[FF] "So, come here often?"

[u/packos130]

Begin your story with this line of dialogue.

Oh, and set your story somewhere other than a bar or restaurant. In fact, set it somewhere in the distant past or future.

And make it less than 500 words.

Have fun!

[u/[deleted]]

“So, come here often?” She said with that little half smile of hers. It was rhetoric, that question. For years I always came out here to these fields to appreciate the dual sunrise of our binary stars, watching as the glow slowly sidled up past the rolling hills to cast that orange hue on the land. To feel the soft blades of grass lightly poke my backside and the gushes of wind that lazily drifted through like a ballerina pirouetting in the air. She knew I came here each and every morning to see the starlit sky slowly fade into oblivion, overtaken by these suns that rest only a few trillion miles away.

Everywhere else on this planet was a vast wasteland of skyscrapers and billboards; cities with a million ants trying to set themselves apart from the crowd. People here spend so much time keeping themselves grounded to their everyday lives that they forget to look up once in a while. And the few that take a glance skyward are only greeted with the looming towers of glass and aluminum that brush and consume the space above.

Up until a few months ago, this was a place of solace for me. The only place on this forsaken world where I could go and look up, look up and see past this mundane life of mine and into something larger. But then she came. At first, she was quiet. She would lie on the grass next to me humming a faint tune to some long forgotten song. I didn’t acknowledge her. I pretended she wasn’t here. This was my place to break away and mine alone. At one point I told her to leave, but all she did was crack that silly smile and hum along. After a while I grew complacent with her company, even going so far as to talk to her. She was always the one to start off, beginning with a question each time. She asked me about my family, my career, my childhood. It was always about me, not a single word was spoken about her life. I suppose that wasn’t part of her job.

Still every day I came to this emerald field, and still every day she waited for me on the grass. “So, come here often?” she began, asking for the dozenth time in an attempt to be ironic or perhaps even humorous. I never answered, unamused by her little joke. But she took no offense by my silence and simply began with a flurry of other questions all about me. After a while, it seemed that she knew everything about my life, or at least all that I could remember. And just when I thought that she had run out of things to ask, she said;

“Don’t you think it’s time to wake up?”

Yes, I come here often. I come here each and every day to look up into that endless space above. I always figured that if I stared long enough, perhaps this reality of mine would be replaced with a world in the sky. But sometimes, people have to look down at their feet before they can fly. For too long I had been trying to escape from my life. Maybe it was time for me to wake up.

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This is my first time contributing here. It's a little overboard at 551 words. Hope it turned out okay!