Pearls of the Desert

Our Special Mysterious Writer Article 

Short Story  |  Merlin* 

Our story takes place in a far away country, so far that even rain could not reach it. Flowers and trees were a mere myth only children believed in. Water was so scarce many died everyday from dehydration. The golden mountains of sand were full of buried corpses, so much that it was frequent to walk on a beloved one’s bone by accident.

In this extreme environment lived a small man. He tried to make sense of his own life in a community that clearly didn’t want him around. He worked all day with the men, desperately trying to find any water or food.

The small man called himself an optimist. Even under these atrocious circumstances, he would never give up on humanity. Sadly, it is humanity that gave up on him.

The small man was getting bullied and made fun of at any possible occasion. The ones he considered his brothers were either dead or picking on him. The ones he considered his sisters barely spoke or looked at him.

But one night, in the wild silence, he climbed on a golden mountain to observe the sky. Millions of stars all stared at him, all sad memories of their past selves. And that night, with the moon as his only friend, he cried, his tears dripping into the sand.

Days passed but still the small man kept his guard up with the sun. He ignored the ones who destroyed his self-esteem the best he could. However, when the night would fall like a curtain over the sky, he would climb again. His eyes would blur in the darkness and he would still pour all of his emotions into the dry sand.

Hope was long gone for him, until life gave him a chance. Through the sand, a small sapling started to form. The small man, astonished, amazed, immediately felt the green leaf with his finger. This time, he cried of happiness, of joy. The legends were true: trees did exist.

The waves of time kept raging on as many years passed. The green stem grew into a small tree and then into a bigger one. The small man cried everyday at the feet of the plant in secret, hoping to find his emotions useful. What he didn’t realize is that wrinkles grew on his forehead and his hair started turning grey. The taller the tree was getting, the emptier the small man’s eyes looked.

As he was working with the men one day, he proclaimed he grew a tree. Yes, they heard right, a fully grown tree. The small man was hoping they would finally accept him, finally stop to treat him like less of a human.

Instead, they told him he was a fool, a feeble. Nobody was going to believe the laughingstock of the village was able to do anything with his sad existence.

The man ran home. He gazed into the mirror only to see a mess. A rusty sinking ship. A dying old man following a dying old dream.

The tears flowing down his cheeks, he went to the tree. He observed a solid branch and threw his tool around it.

When the sand settled, he was dangling at the end of a rope, hanged on the tree fueled with his own sadness.

Nobody cried for him. Nobody acknowledged him. His whole life was only a whisper carried by the wind, his soul an echo in the roots of his sorrow.

The next day, the small man did not get to work. He did not help the men nor did he look at the women which would not return him his looks. The word was getting passed all around the village. The small man was gone.

The first to find his remains was a little girl, three days later. She shouted so loud her mom thought she broke her arm or worse. Many followers gathered to look at the wonderful creation that rose from the tears of the small man.

The tree was majestic. His branches would reach so high it looked like it held the sky above from falling on their heads. Its leaves would flow down like green water, covering the cadaver of its only father.

The men who worked with the deceased man gave it a name: the weeping willow.

His funeral was held on the golden mountain, next to the willow. The whole village attended his burial, realizing they were the monsters of the story. The regret was filling their lungs; their eyes were full of a dreaded sorrow.

Bright pearls of regret were falling down their faces, dripping into the dry sand.

From that day on, everyone went to the tree. In their darkest nights, in their lightest days. Kids, dads, moms, no matter their age. They all went to the willow for the same reason: so that the small man never dies.

The humongous shadow of the tree engulfed all of its guests. Feeling the imaginary hug of the old leaves, each laid a waterfall made of thousands of sparkling drops on the sand.

The weeping willow became a legend amongst the people, and with it the small man. The powerful sorrow he kept hidden in his guts for so many years was able to form the greatest accomplishment any human had ever made. People named their children after him, hoping they would achieve great things just like him.

They all slowly forgot he made great things because society bullied him. They all slowly forgot he cried for nearly twenty years and received no help. They all slowly forgot the man who gave everything for his community.

Legend says that when the wind dances through the thin leaves, his weep can still be heard in the darkness.

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*Fictional name of our anonymous writer. Try to guess who it is and find him! Hint: he is a Champlain student (does that really help?)