Writer's Block

Finalist in the 'The Write Track 2015' competition

Ink spills, like blood when writers are in a bad mood.
Of course, when in good moods, writer’s words often flow like the light, bubbly brook of Spring.
However, there are no guarantees.
In a bad mood is where Arden found herself on a not-quite warm Tuesday morning.
By all accounts, the sun pooling on the carpet, the gentle breeze rustling and her unlaboured breath should paint a picture of quintessential nirvana. She should have been in a ‘light, bubbly brook of spring’ mood.
But she was not.
Here she sat, the cursor blinking in and out of sight mockingly, holding her gaze. Arden thought of nothing in particular, except the yawning, vast and overtly dense realisation that she was dying. The life slowing fleeing from her in every breath, every movement and every sound, was not the worst of her problems.
She had come to accept her death, but Arden’s acceptance of never finishing her last thoughts, was another matter entirely.
Her book was not finished, and over the past few months since her diagnosis, that had become a problem.
She wanted to leave something behind, not something particularly important, a short novel, a meaningful poem that others in her situation would read and know that they are not alone. But her cursor still blinked and the page she had opened was still frustratingly empty.
Maybe she wasn’t a writer; maybe this was some cruel malicious entity telling her that she could not leave a mark on the world, that she would remain voiceless and wordless. Alone, silent soul in the ever-growing presence of humankind.
Her muse was her life and her life wasn’t very inspiring. There were thousands like her, girls with syndromes, girls with cancer, girls with a defect that they were born with that doomed them from the day they entered the world screaming and covered in blood.
Arden was pulled back from her macabre thoughts as her body started to shake with a coming fit. Shoulders wracking, the first coughs erupted, throwing her head forward, hand over mouth.
When the fit, the first she’d had in a while, passed, she drew her hand away from her face. The sickly-yellowed flesh was stained red with blood. Arden sighed and wiped it on a near towel her nurse had provided.
The cursor had stopped, she noticed as she straightened her gaze back on the computer.
She was suddenly overcome with the desire to fill that empty space, the blankness that reflected her life in a depressing sort of way
She started typing, a few words appeared.
Her eyes flicked to the towel stained with her own blood, a few more words appeared.
Maybe she was in a bad mood, maybe the sunlight only darkened her, maybe the breeze was one that brushed heavy thoughts.
Maybe she needed the release of her sickness, her defect, to start her path.
After all, ink spills like blood when writers are in a bad mood.

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