When the Lettuce Goes Bad, but You Eat It Anyway.

And it was here that they sat, at the end of the world. 

“Do you regret it?” was an unfair question. There were those before this, each one planned out and played out and fizzled out in mere blinks of her eyes and yours. She was as much a writer as you, and in this moment, blood on her hands like ink spilled by nothing more than an amateur. Not soaked from hundreds like yours, only drops from a few, but blood nonetheless. There’s an oxymoron of a smile gingerly settled on her lips, not knowing whether she was drowning in sadness or soaring in joy. She doesn’t know. 

“Am I supposed to? What happens if I do?” Another explosion, followed by the crashing of rubble on lifeless soil. The light reflects in her left eye, absorbed in her right, and she only watches as her latest magnum opus goes down in flames that share her brand. Her fingers find purchase on the sleeve of the loose-knit sweater draped around her, tightening with each passing second. 

You chuckle at the thought. Her destruction is beautiful. Glorious shades of gold, bronze, auburn, ebony, scattered and flying without rhyme or reason to the ignorant eye. But you see her meticulousness in every single stroke: perfect cones where smoke rises to the sky, swirling spirals that pull down to the core of the world, mountains torn apart into flawless halves like undoing a child’s jigsaw puzzle. 

She looks to you, and the emotion in her gaze is nothing short of fearsome—not as a threat, but as a bitter memory—you were like her once. “Does it have to hurt? Why does it hurt?”

“It has to hurt. It’s you.”

An earthquake rips the ground apart underneath you, shaking trees clean free of their leaves, emptying an innocent winter’s lake into its gluttonous chasm like it was never there at all. She clutches her chest, less now from the pain and more from the habit; it was never an easy sight. 

“To care for something, to love, is pain.” In this moment, you are not mentor, nor mentee, nor equal. You are not someone who can share in the burden, not someone who knows what it’s like. No, at this moment, you are solace. Place a hand on her shoulder, show but not tell her she is not alone. She places her hand over yours, tries and fails to meet your eyes. She keeps her attention on the necklace that graces your neck, glinting in the apocalypse. 

“I don’t understand. Surely there are better things to do with our time. Why go through this trouble?” 

“What better things?”

And she stops. Ponders. Muses. 

A column of dust swirls at your feet, following the invisible whims of the air current that carries it. Taller and taller, faster and faster, until it’s ripping grass from the earth and flinging them to heights and distances their ancestors would never have had the honor to witness. You and she stand perfectly in the eye, chaos reigning around you no farther than an arm’s reach. 

“There is no pursuit greater than this.” She stares at the cracked pavement through the middle of her feet, her hair flung around like the rest of the world. But she stays firm, unmoveable, amidst the destruction of her. “This is the world I willed into being. Its purpose is no greater than whatever I have set for it. There is no other in existence to craft this but me alone.”

“Now you’re getting it.” Pat her on the back, almost like a joke. She appreciates it. “Tell me about it. What was your favorite part?”

She looks up, having sent the tornado on its path. It follows a serpentine track across what’s left of the once-bustling city, her eyes following—or following her eyes?—picking up everything the rest had missed thus far. “My favorite part…”

She grows wistful, and you can tell by the gradual yet noticeable lightening of the storm clouds off in the far east. Old crashes of thunder still reach you, but only to a point, where afterwards none follow. “There was,” a pause like trying to find comfort, “there were, three dragons.”

Ever the romantic was she, and you can’t even blame her. “Dragons?”

“Yes, dragons. Alluring temptation, both for me and everyone who would see the world that would be. But no, it wasn’t me. It wasn’t these hands.”

“Were you having a bad day or something?”

“No, I don’t think so. It was,” another pause, guiltier this time. She pulls your hand down beside her, but doesn’t let go of your fingers. She stares for a moment, finding just the right word to temper her honesty, before she finally finds, “boring.”

“Quite a word.”

“It is. Perfection is overrated. I know this now. Too well.”

A volcano erupts, spewing the world’s innards out into the ruined sky. It is neverending, unceasing, and every spurt and shake leads her to clutch your hand ever firmer. So you have to press, “What virtue is there in wrath against sins already committed?”

Stops. Ponders. Muses.

“I guess there isn’t any.” Her grip loosens, and the noise dies down. 

“For an amateur, you were masterful. There was no harm in it.”

“No harm? Please,” she scoffs. Her arms cross over her chest, sending a tsunami across the hellscape. 

“Who are you putting the fires out for?”

“Do I need to answer?”

“Not really. I’m just curious.”

“Then…” 

Silence.

“Me. Maybe.”

Ever the romantic. No wonder you chose her as your muse. 

The fires do die down, succumbing to the rising tides. The chasm gapes as the ice cracks and crinkles somewhere deep below, sending shrieks of shattering glass up towards the surface. The tornado grows far too big to control, and she shuts her eyes; it spins ever quicker until it loses its hold on the things barely clinging to the wings of its gusts until even it gets ripped apart. 

It’s a long winding down, and she oversees everything like she did before. The first children to walk, the first fires set ablaze, the first monuments to erect. She takes just as she gives, and it reminds you of you. 

At last, pin-drop silence. There is no sun nor moon in the sky, only stars and planets yet to meet the same fate. Some lie dormant, others bustling with grand and wondrous life. “There are more of my worlds out there,” she points to them one by one.

“And more in here,” you pat her head. “Don’t overwhelm yourself. Take a break.”

“No thanks. We have five minutes. Better call it in. You still have to pick a photo for me.”

“Alright.” This is the easiest concession you’ve ever had the privilege to give. “On to the next star?”

“How about you take a break?”