You Don’t Have To Read This, But I Hope You Do

Dear Sir,

I thought it best to contact you by mail, considering the events of this past week. You don’t have to read this, of course – I’m sure you are very busy, after all – but I hope that you do. Perhaps it will do you good to hear an explanation of events from a point of view other than your own.

After the events of the dance on Friday night – I’m sure I don’t have to explain that in detail – it seems a vital misunderstanding of the importance of our … tryst (shall we say) … has begun to blossom in your mind. Yes, I enjoyed myself very much – as I hope did you – but I thought a man in your position would have understood, as seemed clear to me, that this was simply an enjoyable dalliance rather than the precursor of something, indeed of anything, deeper, or more personally committing.

Now, it is possible this misunderstanding arose from the manner of my departure, which I admit was in haste, and taken without the necessary politenesses which such occasions surely warrant. So please forgive me for my sudden disappearance – although I should say that the hour was exceedingly late, and indeed not just you but most of your guests seemed slightly worse for wear by then. Even in my haste, I did still call out a ‘goodbye’ across the room to you, but it seems that my words did not rouse you sufficiently from your slumber for you to recognise it as my farewell.
It seems however, that my words did, indirectly, contribute to our misunderstandings this week, as apparently you were awakened enough by them to have subsequently watched my departure through the windows of your room, catching a glimpse of me fleeing through the front gates as if pursued, and I assume this is where your belief that I had been kidnapped, or was in some way being held in servitude, was formed.

In point of fact, I was simply hurrying to catch the final carriage of the evening, for it was a cold, wet, and very long walk home for me if I happened to miss it, and I was very much determined not to do so, not least because of the clothes I was wearing – I had not even brought a coat, nor boots, and the thought of my gown being ruined by a mile or more of walking through puddles and mud made me shiver in an anxiety probably unknown to those such as yourself, who have others to worry about such mundane matters as the washing of clothes.

Now, having laid out the facts of the evening in question, and having made clear that I accept some fault for the misunderstanding that has, evidently, occurred, I would like to turn to your behaviour in the week since.

It is of course very flattering to discover that you enjoyed the evident delights of my company so much that you’ve since been searching the city to find me – or ‘save me’, as you have reportedly been putting it – but that does not give you the right to barge uninvited into my home, insult my mother, accost my sisters, and accuse all and sundry of god knows what crimes and misdemeanours against me (‘an innocent’, as you kindly put it, although innocent of what I do not know).

My mother has been in tears ever since, and is simply inconsolable. To have someone of your power and standing insult her so brazenly, and with so little foundation, was deeply upsetting for a woman of her years (and long-avowed patriotism), and was, I believe, genuinely shocking to her on a spiritual level. If even half the things she alleges you said to her are true, then, well, I too am truly lost for words.

At least, if I am to search for small mercies, with my mother you were merely verbally abusive. Yet in your overzealous attempts to save me from my own family, you inflicted, beyond the spiteful insults towards their appearances, such grievous injuries on my two sisters that I fear it will be months before they can walk again. I have never seen wounds of such severity inflicted outside of a war, and even with months of rest I am not sure their feet will ever fully heal.

I am truly sorry I was not here when you called, as perhaps all this upset could have been avoided, although, in my darkest hours, I fear that, in fact, it would have been much worse. As it was, I happened to be working when you arrived – which is what you no doubt consider my servitude, but to the rest of us is known simply as employment.

Of course now, not only do I have to continue to support myself and my mother on my meagre earnings, but my two crippled sisters, too.

So it seems, even if after all this I somehow decided to consent to attend another one of your parties, there is much less chance of my being able to find the time to attend. I suppose I should consider that at least an amusing irony of the whole affair, and one which presumably would have made me laugh if not for the horror and harm inflicted upon those I love in service of it.

Thank you for the return of my shoe.

Please do not call at my house again.

Kind Regards

Cindi

___________

Notes:

1. Written on October 13th, 2019
2. This was previously posted here as Tale #102
3. But is now being reposted (with some slight editing differences I expect)
4. Due to it being performed at a Liars’ League event
5. On 14th February, 2021
6. Where it was performed wonderfully by Martine McMenemy
7. Whose reading I enjoyed very much

__________

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A full accounting of the one hundred and fifty tales that make up the entirety of the thousand and one tales

A Thousand And One Tales was my long term, multi-part writing project, that was supposed to encompass a thousand and one tales over twenty years, but in the end fizzled out at a hundred and fifty and about three years or maybe four. Which is still probably more than was necessary.

Anyway, here is a great big list of all of them, for anybody so inclined to read them again, or for the first time, or not at all. It’s okay, it’s over now.

Tale #1: The Unhappy Bride
Tale #2: Wun, Mun and Undun
Tale #3: The Cat Wife
Tale #4: To Follow A Cat
Tale #5: Lonely Isobel

Tale #6: The Farmer’s Daughters
Tale #7: The Woman Who Was Granted Her Wish
Tale #8: The Three Wishes
Tale #9: The Saddest King of All
Tale #10: The Old Lady And The Three Brothers

Tale #11: The Old Lady And The Thief
Tale #12: The Old Woman Who Lived In The Woods
Tale #13: God, The Devil, And The Man Upon The Road
Tale #14: The Jealous Lord
Tale #15: (fragment)

Tale #16: The Man Who Made Himself A Wife
Tale #17: The Woman Who Lived Alone In The Woods
Tale #18: The King And His Weeping Wife
Tale #19: The Three Doors And The Fourth
Tale #20: (fragment)

Tale #21: The Wolves In The Woods
Tale #22: A Long Winter’s Night
Tale #23: Old Tales Are Made New In The Telling
Tale #24: The Lunar Queen
Tale #25: The King And The Light

Tale #26: The Seven Sisters
Tale #27: The Three Sorrowful Sisters
Tale #28: The Wolf In The Woods
Tale #29: The Wolf In The Woods
Tale #30: The King’s Daughter And The King’s Son

Tale #31: The castle was a prison in a sea of untouched snow
Tale #32: The Grief Stricken King
Tale #33: The Offered Daughter And The Promised Sons
Tale #34: The Lonely Heart
Tale #35: The Lonely Man’s Tale

Tale #36: The Old Woman’s Tale
Tale #37: To Lose Your Faith
Tale #38: The Idle Wish
Tale #39: The town, the forest, the past
Tale #40: Methods Of Torture, Methods Of Death (extract)

Tale #41: (fragment)
Tale #42: The Bear In The Cage
Tale #43: The Girl In The Bear
Tale #44: The Falling
Tale #45: The Floating

Tale #46: (fragment)
Tale #47: The Old Lady And The Woodcutter
Tale #48: The Old Lady And The Crows
Tale #49: The Innkeeper And The Woman
Tale #50: The Stolen Child (A Tale Told In Tales)

Tale #51: The Cat In The Graveyard
Tale #52: The Silk Gloves
Tale #53: A Finger For A Favour
Tale #54: The Search For Lost Things
Tale #55: The Forgetful Prince And The Regretful Bride

Tale #56: In The Woods In The Winter
Tale #57: The Thaw
Tale #58: The Tree
Tale #59: (fragment)
Tale #60: The Lure

Tale #61: (fragment)
Tale #62: Lessons For My Children
Tale #63: And We Went To War
Tale #64: Memorial For The Executed Generals Of The Siege Of Colchester
Tale #65: And In Their Ships They Sailed Out Across The Sea

Tale #66: The Silver Ship
Tale #67: The Fountain
Tale #68: The Drunken Sailor
Tale #69: The Swift
Tale #70: The Crow

Tale #71: The Crow Tree
Tale #72: Our paths trace out behind us
Tale #73: (fragment)
Tale #74: The Woman In The Woods
Tale #75: The Woods In The Woman

Tale #76: Of Wolves And Women
Tale #77: The Wolf And The Girl
Tale #78: On Hansel And Gretel, And Horror
Tale #79: Trail Of Breadcrumbs
Tale #80: A Labyrinth of Streets

Tale #81: How to escape from every maze in the world
Tale #82: Ariadne’s Web
Tale #83: Above the clouds, beneath the sun
Tale #84: The Fairy Tale Heart
Tale #85: Married Hearts

Tale #86: (blue plaque on ruined wall)
Tale #87: To Follow A Child
Tale #88: To Ponder Infinity
Tale #89: The Poor Woman
Tale #90: The Woman Who Lived In The Woods

Tale #91: The King’s Wives
Tale #92: The Morning Birds Free The Soul, The Night Ones Take Them
Tale #93: A circle, whispering time
Tale #94: Beneath the weeping willow she sat down and wept
Tale #95: In The Garden Between

Tale #96: On her shoulders, ravens (a dream of judgement)
Tale #97: The Lord And His Angel
Tale #98: The Woman Of Small Miracles
Tale #99: The Protection of Bees
Tale #100: Old Hope

Tale #101: A Story In The Afternoon (alternate, expanded, 2020 version: A Story In The Afternoon)
Tale #102: You Don’t Have To Read This, But I Hope You Do
Tale #103: Lavenham Ghost Story
Tale #104: A Forlorn Appearance
Tale #105: Beneath A Ceaseless Sky

Tale #106: To Be Kept Safe
Tale #107: The House At Dusk
Tale #108: The Woman In The Bookshop
Tale #109: To Stroke A Hedgehog
Tale #110: To Lose A Beard

Tale #111: The Wooden Man
Tale #112: The Sad Tale Of Lonesome George
Tale #113: The Unfairness Of Being
Tale #114: The King In Red, The Queen In Yellow, The People Clad In Rags
Tale #115: A Short History Of A Minor Kingdom

Tale #116: The Third Dream Of The Waiting Prince, In His Time Of Seclusion, In The High Palace Of Eternal Solitude, Above The Clouds Of The Empire’s Reality, Beneath The Moons Of The Empire’s Imagination
Tale #117: The Eighth Dream Of The Waiting Prince, In His Time Of Seclusion, In The High Palace Of Eternal Solitude, Above The Clouds Of The Empire’s Reality, Beneath The Moons Of The Empire’s Imagination
Tale #118: The Fortieth Dream Of The Waiting Prince, In His Time Of Seclusion, In The High Palace Of Eternal Solitude, Above The Clouds Of The Empire’s Reality, Beneath The Moons Of The Empire’s Imagination
Tale #119: Little Sparrow
Tale #120: While The Peasants Tended Their Trees

Tale #121: Between The Hills, Beyond The Waves
Tale #122: The Dogs
Tale #123: (fragment)
Tale #124: A Dream Upon The Pyre
Tale #125: Reflections Of A Pale Moon

Tale #126: (blue plaque above nondescript door)
Tale #127: To Forget, To Forget
Tale #128: Song Of The Data Miners
Tale #129: The Playgrounds Of Our Youth
Tale #130: On Bluebeard (excerpt)

Tale #131: The Swan (A Morality Tale In Miniature)
Tale #132: The Cormorant In History
Tale #133: The Three Sons
Tale #134: The Three Wives
Tale #135: What Is A Child Worth?

Tale #136: The Bull And His Bride, or The Maid And Her Man (fragment)
Tale #137: The Snow Daughter, or The Voice Beneath The Snow
Tale #138: A Mother’s Love
Tale #139: A Quiet Revolt
Tale #140: All I Know Is That I Am Not You

Tale #141: If You Describe Each Moment Of A Person’s Life, It Becomes A List Of Crimes, An Endless Recitation of Horrors, A Biblical Judgement Upon Their Worth
Tale #142: The Ship Sailed Into The Harbour
Tale #143: The Emperor’s Zoo
Tale #144: The King In His Castle
Tale #145: The Ogre’s Boots

Tale #146: Four Tiny Tales
Tale #147: The Toymaker
Tale #148: The Man Who Wept Too Much
Tale #149: The Woman Who Lived In The Woods
Tale #150: The Man Who Left

__________

Notes:

1. The tales can mostly be read in any order, but a couple come in pairs – Tales #28 and #29 are two versions of the same story; Tale #43 follows on directly from Tale #42; Tales #116, #117 and #118 are all from the same (larger, unpublished) piece; and Tales #133 and #134 are two parts of the same story.

__________

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Tale #150: The Man Who Left

There was a man who had lived for a long time on his own. One day, while walking in the woods, he met a woman and they fell into love. One night, a few quick months later, she fell into labour, and while the doctor and his midwives attended to her the man went outside for a walk.

He headed out into the woods and there was met by men recruiting for the army, and very quickly they impressed him into service. He spent many years away, and was forced there to fight incomprehensible battles in unknowable places for increasingly unclear reasons. He became so weary and distraught by this life of constant toil and terror that it was only his dreams of returning to his wife and child that kept him sane.

Eventually there came a battle the army could not win. A bullet struck him in the lung and he fell down among the corpses of his colleagues and stayed there. When the battle drew to a close and the victorious walked among the wounded to deal them their final blows, he lay still and pretended to be dead in the hope that they would pass him by.

The true corpses attracted the crows. But the crows left his body well alone, for his stench was not yet to their liking. The soldiers drew ever closer, and he feared he would soon be found.

‘Crow,’ he called. ‘Please come here and feed upon me, if only for a little while, so that I may look as if I am dead. For if I am found alive I will be killed stone dead, and never will I be able to return to my love, who I was snatched cruelly from, nor see the face of my child, who was born scant hours after my abduction and whom I have never seen at all.’

Even though the offer was a poor one, for if the man was dead the crow would have his whole body to eat rather than a mere moment’s bite, it took pity upon him and hopped up onto his face. And as the soldiers approached the crow pecked out his eye.

Convinced the man was dead, they passed on by. When it was safe again to speak, the man thanked the crow. ‘And you may have my lung as well,’ he said. ‘For it is dead now inside me, and shall only rot and fester there around my heart,’ and he reached into the bullet hole in his chest and pulled out his lung from within him, much like a magician pulling handkerchiefs from the pockets of his coat.

In thanks for this kind gift, the crow told the man where he was, and how he could get home. The way was long, however, and it took him many years to make his way back. One particularly cold winter in the hills he lost his toes to frostbite, and one especially hot summer by the sea he lost his hand when a mouthful of water stolen from a king’s fountain was punished as severely as could be.

It was well into the sixteenth year of his exile when he finally arrived home. He knocked on the door of his old house and a woman answered.

‘Is that you?’ his old love said.

‘It is,’ he said.

‘What happened to you?’

‘I lost a lung to a bullet, and my eye to a crow. I lost my hand for water, and my toes to snow. But all these years I have saved my heart for you.’ And he opened up his chest and pulled out his heart and placed it beating in her trembling hands.

‘What would I want with this?’ she asked. ‘What could I want with it? I hardly know you. I hardly ever knew you. You left and the world went on for all of us. You didn’t save your heart for me. It was always yours, and yours alone. The dream of me that kept you alive was a dream, and was not me. And it was your dream, and yours alone. Give your dream-wife this heart, and leave me to mine.’

And she handed him back his heart, and went on with her life. And he, eventually, with his.

__________

Notes:

1. Written in February 2015
2. This was first published in November 2018
3. In An Outbreak Of Peace, edited by Cherry Potts, and published by Arachne Press
4. Which is a very nice book
5. Filled with very nice stories
6. Much better than my own.
7. Also in 2015, this was adapted into a song
8. Also called The Man Who Left
9. By Vom Vorton
10. And which you can listen to below:




11. You can also read the lyrics to it right here too.
12. If you so wish.
13. Which you should.
14. Because they’re brilliant
15. And much better than my own.
16. The Man Who Left by Vom Vorton

There was a man who lived alone, and one day he went walking
while in the woods, he met a girl, and soon they started talking
inevitably, they fell into love, and one night, some months later,
he took her to the hospital as she had entered labour
for hours she howled and thundered, in pain and drenched in sweat
and so the man went for a walk, to the place where they had met.
He stumbled across men who were recruiting for the navy
they were not the kind of men who accepted “no” or “maybe”

and so he missed his child’s birth, he was not holding her hand
he was fighting for his country in wars he didn’t understand
and at night, as the ship shook and he feared for his life
he kept himself sane with thoughts of his wife
then one day, a battle came that they could not win
a bullet hit his chest, struck a lung and stuck within
he fell among his colleagues, and played dead upon the deck
but he heard footsteps come closer and he knew that they would check

he saw a crow pecking at a body nearby
and said “crow, come here, and peck out my eye
if the soldiers come closer they will hear my breath
but if they see you feeding on me they will believe in my death
and I may yet survive to return to my home
to the wife that I love and the child I’ve never known”
the offer was a poor one, but the crow’s stomach was full
so it was inclined to take pity and pecked the eyeball from his skull

when the soldiers had retreated and it became safe to speak
the man thanked the crow, eyeball dripping from its beak
and said “since my lung is dead in my chest
I will give it to you to take back to your nest”
pulling flesh from his body like tissues from a sleeve
the crow took his offering and started to leave
but not before telling the man where it was that he lay
and, knowing of his hometown, he told him of the way

the man was far from home and over winter he froze
through the snow he continued, but frostbite took his toes
and in summer, it was hot, and after stealing holy water
the king took his hand, after sparing his slaughter
after many years of exile, he found a place he knew
and a woman answered quietly, “Is that you?”
she looked at his face and his clothes, torn and blackened
and she quietly asked “what on earth happened?”

“I lost a lung to a bullet, and my eye to a crow.
I lost my hand for water, and my toes to snow.
But my mind remained strong and my love remained true
and all these years I saved my heart for you.”
With his remaining hand he pulled his shirt apart
And he opened up his chest and pulled out his heart
“I carried this for you across the oceans and lands”
and he placed it beating in her trembling hands.

“What would I want with this?” She asked. “I hardly even met you.”
“You left and the world went on. We started to forget you.
You didn’t save your heart for me. It was always yours alone.
That woman in your dreams was not me, but a clone.
She only existed in the shadows of your mind.
Give her this heart, and leave me to mine.”

And she handed him his heart, and forgot his name.
And eventually, he did the same.

17. Also, this is the end of A Thousand And One Tales
18. At least for now
19. Because I’ve run out of stories
20. And it’s a new year
21. And it’s cold out there
22. And I’m lonely
23. And sad.

__________

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Patreon subscribers get not just early access to content and also the occasional gift, but also my eternal gratitude. Which I'm not sure is very useful, but is certainly very real.

(Ko-fi contributors probably only get the gratitude I'm afraid, but please get in touch if you want more).

Thank you!


Tale #149: The Woman Who Lived In The Woods

There was a woman who lived in the woods. She was the greatest witch who had ever lived, with powers and knowledge beyond the comprehension of all but herself. She had lived through the entire history of the universe from birth to death many times, and learned of it something more each time, for it was endlessly changing and vaster than infinity, and as her knowledge of the world increased so did her knowledge of herself.

She had lived recently not just in the woods but as the woods, her consciousness spread through every root and branch and leaf of it, from birth and growth and now its gradual death. To understand the causes of its decline she concentrated an aspect of her mind into the form of a single human, and lived as her and died many times, understanding slightly more of the ways of humans with each new life, and each new death.

Eventually the forest died, and her entire mind came to reside in the latest manifestation of her human form, and she stepped out from the shadow of the final tree and into the town and walked out among its people for the first time.

“Nice tits!” shouted the first of them, but she could not answer, for she did not understand fully the complexities of their language.

“I’ve seen nicer,” said the next one. “She’s not all that.”

“A tit’s a tit,” said a third. “And those are some tits.”

She shifted her consciousness across from her body to touch upon their minds, in the hope of learning from them their language and their ways, and alighted upon the mind of the first. At first she was struck by the vast emptiness of what she found there, an emptiness greater by far than even the final days of the universe, when entropy had fully wrought its way and all lay in silence and stasis and a single thought took longer to form than the lifespans of all that we know and have known and shall ever know. Then, as she tried to leap from the first mind to the second, she discovered that it was not a void but a hole, a great dense immensity of concentrated ignorance that compressed all intellectual thought into a single point and let nothing of worth escape.

All her knowledge and compassion and soul was lost to the universe forever. As her old body fell like a tree to the floor one of the men said, “Hey look she’s a fucking spazz an’ all,” as they filmed her last few autonomic twitches with their phones.

__________

Notes:

1. Written in the summer of 2014
2. And unused till now
3. In lieu of a howling rage of despair
4. That is too inarticulate to bear

__________

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Tale #148: The Man Who Wept Too Much

Once upon a time there was a man who was exceedingly lonely. He wept so often and so long even God was disgusted, and he cursed the slovenly creature so that rather than tears, he wept out stories instead. Each story was as bitter and unpleasant as poison, but they never stopped flowing.

__________

Notes:

1. Written on June 13th, 2020

__________

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If you like the things you've read here please consider subscribing to my patreon or my ko-fi.

Patreon subscribers get not just early access to content and also the occasional gift, but also my eternal gratitude. Which I'm not sure is very useful, but is certainly very real.

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Thank you!