A Story in 140 Words

Renegade. That was her, and I loved her from afar. She would never see me, though. I followed the rules, out of fear, out of a sheltered reverence for my parents. I didn’t feel comfortable outside the confines of the box I grew up in. What if I fell off a cliff? I don’t fly. But she did. So beautifully. Long, dark, straight hair traveling down her slender but strong back. Dark eyes always searching for somewhere else, someone else. She let rules flow over her and away; they never caught on her smooth, every-moving edges. I wish she had a web so I could have been gathered into its sultry tendrils. I wish she had walked on the sidewalk instead of the street. I wish she had lived beyond her 17 years. Because then I might have lived too.