storyteller

Finally, her impassive face, a statue which comes to life only through storytelling, crumples as she presses her cheek to her striped sheets. With no exception but the sweet shade of sleep, she analyses this wall, that chair, his hat, her toothbrush; weaving stories around the blank and everyday items until they are rendered bright and colourful by her imagination.

Now, she is thinking of herself; the slim, stone figure shielded by a rumpled duvet, whose slender fingers brush dangerously close to the chipped cup of tepid tea by her bed.

At heart she is the storyteller, has been since she was an infant, crafting a tale to excuse her theft of the cookies with a mischevous grin. But when she puts yearning pen to paper, ambitious fingers to keyboard, the fertile soil of jewelled and petalled fantasy is barren.

If only there were such a job as the storyteller...a career consisting purely of creating fiction and inciting the incantations of imagination to children. Sure, at the same time villagers hovered around the bustling market square and Prince Arthur lent her a ride in his dashing Toyota! In a state of near unconsciousness, she cracks a smile. This is the 21st century!

But even as she relives the stories of Cinderella, Snow white, the Little Mermaid (the glass shoe reflecting the light of the chandelier as it is whisked beneath satin; the tempting, flavoursome bite of crunchy apple which yields a moment of ecstasy before sleep; the weight of wet, bejewlelled body in the mermaid's arms rendered weightless by destiny), the storyteller knows that no fresh tale, no finely encapsulated plot, no tragedy cum vengeance, will appear. Indeed there have been no happily ever afters since her lost love.

The offcasts of her imagination dance before her almost sleeping face: the seductress, with damask cheek and crimson lips masking evil intent; the ingenue, who wonders naively into the forest with tumbling russet hair, unaware of the big bad wolf; the duke, with fine pompous clothes, and a drooping hat, hiding some...uncertainty, and even guilt, for all those in power have secrets. Well, everyone has secrets.