The Essay
English was usually Elena's domain.
She loved words the way Mara loved sketching—sharp lines and clean order, sentences folded into tidy boxes of meaning. Her essays were always neat, polished, the kind teachers pinned to bulletin boards.
So when Mrs. Hayes announced they'd each be reading aloud their latest assignment—A Place That Changed You—Mara wasn't worried for her sister. She was worried for herself.
The class went first by rows. Students stumbled through predictable accounts of family trips, summer vacations, and favorite parks. The stories blurred together, safe and shallow. Mara barely listened, her knee bouncing under the desk.
Then it was Elena's turn.
She stood slowly, paper trembling faintly in her hands. Mara noticed her lips move once before she began, like she was rehearsing something under her breath.
Her voice carried across the room, soft but steady:
"There is a place where the ground remembers.
Not in the way people do, but deeper—older.
Every root is a tongue, every stone a tooth,
And when you stand there long enough,
You feel it pressing against your skin,
The way a mouth might test the shape of a word."
The classroom stilled.
"The place that changed me is not on a map.
It breathes through the soil.
It watches.
It waits.
And when you promise something to it,
You don't get to take it back.
You belong to it.
Beneath the roots, everything belongs."
Her voice cracked on the last line, but she kept going, her eyes unfocused, almost fevered.
"I was one person before the roots.
I was another person after.
And now I am both—
and neither.
The ground is still hungry.
The ground is always hungry."
When she lowered the page, silence hung thick and unnatural. The fluorescent lights buzzed overhead, the only sound.
Mrs. Hayes cleared her throat, forcing a smile. "That was… very creative, Elena. Very imaginative." Her voice betrayed a tremor.
Someone in the back snickered nervously. Another whispered, "What the hell was that?"
Mara sat frozen. She could feel her pulse in her fingertips. The words replayed in her head, latching onto her like burrs. Beneath the roots. The ground is always hungry.
Elena returned to her seat, her face blank. When Mara leaned toward her, whispering, "What was that?", Elena only blinked, as though she didn't understand the question.
For the rest of the day, her sister didn't speak another word.