Once upon a time there was a bend in a tree, which grew among other trees and lay among the rocks covered in mosses of different hues of purple.

The tree with a bend had a heart, which was aching.

Because as it had been growing, among the other trees, up from the ground with the rocks and the mosses, it had been burning…

But it swallowed the smoke and it made all efforts to conceal the fire, and the embers, smoldering…

And while growing and burning, with the grand secrecy eking out from the ground surrounding the roots, into a sort of fog or mist that hazed the acre, this tree took some maligned pride in the secrets she kept.

Because she knew, regardless of any other perception of who she was...she knew there was a fire within her. Whether that fire being a good thing, or a harmful thing, did not cross her mind as of consequence. Because while one is still growing, without knowing of consequences...relativity does not exist. Like Shroedinger’s cat, really.

She took pride that the secret was one of physical threat, one with an aura of risk. One that would not be delighted in by those around her, were they aware. One that in fact may frighten them.
She felt brave.

And she felt clever.

Because the low-laying fog or origin unknown to the rest of those around her, she knew the origin. And for this, she felt clever.

The fire was a hunger insatiable; but deliberate, and bade time. A sick balance was struck between that which could be afforded to burn in secrecy, and that which was necessary to stoke the fire.

And for some time, she believed this agreement was manageable, sustainable, and perfect.

Then, a day came.
Where another tree, once seeded nearby, emerged from the soil.

She found herself proximally closer to another tree, than she had ever really anticipated.
And it was small.

And she realized, how grown already she had become.
The fires inside of her, had burned down slowly over time to the base of her trunk… burned her from the center, outwards, but more so down, to the base, where it festered and expanded and thrived on the emerging’s of her roots.
And it thrived, and it devoured her where she was anchored to the earth.

She beheld her nearby sprouted neighbor...she looked downwards upon him, and she saw how tenderly he was held to the soil, which had ashed somehow from below?

And she realized how fragile this child was, she realized how innocent, she realized how impressionable, and how dependent upon her roots, and her barrier to the wind, he was.

It was here that the realization dawned upon her for the very first time, that the life she had created for herself- and the intricate and meticulously hidden secrets she harbored ****** the fresh child who was planted in her soil, to depend upon the strengths of her roots, the strength that all around her naturally assumed existed.

She became frantic.

Bound by brittle, burning roots to the place she had sabotaged in her own short-sighted impulses to define herself as a mysterious and special tree.

And the fire, which she felt had coexisted as an equal within her, she realized was not with any of her interests at heart.

And that which she had begun so long ago, she could not extinguish, or tame.
And her own damage, pain, inflicted in her decisions still were of little concern to her, but to face that now someone else completely undeserving of any of these consequences would suffer greater than even she: it broke her.

She lacked any plan to remedy, or seek help, it was far past a point where those around her could offer anything to save her, or help her, or quiet the fire, or save the child.

And so she lived on as a slave to the wicked fires gnawing away at her everything, at the air surrounding, of the soil, of the example…

And she died far too slowly, as she watched each passing day those around her living timid tender serene lives of trees

Oblivious in the 'fog'
….and while the young tree beside her came up, but far slower than other trees ought to…

Came up, without solid foundation, roots that were unable to take hold in the ashy soil
came up, feeling the heat from below and beside, but never knowing well enough to realize it was unusual.

The burning tree died too slowly, and she watched the tree born and die from neglect and inadequate surroundings.

And the small tree wasn't even noticed by any of the other trees, because the burning tree was so enveloped in shame and sorrow to even properly acknowledge the presence of the acres newest sapling.

And so, on she burned, every dawn rising upon the fallen, wilted twig beside her, that only she had known.

And her ashes kept any others from ever seeding and sprouting near her.
And as the years went on, the area surrounding her of death and sorrow spread,
And she was alone.

The end.