Of It All

acquire wooden bar in alley. pretend it is a sword.

That board actually does look pretty sweet. You walk into the ally as nonchalantly as you can to pick it up. It’s got a good weight to it.



You give it an experimental swing. You feel like you could be the one who slays the evil, sword-wielding lizard overlord, Gremuckle, once and for all! With your trusty steed and countless allies nothing can stop you! With extreme finesse you dispatch his two guards and corner him against his throne. He had ruled over the land by killing countless innocent lives to stay in power and further his own personal goals. But now he shall die on this throne! His ruthless reign comes to an end tonight! You are the hero the people so desperately needed! They all admire you skill, cunning, and dashing good looks!

You sign and lower the board. Yeah, right.

“Hey, Excalibur. Careful where you swing that thing. Could hurt yourself.”

Startled, you drop the board and whip around to see someone standing at the entrance of the alleyway with an amused expression on his face. NOO! SOMEONE SAW YOU!



“I-i-i-i-i” You stutter, cheeks burning with embarrassment. “S-s-sorry!”

He laughs lightly. “Nah, you’re alright. Just don’t bonk yourself on the head with it.” He gives a quick wink and then starts to walk off.

You drop your head into your hands. He probably thinks you’re some kind of weirdo who spends her time in random alleys swinging around scraps of wood for no reason! But you don’t!

You look over at the board that’s now on the ground by your feet. You kick it. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

You tentatively step back onto the sidewalk, making sure that the person who saw you isn’t still around.

>Go sit in an all night cafe and watch your coffee turn cold. It's not much, but at least it's better than nothing.

You don’t know if there are any all night cafes within walking distance from here, but you do know of one that might still be open. Sometimes you go there on your lunch breaks at work. It’s in the opposite direction of home but you don’t mind. You decide to go give them a visit as a warm drink sounds pretty good right about now. You doubt your fosters will notice if your check is a few dollars short anyways.

As you start walking you begin to think of some excuses you could have for coming home late. Maybe Machel kept you late at work to organize some shelves. Or maybe to do stock of what you had in the back. You can’t say that you had to clean the bathrooms because that was what you said the last time.

>How things did really go so wrong in your life? Better mull it over once again!

Can things go wrong if they’ve never been right in the first place? It’s all your fault things are like this anyways. Your parents abandoned you when you were just a baby so you don’t even remember who they are. Thus you’ve spent your whole life either in an orphanage or with your foster parent who only took you because of the money the city offered them. They made that much clear. Maybe if you were good for something none of this would have happened.

The cafe comes into view. The lights are all off so it’s not looking too hopeful. You give the door a quick pull to confirm it’s locked and look at the open times printed on the glass. They closed at nine. You sigh.

You figure you’re not too far from New Flower Park. Looking at all of the flowers usually makes you feel better, even if most of them aren’t in bloom anymore. You decide to head that way.

Before long the park entrance comes into view. You can see that not too far past the gate there’s someone kneeling next to the ground and doing something with their hands next to what looks like a pile of wood. What is… oh! A small reddish-orange light starts to glow from the wood pile. Are they starting a fire? In the middle of the park? Should somebody stop them?