Fiction Friday: A Far-flung Blog Collection

What Ranges Between Us

Turning the corner, I stop short, bumping into Rowan's chest. His eyes widen.

"Rowan!" I gasp, struggling to regain composure.

"Oh! Hi Azra." We stand there for a few seconds. It's enough. Staring down at me, with his impossibly blue eyes, my breath catches. His body tenses.

"I've got to go." He strides past me before I have a chance to reply, he's out of sight. I sigh.

I know what he's thinking.

She's just like the rest.

He's wrong.

I loved him once. That anchor doesn't just disappear. I saw sides of Rowan no one else has. I felt his gentleness. He showed me his vulnerability. My ears heard whispered poetry, so sweet and intimate.

The thought makes me warm, while my throat chokes.

Rowan frightens people. He's too different. There's a range of difference that works for people.

I'm normal. My skin is chestnut brown, like a lot of people. I have dark kinky hair that sits about my head in a halo. I have brown eyes. I'm average. I'm normal. I'm the middle of the range.

Then there's a man in a nearby settlement, a little ways down the main road, and his skin is as dark as wet earth. It's an unusual color, but it's still in the range of normal. His features are right. He's average height and everyone likes him fine.

Moe – Rowan's sister - is on the other side of the range. Her dark blonde ringlets and nut brown skin are perfect with her hazel eyes. She might be at the edge of acceptable, but her features are gentle. Moe's cheeks are soft. Her nose is wide. Her lips are full.

Moe is right and people love her - not like her brother.

Rowan's features are sharp – like they were cut with a knife. His eyes are so unnaturally light – so piercing the only thing that comes close is moonlit snow in January. That would be strange enough, but there's something about how he looks into people and around them – it makes me think of hawks.

But it isn't just his sharp face, light eyes or white skin, or even the fact that he's impossibly tall compared to most people.

His appearance marks him, this is true, but it's more than that.

I saw it when we were little. He seemed more natural in the forest away from people than he did in town. It sounds crazy to say – but it was almost as if the trees moved around him. It was almost like he understood the birds, insects, and animals – as though they were friends. They responded to him in ways they didn't other people.

Sure, I mean, he still spooked creatures on occasion. Sometimes they still would run off, or give threat displays. But it wasn't unusual for a bird to land on his arm when he was sitting still. Chipmunks, newts, rabbits, and frogs would come up to his feet and the bravest would eat from his hands.

I never told anyone what I saw. I wasn't sure if it would make people more or less afraid, but I didn't want to risk it. I did love him once.

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Azra Williams is a character from the WIP novel, THE CHANGELING TREE.