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Here is an anonymous post that was sent to me. The writer mentioned that they are working on a full-length piece, but wanted to share this excerpt as a preview of what’s to come.

The late afternoon sun cast a soft, amber glow across the valley as Jacob Hartley stood at the top of the hill, his eyes tracing the familiar contours of a landscape he had known since childhood. Below him, the old town of Greenfield stretched lazily along the riverbanks, its quiet streets and weathered buildings wrapped in the same air of calm he remembered from his youth. Nothing much had changed here over the years—at least, not in ways you could see.

Yet, as the golden light began to fade into the cool hues of evening, Jacob couldn’t help but feel the subtle pull of time, a quiet whisper reminding him that the years had passed him by, as silently and surely as the river that wound its way through the town. He had left Greenfield once, chasing dreams of something grander, something beyond the smallness of this place. But now, standing on the threshold of his past, he found himself unsure of whether he had gained more or lost more in his long pursuit of elsewhere.

There was something about the stillness of the moment that pressed on him—the weight of all the things he had let slip through his fingers in the years since he had been that boy, standing on this very hill, dreaming of faraway places. The wind rustled through the tall grass, carrying with it the scent of earth and time, and Jacob felt a strange, bittersweet nostalgia well up inside him. He had thought he would return to find everything the same, but what he had failed to account for was the changes within himself.

The sun dipped lower, casting long shadows across the valley, and for a moment, Jacob let himself drift back into the boy he once was—full of ambition, eager for adventure, and unaware of the gentle erosion that time would bring. He stayed like that for a long time, lingering in the space between past and present, between the innocence of youth and the weight of knowing.