over the last few months i've been recovering from clinical depression. i write, and this story naturally came out when my pen touched paper.   eve x

The girl who was sad

Once upon a time there was a girl who was sad. She looked around at her world and all she saw was black and white and all the non-descript shades of grey in between. One tear fell down her cheek, this was for all the sadness of all the sad people in the world. Then another tear fell, and this time this one was for all those people who had had loved ones die. Then another tear fell, this one was for all the wars she had seen and read about in the news. Another tear fell, and another, and another. There was nobody who was going to turn the tap off inside the girl who was sad.

The girl was sitting at her kitchen table at this time, an empty cup and saucer at her place, and by now the cup was almost overflowing with tears. She went to the bath room, still dressed in her clothes, and climbed into the bath tub. Now she was thinking about all the people in the world who were hungry, and didn’t have anything to eat, and all the people who were thirsty, and only had foul water to drink. She carried on crying and crying, until the bath tub was full of salty tears.

“What am I to do? I am so sad,” cried the girl to her cat who was sitting in the doorway because he was afraid of water, and the cat mewed, because cats do not, and cats cannot, cry.

She cried and cried and cried, about earthquakes and tsunamis and car-crashes and train crashes and plane crashes and terrible diseases and homeless children and freak accidents like falling off ladders whilst doing the decorating. In just under an hour, the time it takes for the average person to learn the Greek alphabet, the girl who was sad’s house was flooded.

Every room was full of salty water, and it was now spilling out into the garden.

“What am I to do? I am so sad,” cried the girl to her cat who had clambered up to the top of a tree, because he was afraid of water, and the cat mewed, because cats do not, and cats cannot, cry.

Clouds were heavy in the sky and the cat, who liked to predict the weather, feared it was going to rain. The girl who was sad was now up to her neck in water from her tears and only her face and the top of her hair were dry. “I am going to drown in all this sadness if I don’t stop crying,” she said to the cat who was still sitting in top of a tree. The cat knew that the girl who was sad was going to stop crying, and the cat smiled, because cats do, and cats can, smile.

The heavy clouds disappeared and behind them was the sun. The girl who was sad stopped crying and all the tears that she had cried evaporated. Her skin felt warm and clean, all the dust was gone from her house, and flowers were growing in her garden.

The girl who was sad looked at the flowers in her garden, her flowers, and smiled. Then she picked her flowers and distributed them across the world to people who were sad. When people asked her “what is your name?”, she replied, “my name was the girl who was sad, but that is no longer my name.”

“What is your name now?” they asked, and she replied, “what the people of the world call me now, is the girl who gives flowers,” and she made her way back across the world, to her house and her garden and her cat.

When she arrived home she looked around at her garden and she saw that all the flowers she had picked had grown back. The girl who gave flowers waved at the cat, and the cat waved back, because cats do, and cats can, wave back.

She spent a little while at home, drank tea, bathed and read a little, then she picked her flowers and set out again across the world, this time in a different direction to different people who were sad.

A sad but happy story, don’t you think?