CREATIVITEA writing group

Tonight the shop hosted a local writing group, Creativitea.

This is a meeting that generally lasts 2-3 hours. Free to attend. Offers a cup of tea and camaraderie.

The first hour is dedicated to a social check in where we introduce ourselves, make check in statements and update each other on writing successes, progress or obstacles. The second hour is then spent in quiet writing. Third, optional sharing and feedback.

I love these group sessions. Here is a sample of what I’ve written during a Creativitea event.

To attend, follow CREATIVITEA on Instagram or Facebook

• and nothing else by Lopez-McKeown

“I’m happy if you’re happy.”

The stars moved just a little when he said that.

Just enough to slip between fingers.

“But I can’t be happy, if you aren’t.. that’s honest. Because even if I thought, all by myself, that I was happy. That you made me happy. Would it be honest, if you weren’t?”

I don’t understand what he is trying to say. He uses a lot of words to garble through the water in his mouth. I would prefer it, if he just kept moving the stars from his hand to mine, instead of trying to speak love into existence.

I like the cold and warmth of something that doesn’t really exist. I like the illusions he spins for me. My mind tells me that all his little lights feel good, but I know that actually his fingers are cold- and we are very nearly touching hands.

“Like, if you are the source of my happiness-“

“Stop.”

It all needs to stop.

But why does he pull his stars away from me when I say that?

“Nameless?”

“Don’t call me that.”

“Until you tell me you have a name, what else should I call you?”

Now he’s being rude, and he’s gripped the stars back into his fists. All waters around us ripple black stripes.

“Can you share the stars with me please? I would only like to see the lights.”

Tepid, he stares. I feel heavy in this moment. It is dread. Dread falling down across my skin and darkness across his face. I remember this sensation now, but I’ll forget it in a moment. That is good.

“They aren’t real.”

“Real enough for me to see them.”

With one hand he slaps the water between us, sending the stars to shatter toward me. Water and starlight break against my lips. Salty and bitter.

“They are only reflections of the moment each of them died,” the boy floats closer, “just like us- they aren’t meant to last forever.”

“I don’t think that matters,” I don’t even remember what it felt like to be alive, “I just want to see them for as long as I can.”

-‘and nothing else’ is what I want to say but I know it upsets him. I’m ok with being dead. I’m ok with being here right now. I don’t need to pretend to find closure or purpose. Even this stillness in time is an existence.

So I sit here, with my bones exposed and my skin frozen to the mud as the boy in the lake captures my attention using the small lights he can hold in his hand. He pretends to remember what life was like by pretending to fall in love with me, while I..

and nothing else