“I can’t do it this time.” One admitted to the other.
“What do you mean, you can’t do it? Why is it different this time?” The other asked.
“I don’t know. It’s… it’s just different, ok.” The first replied.
“That’s not going to be good enough. It’s your job. You are almost done. There is only one left.” The second persuaded.
The first glanced in the direction of the tree. At the end of a cliff, overshadowed by another, barren rock stretched up toward the sky. The roots of the tree, stretching out in all direction. It was not able to penetrate the slate and yearned for sustenance.
The second followed her gaze, “Please help me understand. Maybe I can say something to the boss. If he finds out, we will both get stuck here. You know the rules, no leaving until the job is done.”
“I don’t think he will survive the winter.” The first responded.
“All the more to get this over with and head south. Think about the kites and surf sails…” The second persuaded.
“Have you no heart? That’s the last one, and it’s all he has left. I can’t take that from him. It just doesn’t feel right?” The first lamented.
“You are kidding. Right? He has been clinging to that cliff for nearly a century. His kind isn’t supposed to live that long anyway. He is well past his years. How did he even take root there anyway? This is impossible,” the second argued.
Frustrated, the first moved closer to the tree. “That’s just it. He’s a fighter. I have pummeled him relentlessly, year after year, and yet he always comes back. He sleeps through the winter, and then those leaves just start sprouting everywhere.”
“It’s infuriating,” the second mumbled.
“I know!” the first huffed. “But somehow, I get it.”
She stared at the lonely old tree, with its sizeable worn trunk. It was black all over, some from the shadows blanketing it, and some from lightning that had hit it once before. A stray bolt her boss had thrown out. The top half had long since fallen to the rocks below. She glared at the last leaf on its branches. Her feelings became mixed inside her. She hated the leaves but wasn’t sure why. Though, she liked the tree and didn’t understand that either. Anger and sorrow began to battle within her.
“What are you doing?” The second frantically asked, but the first did not respond. “You are starting to twirl? Why are you twirling? You don’t have permission. You are going to get us in trouble! Stop!”
But the first did not answer; she was indeed twirling. Her extremities pulled in and twisted about with intensifying speed.
“You have to stop! This isn’t going to help!” The second shouted.
“I can’t stop! I won’t stop!” The sound of the first burst forth like a freight train, her anger now winning out in the extreme. She grew to a terrible height from the ground, surpassing the higher cliff in a moment and rising up to be seen, to be feared.
The second looked on in horror as she tried to get away, but it was too late. She was being sucked in. Her strength added to the first until she was fully absorbed, and they became one. Now she understood the passion of the first and joined her sister in rage. Together, they grew in immensity, calling out for justice.
Their siblings heeded the call. They came rushing from near and far, around trees, under cliffs, and from the highest heights. The power of the family grew, twisting about, growing in one-mindedness, a singular resolve. When they had gathered, they looked down upon the tree, reached out gently, and plucked it up from the cliff’s edge. Swiftly they pulled the tree in and escaped.
They tore the landscape in their haste. They had caught the attention of the skies, and they grew dark in anger. Flashes of lightning began to build within the clouds. They ran for it, making great speed. The lightning was fast and deadly, but their boss was slow. Even still, they could not go far without him.
“Look, down there!” Cried one.
“Yes, the spot by the lake, fertile soil!” Another chimed in.
The family of wind carried the object of their obsession quickly to the spot and gently set him down. Some of them immediately began to rush back to their duties, as the winds of the world could not be very long from their task. The balance of strength was fragile, maintaining life or preventing it.
“Where is the leaf? It is off?” the first cried out in anguish as the others began to leave.
“Here!” One shouted.
“Careful!” The unison chorus of siblings chanted.
The first gently took the leaf, coldly in her hands. She stared at the little leaf. With all the strength of her family, she could not prevent this. The second was all that was left and looked on sympathetically.
The first reached up through the branches and tried to reattach the leaf to the twig it had clung to. “It won’t go on!” she began to weep. She blew hard against the tree, the moisture of her tears soaking the branches.
“No, it will not. They cannot.” The second consoled her.
The first looked back, “But why?”
“Because they are leaves, we are the breeze, and they come from trees. That is all there can be.” The second explained sullenly. She did not have the heart to tell her about the tree. What life was left in it was now gone too.
The first blew back and forth in his branches until she realized the magnitude of what she had done, and before her sister could do anything, she stopped moving. She dissipated and was no more.
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