It was forbidden for a reason, and she would come to know this reason now that she had broken her vow.

Disheartened, Quiet went home and retrieved her Tome. She stared at its blank pages, and still, the words would not come. It would not be so hard, if it weren't that she saw how easy the other Dreamers caught their words, and how lovely those words were. Hers were so plain, so scarce.

The frustration clouded her mind. Whereas it had been filled with daydreams and hope, now a fog of doubt crept into its corners. Why had she not been granted the gifts that could foster Talent? She clearly needed it to finish Story and reach her dream.

Quiet started to think, that it could all have been a mistake. The dream that had visited her was a farce, and to continue pursuing it would be pointless, for she was never fit to fulfill it in the first place.

The realization crushed her, and right then her Heart broke into two. And she cried.

For fear of wounding her Heart further, she took it out of her chest and locked it away instead. It would be safer this way. Her Heart was all that she had that mattered. It was the only gift she had, and she would curse herself should she let anything else happen to it.

Years wore on, the warmth missing from her body with her Heart gone. Quiet hardly noticed, because she did not miss her dream. Rather, it was a painful memory she wished to forget. She had grown so used to living without the warmth, it was like it was never there to begin with. The memory of Story, however, just won't vanish.

It stayed and haunted her, though with the passing years its voice grew weaker and weaker, yet it was there.

The passing years did not only weaken Story's voice – it also awakened a resentment within Quiet. She grew to hating her Heart, a gift that failed to serve its purpose. Utterly useless, it was.

And she hated Story, why it had mistaken her at all. She felt as though it was a curse, for it to have her forever chasing after it.

Some days, she would pass by the locked drawer that contained her Heart, and she would hear it weeping ever so quietly. Some times, she would see her Tome together with toys and other forgotten treasures. She would open its pages, and attempt to catch a few words for it again, if only for amusement.

Some days, words would listen to Quiet beckoning to them and come near, but mostly they remained at a far off distance.

Upon hearing the Story Artisans were in town, she thought of showing her Tome just for old times' sake. Perhaps they could help her find a way to reawaken her dream and fulfill it at last.

While waiting in line, Quiet heard the words the Artisans spoke of the stories before hers, and she was stricken with dread.

Though she resented her Heart, she realized it was still very dear to her. Should the same words be spoken of her Story, she feared her Heart would finally shatter into a thousand pieces, in which she would never be able to mend it back, a Heart that would be forever broken.

And so Quiet stepped back and retreated, giving up once more. 

Dedicated to @Shiro_Nekojita (Isabella)

From the storyteller: As a Dreamer, what gift do you think you possess? Comment your answer below ^__~

Thank you for reading this humble fable. The tale does not end there, and in the next chapter we shall see what becomes of Quiet. Do not lose hope, not just yet.