I woke up at about 1 AM this morning with this story fully formed in my head. I have cleaned it up a bit but it is essentially what I scrawled in my notebook before falling back asleep.
The Hoop
The sun still hadn’t crested the horizon when the old man wheeled his hoop into town, casting a long shadow in front of him. The few people who were up and about only half noticed his arrival, as if it were a passing thought, a memory just out of reach, but she did. She went straight up to him and fell in alongside him, matching his lethargic pace.
The old man didn’t say a word, but she knew to reach out and put her hand on the hoop, helping to roll it along through the dusty street. It was soft to the touch, like the arm of a well-upholstered easy chair. It felt like home.
Together, they rolled it up the street, their motions synchronized, natural and easy, as if they had been doing it forever. They passed the fountain in the town square, and she let herself become one with the hoop’s movement, as she knew he wanted her to.
As they exited the square, her hand stopped leaving the hoop. Somehow, it followed the rotation up to its peak, a foot above her head, and then down to the ground at her feet without her having to bend or exert any force whatsoever. It was the most natural thing in the world when her arm followed suit, conforming to the curve of the hoop, slowly rolling towards the edge of town.
As they passed the last few houses, her whole body rolled with the hoop, her head rising to the top, over, down to the earth, back up, and down once more.
Finally, there was only the old man and his hoop, silently rolling out of town.
#dream #shortFiction #writing