Something I wrote for a 250 word story prompt. Was listening to Arvo Pärt while writing.
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Tolran had been walking for hopeless hours lost before he came to the clearing. What had been a wood dense with clawing branches and nettled underbrush opened abruptly to a fern blanketed glade. Disarmed of his usual cynicism, Tolran marveled at how the broad branches arched an arboreal basilica beneath their impenetrable crowns. Fireflies danced, flicking hypnotic. A thick floral scent like incense seeped into Tolran’s nostrils, draining tension and anxiety from his stomach.
Shuffling past the last stone of some ancient masonry, Tolran heard a voice, indistinct. There amid the spiralling starry flies stood a figure. He stopped a moment, squinting, then dropping his machete as recognition dawned. He found his sight blurring into a haze of lights. Wiping his eyes, Tolran could barely muster strength for his surprise
“Tears?” he whispered to himself. The voice beckoned again.
“Yer right,” he nodded. “It’s been… far too long.”
He saw a gesture, a finger curling towards the crook of an old oak.
“Yeah… Guess… it wouldn’t hurt to stop a while.” Tolran put his pack down and rested his back against the roots. A hand cradled his face. His eyelids drooped.
“Tired… if ya don’t mind, I think I’ll just… sleep a spell.”
Tolran sank heavy into memory, the forest disappearing from view. One last word escaped his lips, barely audible.
“Sorry…”
He went limp, neither he, nor his regrets, to ever be found again.
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