After all this writing and reflecting on story and myth, I realized it’s been a while since I’ve shared any original fiction here. So, that’s today’s project. Enjoy.
There had never been a man in the well before.
Lilith had been fetching water since she was five years old. Now, she was eight, and in those intervening years she had never once pulled anyone out. She hadn’t even thought to look.
But all the same, there he was: a tiny little man wearing a tiny little green hat with a white beard tucked into his belt. There were bells on his boots and a clipboard in his hand. There he sat, on the edge of her bucket, tapping his pencil against his clipboard, impatient. He was the size of Lilith’s hand and was suspiciously dry.
“Good day,” he said. His voice was deep, gruff. He hopped off the bucket and onto the old stone wall that encircled the well with a jingle of his boot bells.
“Good day,” Lilith said. She tipped her straw hat toward him, curtsied just so. She was only eight years old, after all. Perhaps pulling gnomes out of buckets was a perfectly normal thing done the world over.
“You’re not wet,” she said. The gnome frowned at her, a deep wrinkled thing that made her own lips curl downward. “I’m sorry,” she stammered, pulling at her one, long braid. “I didn’t mean to be rude. I just…” She thought about what her mother would say, about pestering adults and sticking your nose in places and…
“Well then,” the gnome said. He had beady black eyes that kept crawling over Lilith’s left shoulder as though he was expecting someone else to show up. “Shall we begin?”
“Begin?” Lilith asked. She tugged harder at her braid. “I’ve already gotten the water…”
The gnome pursed his lips together, scrunched his caterpillar eyebrows just as hard as they would go. Lilith was afraid the things might crawl down his face in protest. The thought made her grin—and she immediately regretted it.
“How’s it taste?”
“What?” Lilith asked, forcing her face to resume a respectable pose. The gnome gestured toward her bucket, his body rigid with impatience. “The water? Fine.”
“Sweet?”
“I guess.”
The gnome nodded and leapt down from the rock wall. He began walking along the dirt path—jingle, jangle—back to Lilith’s village. He seemed to be making notes of things as he passed them, but Lilith couldn’t decipher his tiny handwriting.
The gnome was muttering something about nicely trimmed hedges when he caught Lilith’s prying eyes. “You can read, then?” he asked. “School and all?”
“Yes, sir,” Lilith said.
“All of the village children?”
Lilith paused, thought, nodded.
“None of you work?”
“I get the water—”
“I mean work.” The gnome scowled and marked something on his clipboard.
“School can be hard sometimes,” Lilith began. “But Mommy and Daddy always say—"
The gnome smacked his lips together. “Your parents,” he interrupted. “Working?”
Lilith blinked once. “Yes,” she said. “In the fields.” She glanced nervously at her neighbors’ houses, suddenly quite aware of the fact she was with a stranger, small though he was.
“Both of them?”
“Well…” She caught sight of Mr. Blackensheld and his two older boys just up ahead, making their daily rounds from the bakery. That made her feel a bit better.
“Both of them?”
“No,” Lilith said. She stopped walking, put her bucket down and her hands on her hips. “Mommy isn’t supposed to until after the baby comes.” She nodded as though to agree with something that had gone unsaid. “But she says the fresh air is good for—”
“Fresh air,” the gnome muttered. He’d clearly stopped listening. “The last time I did an inspection, the air was little more than soot and the fields were nothing but ash. No one had time for fresh air.” He looked up at her darkly, said: “And everyone worked, one way or the other.”
It was Lilith’s turn to scrunch her eyebrows. She made a pouting face—the one she used when one of the older kids was picking on her friends at school—and she stamped her foot in the dust. The ensuing cloud encircled the gnome, and he cleared his throat.
“If you’d please—”
“No,” Lilith said. “You tell me right now who you are and why you’re here.”
The gnome glanced up at her, grinned. “No,” he mimicked. “Enjoy your nicely trimmed hedges.” And he turned and walked back the way they’d come.
***
The well was much deeper than the village folk realized. Much deeper. In fact, when the original villagers had dug it all those years ago, they hadn’t realized what they’d stumbled upon.
They still didn’t.
They never do, Lazura thought, his clipboard dangling from his back as he carefully made his way back down into the shadowy depths. The jingle-jangle of his bells warned any curious creatures to keep their distance—the clipboard was hardly the most dangerous thing the old gnome carried.
Finally, he reached the bottom.
“What’s the news?” A voice from deeper in the shadows. “You weren’t gone very long.”
“No need,” Lazura replied. A match was lit, and the darkness gave way to reveal a dozen gnomes standing around, expectant. Lazura handed his clipboard to one of them. “It’s time.”
The other gnome nodded, her eyes scanning Lazura’s report. “Trimmed hedges, eh? In orderly rows and everything?” A few laughs from the others gathered. “No—this can’t be allowed to continue.”
“Give it a few months,” another voice said. “Change the recipe. They’ll be at each other’s throats.”
Lazura nodded, thinking of the girl he’d met, the brother she’d yet to meet. “It won’t take that long,” he said. “They’re soft. They have no idea what they’re drinking.” He smiled. “Divide them, scatter them—we’ll have new wells in no time. Expanded access. What’s sweet inevitably becomes sour.”
“Good work, Mr. Lazura,” the first gnome said, handing back the clipboard. “As always, we appreciate your diligent attention to detail.”
Lazura bowed slightly. “Of course.” A smirk, then. “Peace is so boring, after all.”
And another thing:
- had me on over at to talk about “My Life with the Jedi: The Spirituality of Star Wars.” Check it out!
In this week’s “Now Discern This,” I wrote about what it means to find the last egg of Easter. Give it a read.
I’m really honored to be emceeing this year’s “Company of Grace” event, sponsored by the Ignatian Spirituality Project and featuring writer David Brooks. You can register to attend the event virtually (or get tickets if you’re in Chicago) by visiting this site. As a special treat, Loyola Press is running a sale on my book, so go check that out, too!
And if you want to join me for a special webinar to celebrate Star Wars Day, head over to IgnatianSpirituality.org to register! Click here!
Scary little short story there! Just signed up for the webinar - though I don't know if I'll be able to catch it live