TIME

TIME

The sun was high but the sky was dark, and on a low hill overlooking what was once a vast green prairie, an old Indian woman sat cross-legged, surveying the scene before her. Her thoughts were of a better, happier time, when her tribe used to hunt the buffalo that roamed this great land. But now those times, just like the buffalo, had been taken away from her by the white man who had killed off all her people.

As she stared at the scorched earth in front of her, she remembered the fire; that huge, breathing, smoking beast that the white man had set loose to chase them from their homes, sending the children running and screaming into the woods, fleeing for their lives.

But even though those screams were now gone, she could still hear them in her head.

They were so close — they were right behind her and they were almost safe — until a huge, flaming blue pine fell across their path, blocking their way out.

Those screams.

Why did I have to live? she asked the dark sky. I would have given my life a hundred times over for a single one of theirs.

Why?

Her gaze fell back to the barren ash filled plain. If the sky didn’t have an answer, then perhaps her beloved Mother Earth did. She saw that it was in pain as well. There would probably never be a cure for everything, but time would at least allow some things to heal.

But the earth, just like her, would always be scarred.

As she rose to her feet and began moving down the hill, something caught her eye: one single purple flower still clinging to life in the hollow of a burnt out stump.

And a tear fell from her eye.

ORIGINALLY WRITTEN ON 4/11/12 AND NEVER ENTERED INTO

'THE DAILY FLASH FICTION CONTEST’