I self-published this fable in Dec. 2021. By self-published I mean I used cardstock paper, a hole- puncher, and some ribbon to gift a copy to a few friends and family. To keep the posts short and sweet, this short story is presented in parts. You can find Parts 1 and 2 here and here, respectively. Enjoy!
As the years went on, the child grew. She had large brown eyes and a sweet smile. Like all children, she got into mischief, though not exceedingly so. In the evenings, she and her mother would sing songs of the mother’s ancestors and her mother would recite the words of wisdom that had been passed down through generations.
Though the man loved his wife and daughter, insecurity rose in him as he saw the bond between his wife and daughter continue to grow. He increasingly felt alone and out of place, and the insecurity started to poison his mind. He started to believe his wife had turned her heart against him and that she intended to teach the child to do the same. What the man couldn’t see was, in fact, it was his love of money that had estranged him from his family.
It had started innocently enough. He simply wanted to provide for his wife and daughter. However, he soon became consumed with attaining more—he refused to have his family live in poverty as he had. He worked so hard that most days he came home well after dark; many times his daughter was already asleep. His wife, not knowing what else to say, would ask him about his day. After working all day, though, the last think he wanted to do was talk about work. There was little else to talk about, however, because it was all he did.
Then the wife would try to tell him about things she had done with their daughter. To the man, these were trivial details, and he would, instead, start to think of all that needed to be done the following day. The man saw that this hurt his wife, but he saw no way to change it, so he concluded she must be too sentimental. “This must be the flaw in these fabled women,” he thought to himself.
Day by day, the wife could see her husband’s countenance grow sallow in the shadow of darkness that was overcoming him. She knew, though, that she could not save him. The only power great enough to save him was the One mentioned in the songs she sang to her daughter. It was the same One who brought peace and happiness to her village. When she left her village, she noticed the air felt different, but it hadn’t dawned on her that the difference was the absence of the Life-Giving Spirit.
Over time, the wife and her daughter saw the man even less. When the wife went to the river to do the wash, she could hear the other women in the man’s village whisper stories about her husband—the other women, jealous of the woman’s beauty, were happy to do so. They would say how the man was often seen on the outskirts of the village.
Those that lived on the outskirts of the village were considered the lost souls. They had either been abandoned or fallen so hopelessly that they could only beg and spend the little they had gathered (or stolen) on strong drink and substances from far-away lands that were said to take away pain. To be sure, these lost souls felt nothing but pain, and they were desperate to be rid of it. Most of the other villagers never saw them, because they wandered about the cover of darkness, when the dark circles under their eyes and unkempt appearance were more easily disguised. The women in the village knew men sometimes ventured there to satisfy their lust for debauchery. Some men frequented more than others.
The wife heard these tales about the man and knew they were true. The wife also knew that one could only go to the outskirts of the village so long before they found themselves a permanent resident among the lost.
