Jose Luque Montero

Country :  Spain

Hey! My name is Jose, I´m a spanish writer who happens to like writing in English language. I have been writing for about 1-2 years artistically, however in school I was also writing artistically – without being aware of it. In my free time I like to draw, read, make funny videos, watch TV shows, movies and hang out with friends just like the rest of us, really. About my art, I would say it depends on the target, it can be dark and angsty, or happy and enlighting, it pretty much depends on the day and my mood. I hope you enjoy my work as much as I enjoyed writing it. Happy reading.

 

Отрывок из малой прозы “SackTime Stories“

 

The Lumber, Jack

It was a cold Winter in Canada, usual stuff really, but cold regardless, Jack was now a grown up and, as is tradition in his family of lumberjacks, Jack had to chop a tree on his 18th birthday. His dad John was extremely excited – “finally my boy is going to become a man and chop”. Jack was enthusiastically shaking. He went to pick up the chopping axe, said goodbye to his, now very proud mom and to his sister Lily – and took off.

Jack was listening to his dad carefully, as he did not want to miss any details.        After several miles walking in the snow, they made it to the Ancient Forest. The trees with the best wood was found there. Their leaves, crystal coloured and diamond fragile were reflecting all the colours of the light spectrum.         Jack wasn´t seeing trees – those were something else. Magic, one might say.  John started yelling, “Jack, Jack, get your axe, let´s chop ‘em down!” 

Jack picked up the axe and started to tremble. He saw himself on the very edge of the sharp tool and he started to cry. Jack couldn´t understand what was going on as he steeled himself to strike against the helpless tree. When he was about to hit it – “PUM”- a fairy appeared out of nowhere. Jack stopped the attack and asked, “who are you little creature?”

“I´m one of the forest Gods”, the fairy replied. “Every tree is one of us, I am this tree´s soul”, the fairy continued.

“Oh, cool!” Jack replied, excited.

“We´ve seen into your soul and we saw doubt. You don´t want to harm us, but you don´t want to disappoint your dad either”, the fairy explained, very wisely.

“Well I did not know you guys had soul. I don´t want to hurt you, I just want to leave you all alone”, Jack replied.

“Then you must convince your dad that what he is doing is wrong”, the fairy demanded.

“Count on me you magic dwarf!”, Jack exclaimed.

A tiny dwarf appeared, “thank you, Jack”.

“Kiber, I think he was referring to me”, the fairy said.



They both laughed. And, it is well known that when spirits of the forest laugh, you can hear the wind pass through the leaves – also known as psithurism.

Jack was walking towards his dad.

 “Dad, I don´t want to chop trees anymore”, Jack said.

“How come, son? That´s disgraceful”, John replied.

“Neither should you”, Jack bravely stated.

“Why not? Tree chopping is all I know”, John asked intrigued.

“We can find another profession, but there is no replacement for the trees that we are chopping. If we don´t stop now, the whole forest will be soon gone, and I don´t want to destroy their magic world”, Jack stated.

“Wait a minute, what magic world are you talking about, son?”, John asked bewildered.

All the magic creatures from the forest started to show. There were deer with long ears and crystal horns, dwarfs, fairies, druids, Bon-sais, Fungi, and even a big nosed troll. 

“Ooooooh!” – Exclaimed John. 

“We are the creatures of the forest. We live in these trees. Our souls are linked to each of these trees”, the creatures explained.

“See dad? They deserve to live” – Jack stated.

“I see now, all the tears that I could hear whilst chopping were these creatures begging me to stop. What have I done, my beloved son?”, John asked, his voice breaking.

“It is okay”, the fairy said. “You were doing this without knowledge. We can forgive you for your old sins, but the killing must stop now”, she finally stated.

John burst into tears. “Sure, sure, I´m extremely sorry. I won´t do it anymore”, John replied through his tears.

From John’s honest tears, a small plant blossomed. He smiled, as a tiny unicorn was its soul. 





“Oh, son, look what has grown!”, John said with glee – as he started to dance around in happiness.

“I´ve got an idea dad, let´s plant more trees, to make it up for all these years”, Jack suggested.

“Yes let´s”, John decided. “But what are we going to do for a living from now on?”, he asked.

“Don´t worry good Sir, since your son has proven to be a worthy friend, and you have redeemed yourself… we will bake magic bread for you to sell. You will increase the size of our family and we will provide for yours.”, the spirits of the forest replied unanimously. 

“You´ve got yourself a deal, thank you all, good creatures”, replied the two ex-lumberjacks.

The magic bread turned out to be a success. Soon enough the Lumber´s family was well known in Canada for their tasty bread and the forest and its magic kept growing till the very end.

If you ever stop at Canada, please say hi to our Friends.

-The end-







Overgrowth

Roger was a Little Tulip living in a tiny tulip field, from a young age he admired Vulcan, the biggest Tulip around. Vulcan was sooo big that he blocked out the sun for all those under him, getting the light for himself. Roger wanted to be as big and powerful as Vulcan was. He had it all, every nutrient you can imagine, every drop of sun. His photosynthesis was beyond perfect. 

One really warm sunny morning, were you could feel the heat in the air, every breath felt like fire, allowing you to believe, for a brief moment, that you could be a dragon and, potentially, spit fire. The Gods of the garden came in as usual, but this time, they were bringing with them an unknown tool… it looked like a deadly device. They approached Vulcan and dug a hole around him, lifting him up and taking him away from the field. Roger burst in tears; they took his idol. He was so focused on crying that he barely noticed he was being moved into Vulcan´s place. Once he wiped his wet eyes, he realized he was now occupying Vulcan´s spot. He started to cry again, but these were tears of joy. The days went by… Roger was getting bigger and stronger, he even surpassed Vulcan´s size. He had it all, he was happy, but he developed some sort of cocky attitude. The new-borns weren´t liking him much, but Roger couldn´t care – “flower up” he would say. It was all happiness for him, until the garden Gods decided to visit again.

“Put me down you monsters, you don´t know what you are doing! Take me back to my kingdom!”, Roger desperately yelled.  He was so concerned about his future that he even lost consciousness.

 

Roger woke up in the middle of a magnificent field filled with other plants, all kinds of them – I´m not a botanist myself, so I won´t list them to avoid hurting sensitive scientists out there-

Roger found himself to be of average size, he even saw Vulcan there, amongst the most mediocre sized plants. Roger refused to be one of them, and out of anger and thirst, decided to bend to avoid his neighbours from getting sun joy.




Several weeks went by, and he found himself taller than everyone else, he felt powerful but lonely as well. No one close to him whom he could share his success or strength. And now, being at the top, all he could do was to inevitably grow more and more. All the sudden, he noticed tickles at his roots, he took a quick look down there and saw a tiny tulip smiling at him. It was like looking at his young self, eagerly desperate to grow up. Roger decided to bend to provide some light to who reminded him to his young self. The time went by and the tiny tulip grew onto a giant one, Nemed was his name.

Nemed thanked Roger: “it was very kind of you, being so powerful, to share some light with me”, 

“I was all by myself, now I´ve got someone to share it with”, replied Roger.

“I don´t want to annoy you, Roger, but wouldn´t it be better if we could share our resources with the rest? We would all grow together and not at someone else´s expense.” Nemed suggested.

“There is wisdom in your words young Nemed, thank you for teaching me so I can learn”, Roger replied amicably.

“I´ve experienced more growth with a conversation than I would´ve expected – more than with sunlight even!”, he added.

“Imagine having more fellas to interact and share”, Nemed replied. 

Soon enough Roger and Nemed made room for their neighbours who greeted and thanked them for allowing them to grow as well.

“It´s not accomplished by one plant alone, but by the whole realm”, Roger replied. He also apologized for being a jerk.

“I forgot what truly matters it to give and share.”, stated proudly.

The whole yard grew extensively that year, the garden Gods were proud of how well they did and decided to move them to a bigger and higher place, where bees and other insects would help them to pollinate. The miracle wasn´t solely accomplished by Roger, but by each individual focused on help. They soon all had families and lived happily as a tree, despite being flowers.

If you ever visit Amsterdam tulip field, say hi to Roger and his friends. They will teach you about life and, perhaps, something else.

-The end-



Final Line

The crowd was cheering relentlessly. Michal, the most predominant, strong, and fast racing horse ever seen, was able to make a few lucky and wise ones slightly richer and perhaps, happier. But he also made a whole lot of non-believers a bit less fortunate. He crossed the winning line three seconds ahead of the second, not so fast, horse – Manoel. A crushing victory, again, for Michal. All the people who frequently rooted and bet for him were now nearly millionaires, as Michal had won 118 races in his whole career, despite being a young horse.

Manoel was obviously jealous of him, but after every race he had someone to cheer him up. Manoel´s sister, Molly, was the prettiest horse around – long blonde horsehair, robust constitution, and a breezy smile. She was always rooting for Manoel, even though she knew deep down, that he was no competition for Michal.

After the race Molly approached Michal to congratulate him. Michal was about to thank her back but was commanded to go back to training. For an elite horse, there is no time to waste – not on friendships, family, nor anything else. Molly stood there waiting for Manoel to celebrate. 

Michal said to himself- “Why don’t I have anyone with whom I can share?”, his thoughts were interrupted by the engine sounds that took him back to the dungeon where his strong body was forged.

Michal spent several years training at the highest level, waking up before the sun does and going to bed after the moon waves at us. Running whilst eating, racing around the mountains for days and days without the joy to stop every now and then to enjoy the views and contemplate. Needless to say, he was in magnificent shape!

During the training he was also competing and of course, winning every single medal. Manoel was always crossing the line far behind him, but still ahead of the third. After several years of severe competition Michal had it all, and yet nothing. 




He was living in a huge horse house surrounded by gold, trophies, and trees, but not with a single soul other than his own. He had no hopes or dreams, all he knew was running, but he couldn´t run away from it. He decided that it might be a good idea to set a world record, to fill the void and he trained even harder for it.

After 18 months of intense training he was ready to demolish the record. The crowd was torn, some of the spectators were hesitant, but the most loyal ones thought that it would be a breezy challenge for Michal.

“BANG”, the race started. Michal took off like a lighting, eager to touch the ground for the first and the last time. He kept the same speed and energy throughout the whole race and made it to the end quicker than expected. The crowd went bananas, not a faster horse had ever lived. He crushed the record by 20 seconds. He made it! Yet, once the competition was done and the bets were collected, no one approached him to congratulate him. As he was leaving the stadium Molly saw him in the distance and galloped towards him.

“Michal, Michal! You were fantastic out there!” She said enthusiastically. 

“Really?” Michal replied.

“Yes, absolutely. Are you going out now to celebrate with your loved ones?” Molly asked.

“Actually I´m going back home to get some rest” Michal replied with a sad expression on his face.

“Oh well, if you want…I can go with you” Molly offered.

“That´d be great” Michal said as he smiled and a tear drop sailed down his face.

Both horses walked away, chatting and laughing as the sun was setting, leaving a lovely picture behind. 

Soon enough Michal and Molly developed feelings towards each other, meeting almost every day, chatting for ages and laughing as well.

“Molly”, said Michal.

¨Yes?¨ She asked.

“I´m thinking of quitting racing”, Michal said.

“Why? You are the best at it!” Molly replied surprised. 



“Yes, but the second best has always been your brother. If I quit, he would be the happiest racing horse ever, and I will finally be able to live a normal life with 

 

someone I love. These past few months have filled me more than all the trophies, victories, and glory.” He explained. 

“How is that possible?” Molly asked naively. 

“I´ve always wanted someone to share my joy with. I saw your brother, despite not winning, being happier and loved. That´s all I´ve ever wanted and now I finally have it.” Michal explained. “Don´t get me wrong, I won´t entirely quit racing. I´ll become a racing teacher to show what I´ve learned”, added.

“That´s fantastic, I´ll be there with you”, Molly said.

They both hugged and lived together a lovely and peaceful life, filled with joy, love and purpose.

Manoel ended up being the fastest horse in the competition until his retirement. On family dinners he would always thank Michal who would explain that is better to be loved than to be an absolute success. 

If you ever stop by a racing horse bet, please support all of them. You never know how much of a help that can be.

-The end-

 

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