This is a collection of short stories, featuring crystals, crows, soccer fields, bloody skies, and more. Most stories will be based off prompts from writing contests across Wattpad, and some may be based off the splinters of my soul and the waltzing...
That's what Nora told herself as she leaned back against the black bench, her cheap romance novel perched over her knees. The puppy was only metres away, a shivering ball of flea-infested dark hair.
She stared at it. It flicked its tail to one side, then the other, like a metronome that couldn't decide on a rhythm. She only stared at it harder, her lip curling into a frown.
"You stink," she told it.
It lowered its head onto the ground, where the grass was gleaming silver from the snow. It even had the audacity to lower those perky ears and whimper. Those large brown eyes looked pointedly at her, and, though she was sure it was a trick of the shadows, Nora thought she saw a single tear slip down its snout.
A ridiculous thought. Dogs didn't cry, did they? She never had a dog, of course – she had sworn against pets two decades ago, when her six-year old daughter had convinced them to buy a kitten. Only weeks later, when the kitten had collapsed while scampering across their bed, the vet had told them that he had some sort of congenital abnormality.
They had to put it down. And, though they had only had the little thing for three weeks, it had shattered her whole family into pieces.
Her daughter had moved, now, to chase her dreams of becoming an actress. Her husband...
Nora glanced down at the puppy.
Had her husband still been here, he would have strode over to the dog. Given it a little pat. He probably would have even raced back to the apartment, grabbed a bowl of water, and brought it over.
But Nora just glanced awkwardly around her. Darkness was stretching across the park, and the children that had been laughing and tumbling over the snow were now pulling their woollen hats over their red cheeks. Parents were grabbing onto gloved fingers, stiff from the cold, and dragging them down towards the road.
Leaving Nora. Her cheap romance novel about an arranged marriage.
And the puppy.
It wasn't her puppy, though. So it most certainly wasn't her business.
She would come here tomorrow, as she did every day. She would sit on her bench, the air like frozen lace on her skin, listening to the tinkling laughter of the children while flicking through the pages.
The puppy would be gone. Someone would find it, and help it find its owners. Better yet, its owners would find it, give it a good bath, and all would be good in the world again.
"You're not my dog," she told it.
It gave her a low whimper.
"I can't help you."
Finally, it lowered its head. That glint in its eyes was back, a single silver streak falling onto the snow.
And she was sure, then, that dogs could cry.
For some reason, that changed everything.
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