The Tragedy of the Girl and the Plum Tree

She was born in the spring, just as the blossoms began to arrive. Her mother died in childbirth, and her father never forgave her for it. Villagers whispered that she was cursed when they saw her strangely shaped eyes and pale skin. No one tended to her. Twice, she almost died from neglect and malnutrition. Times were hard. Plague spread through the land. A great earthquake erased entire cities. Conflict among the daimyo warlords covered the land in red as years of slaughter soaked the soil with so much blood that crops could no longer grow.

Hardship befell the village as harvests failed year after year. Whispers arose once more. Blame was placed on the strange pale child whom everyone ignored. Even when her tiny hands reached up for connection or warmth from strangers and neighbors, the touch never came. Her hands stayed reaching, always alone. It was decided that she was to blame. Her father did not defend her. Even though she was only a child, she was banished from the village and forced to live in the forsaken grove at the edge of the town.

Meals were brought to her once a day. Always cold. Never enough. Water came from the nearby stream. She was never allowed to leave. Two guards patrolled the barrier fence that held her small hamlet, armed with torches and blades to cut her down and burn her alive if she ever tried to escape.

Thus, she became an abyss.

Years passed, and not a single person visited or checked on her. Eventually, crops did return, and all the villagers felt justified in their exclusion and abandonment of the girl with the sanpaku eyes. If any of them had ever cared to check on her, they would have found her shivering and crying every night, praying for any sort of company.

NAOEI’MHEREI’LLALWAYSBEHEREWITHYOU!

Time passed, and her father died. Now she was truly alone. Meals came less frequently as the villagers slowly forgot about her. By now, the skin beneath her eyes was calloused from all the years of crying. If only there were a sharp stone she could have used to slice her throat, or a high ledge from which she could have jumped. No, all she had was that grove and no escape. She was condemned to live.

As the years passed, she began to forget the concept of connection or human interaction. Words came less frequently from her lips as seasons bled together without a single word from another soul. Her psyche started to break like fissures in a dam until finally the cruelest of thoughts dripped into her mind; this is what she deserved. This is all she was meant for.

NAOEIT’SNOTTRUEYOU’REABEAUTIFULPERSONANDYOUDESERVELOVE!

Then, one day, a single sapling sprouted from the soil. Plum trees lined the edges of her grove, and she could occasionally catch glimpses of their blossoms peaking above the edges of her enclosure. She wasn’t even sure if it was a plum tree. For the first several months, it was merely a twig with a handful of leaves. She enjoyed seeing it every morning when she crawled from her small mud hut. It became her one companion.

Thus, she set out to tend to it. Every day, she sat with it and observed what it preferred or struggled with. Cupped hands made dozens upon dozens of trips every few days to make sure it was adequately watered. Leaves, bark shavings, twigs, and more were laid in a padded circle around its root knot, giving it a mulch bed to better gather nutrients. She never gave it a name. It wasn’t hers to name.

All the while, she heard the footsteps of her guards checking on her in silence every day. The meals got smaller. Crop failure and war had returned. All of the young men in the village were taken away. Days would pass without a single meal. Strength faded, and her very bones felt weak. Still, she tended to the tree. Days became weeks. Weeks became seasons. The tree grew and soon was as tall as she was. Now she was nearing womanhood, but she no longer remembered her birthday. Someone as low as her did not deserve such a concept. This was all she was meant for.

NAOE!NAOELISTENTOME!THAT’SNOTALLYOUWEREMEANTFOR!

Knots clumped her hair into a tangled mess. Infection gnawed at her gums. No one ever checked on her. Yet every day, she checked on the tree. It was the only thing that gave her comfort. Maybe that was all she was meant for: to be the caretaker of this tree. Maybe even the other trees nearby. She began to imagine herself as their steward. Even though she could not see them or nurture them, she sent her energy to them in prayer every night and every morning as she tended to her solitary tree.

Now she was a young woman. Several of her teeth had fallen out. She hadn’t spoken in over a year. War had never stopped. Power-hungry men were never satiated, and the country still had young men it could sacrifice. But that amount must have been dwindling, because one day, the footsteps stopped coming to her fence. Her guards were no longer there. The tree was nearly full-grown now and was able to bear fruit. She enjoyed sitting beneath its blossoms in the spring and would ravenously consume her daily ration of one plum during its bountiful months. Thoughts of escape did not immediately arrive in her mind. Even without guards, this was her condemnation. This is what she deserved. This was all that she was meant for.

NAOENO!ONEDAYYOU’LLSEE!YOU’LLSEEHOWBEAUTIFULANDKINDYOUWERE.THEYWEREWRONG!

Another year passed without footsteps ever coming to her fence. Only after months of near starvation due to the meals stopping did she finally consider leaving. All the world had forgotten her, and it was another month or so before the plums would arrive. She would be dead by then if she stayed. Something animalistic and basic gnawed at her and told her to leave. Her tree told her to stay. She could not forsake it.

YOU’LLDIEIFYOUDON’TLEAVEYOURTREE!YOUHAVETOLEAVEPLEASE!!

Hunger pains stabbed at her insides as she lay on the cold dirt floor of her hut. Not even her single blanket was left; it had torn and mildewed years ago. Death seemed to be approaching, and after days of lamenting, she forced herself up and to the door. To her shock, it was not locked or tied in place. A single rotting hinge was all that had held her captive for that time. As the door fell open, she glanced back at her tree with the feeling that she would return at some point. For now, she had to eat. After that, she could return to her hut. That was all that she was meant for.

Shaky legs shuffled dirty bare feet down the forgotten walkway that led back to the town. Ahead was a bridge that fed into a large field, which spanned several acres before ending at the village edge. She crossed the bridge slowly, and a foul scent filled her nose. Rotting flesh’s wretched fumes soaked her nostrils and burned into her mouth until she almost vomited. Then she saw why. Thousands of armored bodies lay strewn across the field in different stages of rot. Crows picked at flesh as once proud men lay split open on top of the banners of their lords. No one was alive. Beyond that, the village was gone. Smouldering ruins were all that remained for the vast majority of the place she had once known.

Still, she could not help but cross the field of the dead and enter her former homeland. Silent streets covered in charred earth and collapsed wood greeted her as she wandered the realm like a ghost. She could not even remember where she had lived, so she had no desire to visit her home. Food was all that mattered. Hours were spent wandering and scavenging until finally she found a fairly large house that had only partially been destroyed. Bodies of women and children lay pale and silent in the courtyard as she approached and entered.

Most of the interior was gone. Walls had collapsed in the blaze. Towards the back of the house was where she found the store room, and to her delight, she found a few pieces of salted meat. Even though it had started to turn, she consumed them in moments out of pure desperation. She ate everything she could find until it felt like her stomach might tear. While her body digested, she decided to search the house for any more food or useful goods.

Down the hall she went, checking each room until she found a room that must have belonged to a wealthy young woman. It was surprisingly undisturbed, save for a few burned-down walls and a hole in the ceiling where the moonlight now shone through. Amid that light, a single leaf fell and drifted down before her until it came to rest at her feet.

NAOEI’LLFINDYOU!I’LLFINDYOUJUSTWAITFORME!

Watching the leaf fall made her eyes catch sight of a piece of pink fabric hanging on the wall. She approached the fabric and found it to be a beautiful kimono. Memories of beautiful women in town, draped in elegance, flashed in her mind, and a long forgotten softness yearned from within her heart. Her unwashed hands pulled the fabric from its stand and slowly slid it over her frail frame. She did not know what to do or how to tie the belt, so she merely harnessed it around her waist. It was enough. Standing there in the oversized kimono, she felt beautiful. That sense of beauty was so overpowering that she did not even hear the footsteps approaching down the hall. As she spun in circles beneath the glow of the moonlight, she caught a glimpse of steel shimmering.

The slice burned like fire as the katana blade tore through her back and lungs with ease, severing nerves and blood vessels, sending her screaming to the ground. The men in armor watched her in laughter and murmured insults at the crazy outcast trying to dress in fine clothes. Gasps of horrifying pain escaped her mouth as she begged for help, but the soldiers merely walked away in bemusement to continue their slaughter of those who remained alive in the town.

Her body began to go numb, but her thoughts were only of the tree. If she were gone, who would tend to it? Pain in her chest felt like daggers. Her legs no longer worked, but her arms did. So she crawled. Out of the room. Out of the house. Down the courtyard. Through the field of the dead.

Screams of agony mixed with tears of hysterical sadness as she dragged her failing body across the ground until she was back at her grove. Blood stains streaked the earth behind her, and now her vision was blurring. The taste of rust filled her mouth. But she was back. Up ahead, her beautiful tree stood there waiting for her. It was the only thing in that world that had never hurt her.

“Mm sorr. I’m sorr. I’m sorry,” she cried out as she reached the base of the trunk and collapsed against its familiar bark. The world began to tear. A single blossom fell and landed on her back. Darkness crept into her sight, and everything faded except for the tree.

“I’m sorry. I’ll nev… never… never leave… you… again…” she whispered to the tree as she cursed the world and all its forsakenness.

There, she died.

NAOE!NAOE!YOUHAVETOLEAVE!NAOE!!

Everything burned away, and the roots pulled back from Naoe and Hazuki’s minds as wind howled around them. Naoe let out a gasp as the weight of existing again collapsed onto her in full force. No matter how she tried, she could not catch her breath. Fingers clawed at her throat as she let out a guttural growl of release that bled into a broken scream. Hazuki's hands stayed clasped against her in fear she might shatter otherwise.

Her scream turned to a howl as tears fell like never before as realization sank in. Limbs bent under strain as the gusts threatened to rip even the ancient tree from its roots.  Hazuki felt a rage unlike his own burning into his energy and threatening to tear the world apart. Naoe's rage and sorrow, after centuries of being alone, were now unleashed.

"Naoe! Naoe, you have to listen to me! You weren't cursed! You weren't meant for only that! You were perfect! You were beautiful! COME BACK TO ME! COME BACK TO YOURSELF!!" Hazuki screamed as the trees around them bent and cracked.

Naoe's nails dug into her cheeks and pressed till they broke skin. Her cries were uncontrollable, no matter how hard Hazuki tried to pull her back to earth.

After all those years, she finally remembered. She had allowed them all to poison her mind. She had condemned herself to that tree. She had allowed herself to believe that was her worth. She had died believing that was her only place and purpose in the world. In many ways, she was to blame.