I am not the future you, nor are you my past self anymore. More correctly, you are that forgotten starting point of mine, unfulfilled ideal of mine, the unchosen answer in many decisions. -- Anon Guest
If you could change anything about your past - would you? If given that chance, what would you change? The threads of time and fate can only tangle one way, it seems. But what if--?
The Faekindred of Nanogh play with time like most children play with dolls. They also play with mortals. One of whom is about to get a typical "Faerie Favour".
Call her... Mari. That's how the nursery tales will remember her centuries hence. Those stories also differ about what she did to earn it, and ultimately don't matter. The point is the tangles of change.
"You mortals love changing things around," said the Fae. "Why don't you change your life?"
"I can't do that," said Mari. "I can only make decisions and live with them in all my tomorrows."
"Stupid way to do it," said the Fae. "Tell me what you would change, and I will make it a much better life for you."
Mari, according to the tales, was smarter than that. "I would much rather we both meet the kind of person I'd be if you did that."
Every person has regrets about their life. Little ones and large alike. Mari thought of her largest sorrows and biggest mistakes. A wish for a little more money in her childhood turned her alternate self into a selfish brat who would never have gone to the lengths that the real Mari did to gain the favour.
A wish that she had kissed a boy she liked in her youth showed her to be a busy mother with a bad husband who would never meet the Faekindred in the first place. A wish for a younger sibling had her just as tied to a similar fate.
Every mistake, little ones and large alike, is a chance to learn. A chance to change.
Mari did not wish for a prince to marry. She did not wish for gold or treasure. She simply wished that no food she cooked became burned or spoiled in the process of making. All for the rest of her living days.
"I cannot mend the past that made me," said Mari to the Fae. "What I can change is the things I do in the here and now."
[Photo by Scott Webb on Unsplash]
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