She stood there in the field, the wind rustling her long hair to and fro. No noise could be heard. It was a calm, pleasant day. The clouds provided shade from the sun that shone down, highlighting a few chunks of the surrounding fields. Beautiful. If only she could embrace it. Enjoy it. If only she could love it like others would love it.

    She knelt in the grass, staring into the dirt. Staring into the Earth's soul. Filthy, raw. She ripped out a handful of grass. Could the Earth feel it? She couldn't feel it. It couldn't have hurt that much if she couldn't feel it. She ripped more out. And more. Before she knew it, she had ripped out a patch of grass surrounding her. Still, she felt nothing.

    There was a cabin, not far from here. A cozy looking structure, with a pond not far from that. She wouldn't go near it, she couldn't. She would stay right where she was, glaring from the field, glaring at the cabin. Rustic in nature, made of wood with window panes that have warped and distorted the vision through them. Not that she could see anything through them. It was too far away from her. Shrouded in a patch of trees, the cabin was covered completely from the sun, sheltered from the world it seems.

    The pond was motionless. Not one ripple, no sign of life. Just still, stagnant water, sitting there. Evaporating. Like a photo, so lacking in movement. She would not go there. She could not go there. She would stay right where she was.

    She began to dig into the dirt with her finger tips. Small pinches of mud at first, and then more. Then some more. Then they were handfuls. She was grabbing out that dirt as fast as she could for a few moments. Did this hurt? She felt nothing, and so the Earth felt nothing. She wanted to lie down, though she had no urge to sleep. She wanted to do nothing, to be nothing, as she felt nothing. 

    A woman made her way towards the pond. Did she come from the cabin? She was slumped. Not old, just slumped. Exhausted, perhaps. She craved this woman's exhaustion. How nice it would be to feel tired. To sleep. She watched the woman stand at the pond, staring at the lifeless puddle, her lips moving and not a word carried through the wind. Slumped, talking to the pond, she fell to her knees.

    She watched as this woman felt pain. What kind of pain? Her head was in her hands now. How grievous. She yearned for that. She yearned to feel pain. She felt nothing, and watched as this woman bled agony into the world. Into the Earth. Could the Earth feel her anguish? She stopped digging at the dirt, and she curled up into a ball within the hole she'd carved out.

    Was it cold? It was filthy. She didn't want to look at the pond anymore, or the woman, or the cabin. She didn't want to look at anything, at all. She wished so dearly to be tired, to sleep. To close her eyes. She wanted to leave this place, this field. She wanted to feel. She clutched the hard lumps of dirt around her, running her fingers over them and tracing their shapes. She lay there, waiting for something.

    Footsteps.

    Footsteps in the grass. In her field. Approaching her Earth wound. Her hole in the ground. Her place of yearning. Footsteps.

    She stared up at two faces, a man, crying. A woman, screaming. Such emotion seeping from them. She felt nothing. She stared at them, longing to reach out and feel what they felt. She couldn't, and she continued to lay there in the dirt. They looked right through her, past her, into the dirt. Perhaps her digging pained these people, instead of Earth. Perhaps people felt what the Earth couldn't feel. The man grabbed the woman and pulled her close, she clutched his shirt and buried her face into his chest, blubbering sobs like an infant. They hobbled away, frantic and shaking.

    She lay there, staring at the clouds. The sun was leaving her. She felt no heat, the sun made no difference. The pink sky only resembled a sunset that somewhere, someone was finding glory in. Somewhere, someone was feeling something about this Earthly display. This natural beauty that she felt nothing about. She lay there, tracing her fingers over the mounds in the dirt.

    It hadn't been too long before she heard footsteps again. Had they returned? She stared up, and it began to rain.

    It was raining grass. No. Dirt. Mounds of Earth began hurling themselves into her hideaway. She lay there, feeling nothing. The dirt continued until she slowly lost sight of a darkening sky. There was nothing. There was no light, there was no heat. No cold. No feeling. There was only the nothing.

    She waited for a while, perhaps hoping this dirt would push her into feeling something. Exhaustion, pain, fear, something. Anything. All she had, was the nothing. The nothing that surrounded her inside and out. She was nothing, everything around her was nothing. No feeling. No anything. Just nothing. She wriggled her arms up through the moist dirt that surrounded her. Her hands pushed through to the air above. Emptiness, and nothing.

    She stood up and brushed all of the dirt off of herself. Why? Dirt was nothing. She was nothing. She stopped. A tidy garment seemed trivial and useless. Let it be. She wanted so badly to go to the cabin. Why? Would she feel something there? Or is nothing there too? She stood in the hole in the earth, staring at her feet. Bare, covered in Earth. She stepped into the grass and continued walking. How far could she walk? How far would she have to walk to feel pain? Like that woman?

    She trudged through the field, walking for what seemed like an eternity and only covering mere meters in distance. She was closer now. Closer to the cabin. Closer to the pond. She had no keen mind to go to the pond. The pond was still, the pond was nothing. But this cabin, perhaps, was something. This cabin, perhaps, would hold things in store for her.

    She continued. She could do this, she was determined. She could go to the cabin, where these people were. These people with their feelings. These people with their somethings. Perhaps here, she could avoid the nothing.

    She came to the door, where it was silent. The cabin was silent, like the nothing. She looked in, and she saw warmth, she saw photos and a wood stove and she a small dining set. She saw something. She wanted so badly to be inside, to feel something. To feel the things she could see. She stood on the deck, staring in through the warped panes.

    The door swung open, the woman stood there. Staring. She stared back. She stared into her, and for a moment, it seemed the woman could see her. She walked past her, and into the fields.

    Why would she leave all of this, for nothing? Where was she going? To cry in the field? To yell at the trees? She followed her into the fields, walking quickly to keep pace with her. They stopped at the mound of disturbed Earth, where she crawled from. Where she once lay, trying to feel something. Where she was covered in the nothing.

    "Eleanore, my dear Eleanore." The woman whispered through a trembling voice. "It wasn't fair, and I'm sorry. There isn't a day that goes by that I don't wish you were here with me. Perhaps you'd have your own family..."

    Who was Eleanore? The woman began to cry.

    "Thirty one years and to this day, to this bloody day I can't make it a week without crying..." she sobbed into her hands. "I'm so, so sorry. I should have been there. I should have saved you." and she fell down in the dirt. "Please. Please go to sleep Eleanore. Please. You've been stuck here for so long..." she whisper as she began to trace the mounds in the dirt.

    As more of the Earth was moved, the mounds became more prominent. More and more of them. Bones. They were bones. Still, she felt nothing. She just watched as this woman ran her fingers over the bones in the dirt. Softly speaking to them, begging them to go to sleep. She watched, and she stared. Still, nothing. The woman stood up, filthy and her faced stained with tears.

    She walked again towards the cabin, though she continued right past it, and so she followed her. What would she do now? Where would her emotions take her? Into the something? Away from the nothing?

    She stood at the edge of the pond, the still, lifeless pond, and continued to whisper things to Eleanore.

    "I miss you. I'm so sorry. You've waited so long, and you've been so patient. I'll help you sleep soon, I'm so sorry..." she said in repetition as she stepped into the dark water. With each step, not one ripple was made. It was like stepping into an abyss. She stared, in wonder... Feeling something. She had something.

    She stared, and she watched as this woman fed herself to the lifeless void that was a pond, as she submerged her head under the water, her pale skin gleaming close to the surface, and her eyes lost their light. She stared, and she watched, and her eyes shed tears.

    She went into the pond.

    She went in, and she reached out for her hand. She had feelings, she could feel sadness, loneliness. She could remember the pond.

    She was playing near the pond by herself, as children should never do, and she fell in. Nothing violent, nothing brutal, she just fell in. She fell, and no one knew she had been there, so no one thought to look for her until it was too late. No one, not even her twin. Not even her Marjorie. Her best friend. Her sister.

    She sobbed, in the pond. She sobbed. She felt, and she wished for the nothingness in return. She wished she had never come to this pond. She wished she had never pined for emotion or feeling something.

    She rushed from the pond to the field, to the grave where she was buried. She began to claw at the Earth and frantically tried to dig herself back into the ground from whence she came. She stopped, she cried harder, her hands clutching her heart. She remembered, and she felt, and she hated it.

    A wet hand placed itself on her shoulder.

    "Eleanore... I'm so sorry... I wasn't there. I wasn't there and I'm so sorry. I'm here now..." it was her sister. It was Marjorie...

    The tears ceased, and she stared at her sister in all her glory. A matching gown, her hair in curls. Just as she'd always remembered her all those years ago.

    "Marjorie, I'm so tired... I missed you so dearly." she said as she held out her hand.

    "Let's go to sleep. Let's sleep for just a little while. I promise you'll never be alone again." Marjorie said as she led her to the grave.

    The girls curled up into the shallow grave and held hands. Facing each other, and each with a sweet smile on their faces, they fell asleep.

    Come the morning, there was nothing. There was not a chirp from a bird, or a buzz from a cicada. There was nothing. The man went outside to look for his wife. Where had she gone in her distress? He found nothing by the cabin, nothing by the pond. Nothing.

    He noticed dirt all over the deck, all over the pathway leading to the deck. Dirt everywhere. Dirt from him? From covering the grave? He walked into the field, to the small headstone that was standing crooked now.

    He stopped, crying out his pleas with the gods as he saw a body. Alas, he had found his sweet Marjorie. Her clothes still damp, her hair wet and matted about her. She lay there, dead, cold, and sopping wet... Curled up in a fetal position, with a smirk on her ever silent lips. Her hands placed over the skull of her deceased sister, of whom he knew she missed dearly. He stood there, staring at his dead wife and her silent grief. He stood there, and he felt everything.