The Raven and the Willow Tree

Guys honest comments on this one, please. It’s a different try away from my usual genre and I would really like to hear improvement feedback from you all!! Enjoy reading!! 

DISCLAIMER: Got to know about the Weeping Willow from “The Weeping Willow” story by one of the story mirror authors!! Kudos!  

“Gotcha! Oh, no I didn’t!” Arianna whines as a black feather falls to the earthly grounds.

“Whatcha doing, princess?” Her dad chimes in to calm her whines.

“Daddy that Raven flew before I could catch it. See, there!” She points to a black bird sitting on the branch of a Weeping Willow tree.

(fun fact: the Weeping Willow gives the sound of a baby’s cry when you give it water! Just for the sake of the story, some features of the tree has been kept fiction or not revealed at all.) 

“Leave it, princess. It is meant for the sky!” Her father consoles her, picking her in her arms. She giggles and tries to escape his grasp. 

“Trying to run away huh? You’ve worried your mum enough already!” He points out to his wife frantically searching for Arianna. 

“Oh, this girl can’t stay in one place!” Her mother yells, throwing her arms in the air. A sigh of relief finally comes out of her mouth when she sights her daughter in her husband’s arms, 

“Found her in the woods again,” He chuckles, as he hands Ariana to his relieved wife.

“Goodness gracious, Arianna! What have I told you about the woods?!” Her mother scorns her.

“But they are HUGE!” She laughs, twirling in a pile of leaves she found.

“Exactly. Huge, so you could get lost easily!” She scorns her again.

“Lily dear, children cannot help but explore. We can’t keep her locked inside this wooden house..” Her husband tries to console her.

“I’m just concerned, you know?” Lily picks Arianna and gives her a peck on the cheek.

A full-grown woman’s figment can be seen from the Weeping Willow’s trunk, and she is watching the scene as if she wants to grab this memory from that little girl. 

“If I could just go there..” she murmurs. 

The Raven flew beside the trunk, flapping its wings continuously. The woman’s figment tries to shoo it away. Fortunately, the family cannot spot her. 

The scene fades away and another memory pops in. The days she felt love. Arianna was sitting under the Hemlock Tree, in her lover’s arms, nuzzling against his neck. He kept pulling her closer giving her pecks on the nose, as she bashfully shies away, blushing dark red like her hair. They both smile, laugh, and giggle. The other couples look at them. Some adoring, some in envy. Arianna smiles as her lover whispers something in her ear. The figment is famished to grab all of that. “I want all that !”

 The Raven flaps continuously at the figment again. She shoos it away, but the memory fades again, this time showing her the day of her marriage. All the throng so joyous, the grandeur shimmering, the white gowns all swirling down. Arianna smiled wide at the groom, holding his fingers tightly like she could never let go. The laughter chimes through the hall, overshadowing the tears of the figment in the Willow. Weeping away her sobs, she murmurs “Why not me too?!” 

The scene fades away on its own. The figment brushes away the teardrops. The figment could see Arianna holding two twin boys, her husband clicking the photographs. All are beaming and smiling. The figment weeps even more wildly. “I want all that..” she mutters. 

The woman figment finally realised Arianna staring at her with a despondent smile “Why didn’t you make that all happen?” She asks. 

“Arianna, I’m sorry,” the woman figment weeps.

“You decided wrong, Lily,” Arianna reminisces about the scene. She was still in her mother’s womb. Lily was petrified. She was trying to lock the door when someone kept knocking. Lily was sobbing loudly as she grabbed a sharp knife and cut through her vein at the wrist. She didn’t think straight. She couldn’t.

She took a look at the Weeping Willow sitting by the garden. She smiled sadly, as the tree wept with the first drops of rain falling at the branches.

Arianna smiled at Lily through the Weeping Willow‘s Trunk. She smiles, and the Raven flaps hard before her, making the memory fade away.