When I reached the garden, there she was, rubbing her bum as if she had just slipped on some ice, but otherwise, didn’t have a single scratch on her. This of course was my first cause of alarm, that and her outfit. She was wearing a black skirt, a white t-shirt, and a black denim jacket that had the words “Amber Trade Co. 2059” sewn in across the shoulders in pink thread, black and purple knee high stockings, with steal toe boots, and brown leather gloves.

I approached cautiously, as this was all very suspect, and in an even, nonchalant tone of voice I asked if she was ok.

“Oh yeah, I’m fine, thanks for askin’!” she said as bubbly as golden retriever.
“That was quite a fall,” I observed, “You aren’t hurt at all?” She must be one of them, she can’t be human.
“Yeah, over a mile I’d say! Must be some kind of record. I fell off my sky-ship, doin’ repairs, ya know? I thought I was a goner this time!” She blushed, looked to the eastern sky, then down at my vegetables. “Say are these your turnips and rutabagas?”
“Well they were….” I said, taking in the vegetological carnage.
“Oh.” She paused. “I’m sorry. Hey at least I landed on vegetables nobody likes!”
“Well Im a vegetable farmer and I don’t even know know if turnips an rutabagas grow together, or at the same time of year, or need the same climate. Those were just the two vegetable names that I pulled out of a hat…… way to go.

“Vegetological carnage?” disgusted with her work, Sophianna closed her laptop and stepped outside for a smoke. “At this rate, I might as well name my book Flying Ninja’s VS the Zombie Nachos!” she laughed. She felt a little more defeated each and every time she tried to write and realized that she lost the story as soon as she had it. This had to be a faze, all great authors must go through this, or something. Well, maybe. The facts were facts, she lost her magic. You know, the magic in all children that attract them to the magic in little old men on park benches, near fire places, & in the back of book stores. That “something special” that made stories worth knowing, worth reading aloud to be heard.

Ok so maybe she was just on the wrong path. Why was she even thinking about that story line in the first place. After all, she wanted to be like Beatrix Potter, or maybe Rudyard Kipling. Even to be known as “the next N E Bode” and that is in fact just an alias, was better that being known as “the latest nobody.” Ok, maybe she just needs a muse, or a vacation? Why not? Why not run away on a train with nothing but a sack of necessities, a blank book, and a pencil; the way it it used to be done. Ok, maybe a plane and a credit card as well. Something had to give. If she had resorted to “vegetological carnage” as a serious statement in the opening page of her book when she didn’t even know if vegetological was a word, she knew she had lost her magic.

Sophianna put her cigarette out on the side of the porch rail and paused to watch the smoke elipse. Then all at once there was a beautiful scene in her mind.

A young woman, dressed in green, rich brown skin, in her hand was a glass of crystal clear, cold spring water. She leand back against the grassy knoll and sipped it, laid her head to side, closed her eyes, and let the tears slip out as she thought about her true love, who was under a spell. The fae girl rolled over on to her side and the trees mourned with her as they gave forth all of their golden petals that genteelly swayed as they fell, each on its own course but all sharing the same rhythm as the covered the girl and coated the ground.

What a beautiful image. A great expression of emotion. Too bad she didn’t have a story to explain the scene and that she couldn’t write about it if she did. She took a deep breath and went inside.

As Sophianna fell onto her bed she took a sip of water and laid back, and as she began to cry over her loss of magic storytelling and the horror of growing up. She rolled over on her side away from the window and closed her eyes. Just outside, as she mulled her life over, the rosebush gave all its petals in grievance; but she never saw a thing. Her last thought before drifting to sleep was simply “vegetological carnage?”