IRVING //a short story//

4.

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a forest in the sea.

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WREN IRVING MATTHEW

More days passed and Wren felt the weight of everything begin to pile on her shoulders. At school the teachers began to notice her name missing from piles. She knew Matthew noticed the absence of the bricks in her bag, but he said nothing. Her life had been a constant grey up until Matthew, and the consistency had been the one of the only things she could count on. Now he had brought with him light and colour and the knit of the grey against all that brightness tore her to shreds. She desperately wanted to be a part of the light and brightness, but the act of doing so and the possibility of getting hurt made her want to run back safely into the dark arms of the grey she knew so well. For now, she decided to sit on the ledge between the two, even if the effort of doing so tore her to pieces. She thought about that image, of herself standing on a cliff on the precipice of falling, in between two monstrous twisters pulling her into each other while her very being tore into pieces, like paper in a blender. He could be her secret friend... Irving didn't have to know.

Wren was so caught up in her grey and Matthews colours that she didn't notice Irving's darkness creeping up from behind her, threatening to swallow it all.

At school Matthew soon wiggled himself into her world, in all her imaginary stories he was by her side. When she was drifting in space she was no longer alone, when she travelled to the Amazon, he carried her luggage and when she was trapped in a seemingly never-ending labyrinth escaping a monster, he was there offering her a way out, a ball of magic thread

"At my old school, I always kind of felt like I was speaking another language. When I talked no one quite understood what I was saying, not even my friends. It sucked. "

He told her one day. Wren didn't say anything, she didn't know where he was going with this.

"But then I came here and met you, and I realised that you spoke the exact same language as me. "

"I find that hard to believe considering I hardly ever spoke to you"

"You didn't need to, but that's not what I'm talking about, let me finish."

She was about to say something, but stopped herself.

"... I realised that you spoke the same language as me, but you spoke it fluently. You lived in this world completely of your own and I desperately wanted in, and I still do."

"What's this got to do with anything?"

"I don't know. I just wanted to say it."

Wren crinkled her brow at him.

"You do know you're weird, right?"

"Thanks"

He smiled and continued about whatever he was doing, sitting on the green grass, the sunlight casting weird patterns and turning his hair a lighter shade then it actually was. Wren watched him silently. As she looked at him she found that her chest became tight, and her heart had an odd feeling to it. It wasn't painful, in fact it was quite the opposite. She closed her eyes and tried to cast away the feeling, she thought of a forest growing from the sea, green and blues big solid trees and ever moving free seas together in one strange harmony.

When she opened her eyes the feeling was gone. Matthew was looking at her and smiled when she looked at him in return. Her chest played up again. This isn't good she thought. This isn't good she repeated. This can't be good the tree's whispered, or could it?

Each day Irving grew and the fog in her head thickened and Wren felt utterly helpless. The tasks whispered and glared at her from every side and angle, some days they were loud.... Others they were hushed and scared, it was overwhelming. Irving ate everything, her clothes, her books, the things in her bag and her fish tank was now completely empty. She no longer sat at the dinner table for meals, instead she ate in her room, staring at the now empty cage of dull water... the filter still whirring. Irving didn't think it was good for her to sit at the table.

"It's not like your sister is ever here anyway and parents have a nasty habit of sticking their nose where they shouldn't. The teachers will call, your parents will know and they'll get hurt and worried. They'll get mad at themselves and next thing you know they're taking you to fancy places where a doctor will talk to you with a pen, but it won't be for your sake. It'll be to make them feel better, to make your parents feel as though they haven't done anything wrong"

He'd said.

"Why would the teachers call?"

"The teacher's will call because you're not doing what they want you to do, and to them that means that something is wrong. Nothing is wrong, you're just doing what's right for yourself. Just don't talk to the adults Wren, the less contact you have with them the safer you'll be."

So wren didn't show up to dinner that night, or the night after that, or even the night after that. She didn't stay long at breakfast either. The dishes in her room disappeared like magic and Irving smiled.

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Not much to say this chapter.