{"id":414,"date":"2011-01-19T21:04:36","date_gmt":"2011-01-20T02:04:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thefourpartland.com\/blog\/?p=414"},"modified":"2011-01-20T16:30:21","modified_gmt":"2011-01-20T21:30:21","slug":"my-friend","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/thefourpartland.com\/blog\/?p=414","title":{"rendered":"My Friend"},"content":{"rendered":"

Effectively my first piece back from two months of break (I last wrote seriously in November). Hopefully, I haven’t lost my touch too badly.<\/em><\/p>\n

\tI lost a friend today. A good friend. One of those you can call in the middle of the night to talk to, one who will hold me when I’m down and knows the right words to say to bring me back. It was a slow fading that took her. We both could see it coming, but neither wished to acknowledge what was happening, and so we meandered on through life, until one day she was gone, and I was without my support.<\/p>\n

\tWhat hurt most was never saying goodbye, knowing that there was so much life that had been left unlived, so many gifts the world had not received because of a life that was broken too young. Of the two of us, she was the better, the one with more promise to offer the world. You could find people like me anywhere you looked, but her? They came along rarely, for they healed the world about them.<\/p>\n

\tShe had healed me, over many long days and nights of conversation and friendship, and so I thought to pick up her mantle when she had gone, but people did not respond to me as they did to her, and I did not have the talent to heal. I became bitter, for I felt rejected by those around me. I had reached out a hand in kindness, and found all too often it was bitten and cursed with foul words and foul intent.<\/p>\n

\tAnd so here I am now, a changed man once more. No longer healed, but perhaps happier all the same. I feel more myself than I have in some time. Perhaps it’s my renewed taste in food. The ancients always believed you gathered strength from the souls of those you killed, and I have. I have gathered strength from every soul but one.<\/p>\n

\tKilling my friend was an act of kindness, for she was grey and wan when I came to her, and smiled at me as I kissed her forehead. It was the last time we whispered our love for one another, friends, and once, more.<\/p>\n

\tI could not gather her soul to me, for it needed to fly free. I let it go, my best wishes sent winging after it. Then I turned my attention to the room next to hers, and began to gather souls again.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Effectively my first piece back from two months of break (I last wrote seriously in November). Hopefully, I haven’t lost my touch too badly. I lost a friend today. A good friend. One of those you can call in the middle of the night to talk to, one who will hold me when I’m down […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":[]},"categories":[36,4],"tags":[21,22],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pRIK4-6G","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":534,"url":"http:\/\/thefourpartland.com\/blog\/?p=534","url_meta":{"origin":414,"position":0},"title":"Misery of a Friend","date":"July 22, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"The misery of a friend. A strange thing, is it not? Do you comfort them? Do you push them to move on? There is a third way. Use a knife.","rel":"","context":"In "Flash Fiction"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":432,"url":"http:\/\/thefourpartland.com\/blog\/?p=432","url_meta":{"origin":414,"position":1},"title":"Imaginary Friends","date":"February 6, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"There exists among all things a strange connection, one that cannot be defined. Philosophers will argue its existence, physicists will try to test for its presence, but none cannot prove it, or even truly explain it. Yet ask a little boy, and he knows, for he can see beyond the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Flash Fiction"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":466,"url":"http:\/\/thefourpartland.com\/blog\/?p=466","url_meta":{"origin":414,"position":2},"title":"Old Friend","date":"April 4, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"A hand swept across the earth, taking in a great plain, little more than weeds and dirt. \u201cThis was our home, once. A city stood there. It was stripped bare as the fire came. Those of us who fled remember the smell of burning, the screams of pain of all\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Flash Fiction"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":221,"url":"http:\/\/thefourpartland.com\/blog\/?p=221","url_meta":{"origin":414,"position":3},"title":"Writer's Carnival: City of Sadness","date":"August 18, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"This particular story was inspired by a friend of mine, and is as much poetry as prose. Or at least tries to have tendencies in that direction. It's also rather short. I do hope you enjoy it. It's also the first of my three entries into the Writer's Carnival. 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Aren't they going to get themselves sorted out any time soon?\u201d A cough sounded in the grey, and Locsyn and Gwyth looked up as Rhyfelwyr stood over them. He gestured, and the two soldiers went\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "The Four Part Land"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/thefourpartland.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/414"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/thefourpartland.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/thefourpartland.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thefourpartland.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thefourpartland.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=414"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/thefourpartland.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/414\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/thefourpartland.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=414"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thefourpartland.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=414"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thefourpartland.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=414"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}