Short Stories

Number 5: Adventures Not of the Heart

    This dedicated to my Mom, who is completely insane, but I love her anyway. There are many references to J.R.R. Tolkien's masterpiece, The Lord of the Rings. I hope you enjoy reading!

     Sara had been baking for the past eight hours. 48 muffins, 92 chocolate cupcakes, three berry pies, and over twelve dozen chocolate chip cookies; yet she still had tears streaming down her face. She couldn't stop them, nothing could at this point. Not only was she cheated on by the only boy she had ever loved, but she was going to go into a sugar coma while eating her feel-better desserts during a Lord Of the Rings binge watch to rule all other marathons.

     Not to mention she lost her One Ring replica! It could be in a pie, but Sara wasn't completely sure when it disappeared, Sméagol would be so disappointed. The thought of him shaking his wrinkled head at her in disappointment had her dying inside.

    Maybe that's why Colbie had cheated on her, she was a total nerd who had hobbits-or ex-hobbits-comfort her instead of humans. Her mom didn't count as a human in that sense though. It took a magical unicorn of a person to raise a weirdo like her on their own. The magical unicorn was also not going to like the amount of sweet treats that filled their kitchen and were beginning to flow into the dining and living room. Or the sound complaints her eighty year old neighbors were probably filing with the cops because she liked her bass to shake the house. But Sara had had a rough day, so she could do whatever she wanted.

    "Sara, I swear to sweet baby Jesus if you don't shut off that crap music and explain why there are pies on the white couch this instant, I will decapitate you and use your head as decoration for next Halloween!" Mom was a total magical unicorn, even when she was yelling about dismembering people.

    "Look, Momma, Colbie cheated on me, with Piper-"

    "The blonde demon cheerleader that has the wrong color of foundation?" Mom always had an eloquent way of describing people.

    "That's the one. Anyways, I needed someway to vent my problems and I can't stop making cookies or crying at this point. I should drop out and become a hermit, I'll turn my room into a cave and only come out for cookies and apple juice." Sara had thought this through in detail in the past, but it had never been so tempting.

    "I told you Colbie was a dick sucking loser-"

    "Momma!"

    "What? Anyways, why do you need a good for nothing boyfriend when you have so much to offer the world and he has none? He is a talent leech who is hell-bent of bleeding good people dry."

    "So I'm supposed to be the only seventeen year old girl who's alone in life? Literally everyone else worthwhile is taken, and life really sucks for the social pariahs that only have friends to eat with at lunch. I don't even have that many friends!"

    "You're dramatic and I love you for it," Mom said with her smile that could light up a room and make everything okay. "I'm just saying you have so much already, why do you need a boulder to make keeping your head above water that much harder when you're still learning how to swim?" Her eyes lit up with a manic brilliance. "I'm using that metaphor in my next book! It's mine, I'm unofficially copywriting it right now."

    Mom wrote self help books. The kind that stay-at-home moms with rich and unfaithful husbands listened to on audiobook while they cleaned the kitchen of their mansion when the seven kids were at school. Mom had been that wife years ago, but at one child in and the fourth mistress/secretary newly kicked out of Sara's dad's hedge fund company, Mom decided to change somethings. The first thing she changed was her relationship status.

    "Momma," Sara mumbled whilst simultaneously stuffing another cookie into her mouth, "How did you leave Dad and still manage to be happy? You married him, but I only dated Colbie for seven months!"

    Mom looked torn as to whether or not start a feminist tirade about how Sara needed no man or sit on the couch and cry with her. She chose the latter as she moved the pies to the floor, grabbed a fuzzy blanket, and joined Sara and the cookies on the couch.

    "Honestly Sara," she murmured, "I went on the  adventure of a lifetime and sent that asshole postcards from every amazing place I went. You were there too. You were one then, I made sure he saw what he was missing out on as you grew up. He didn't want either of us, so I made sure he saw a hell of a lot of us."

    Mom had always had a fierce determination that Sara wished she possessed. She might have said everything with a sad and wistful smile on her face, but there was no chance of anyone missing the fire in her eyes or the unstoppable pride in her voice. Mom was determined, but Sara was motivated by sheer insanity and extreme levels of sugar.

    "Momma, you are a beautiful force of nature. Wanna go on an adventure, you perfect summer storm you? You can write your next book about it." Sara was getting into this. The more she though about, the better traveling sounded. "We'll make Colbie wish he never cheated on me, make him want me, but I won't take him back. I'll be the protagonist of a story that history will never forget! What do you say, Momma, want to do something completely insane? There's three weeks left until school starts, we could go anywhere or do anything until then!"

    Mom looked quite pensive, she was staring at Gandalf on the tv while she decided whether or not to support the biggest and most amazing decision that had ever crossed paths with Sara. This spontaneous trip was the thing that would stop the crying and end the obsessive baking, all she needed was a three letter word of confirmation.

    Finally, after a short eternity, Mom looked up. The steely determination in her eyes made Sara feel ridiculously hopeful inside. "Hell yeah. Go pack for everything Sara, I'm looking for someone to share an adventure with."

I hope you enjoyed reading this! It was so much fun to write, and, if I'm ever up to the daunting challenge, I could write another part or two illustrating their adventure. I'll have to think on that. Hugs for everyone!