Lost Tales

I spent most of my childhood dreaming and daydreaming about different worlds, imagining so many stories unfolding in my mind every single day. Mom always told me I had a vivid imagination and encouraged me to write whatever I dreamt about. She said she was just like me when she was young, and that writing all those stories down from a young age was a major factor that contributed to her becoming an author.

I took her advice and started writing when I was just six, and over the years, I had so many stories of my own that I was proud of. However, my preferring fiction over everything else pushed me into a corner in social situations; a lot of my classmates thought me a freak and often bullied me. I struggled to make friends for many years, and once I reached my teens, I finally gave up on it. My stories were enough, I didn’t need any friends. My characters were my second family.

After I finished school and started working, however, my writing slowly faded into the background of my life. Before I knew it, I had started to neglect my second family. A year into my work at the museum, I began to hear voices calling out to me. At first, I thought I was simply overworked, but as time passed, those voices only became louder, and I began to fear for my mental health.

“Why did you leave us behind?”

“Have you abandoned your family?”

“Don’t you love us anymore?”

Those were what I heard. I couldn’t make sense of it. Then one day, my boss caught me holding my head and whispering “shut up” under my breath. She asked me to take some time off, and maybe check with a therapist if I feel stressed. I took her advice and took the rest of the week off. I argued with myself over the next three days on whether or not to see a therapist, and in the meantime, those voices didn’t leave my side. I called Mom for some insight, and she told me not to see a therapist, but to resume my writing once more.

I asked her how that would help; she said she went through the same issue when she stopped writing, and that it was something very few of us experienced. I asked her what she meant by that and she asked me whether it wasn’t obvious who my second family was. Her words made me question reality. How were my stories communicating with me? I found it difficult to believe, but I trusted Mom and started writing again. To my surprise, those voices disappeared instantly the moment I resumed it.

“Thank you… Thank you for returning to us.”

It was what I heard last from one of the voices. Little did I know that the worlds I wrote about actually had a life of their own. It was a scary thought at first, but remembering the sheer joy it brought me since I was a child, I embraced it without further questioning. I continued to write during my free time and eventually published my first novel. I was thrilled to stand beside Mom as a fellow fantasy author.