Chester

Sometimes it rains. The sky is dark when it shouldn't be, colors are washed away. I saw a cat under a bush trying to stay dry and looking sad, and the water trickled through the branches and found its back anyway. There was water on the path to the pool, because the drains had backed up.

Even the best of us don't believe that stuff about fairy tales anymore. People hold paper bags behind concrete buildings. Cars push their way through the crowds and everyone seems to be on their way to somewhere they'll never reach. Trees stand like skeletons, leafless, chattering in the icy wind. Everywhere, something is dying.

Even the best of us don't really believe in fairy tales.